Game Knowledge

Brickadia behaviour that the language does not define but that programs depend on. The language reference tells you what compiles; this page collects what the game does with the result, plus the practical tips that follow from it.

Rich Text Markup
Input Action Names
DisplayText Screen Placement

Rich Text Markup

Any string the game renders as text accepts markup: DisplayText, BroadcastChatMessage, ShowStatusMessage, chat, and the text components a @label writes. Markup is ordinary string content, so it composes with interpolation and .. concatenation like any other text.

Tag	Effect
`<b>`	Bold
`<i>`	Italic
`<br>`	Line break. It is not a container, so it takes no close
`<color="RRGGBB">`	Text colour, hex. `#` optional, `#RGB` shorthand works
`<size="N">`	Point size
`<font="Name">`	Typeface, from the font list below
`<icon>Name</>`	The named game icon, inline at text size
`<inputAction>Name</>`	The key the reader has bound to that action
`<inputAxis>Name</>`	The same, for an axis

</> closes the most recently opened tag, so nesting reads as it does in HTML apart from the closing form:

in go: exec
let hex = "ff4040"

on go {
  BroadcastChatMessage('<b><color="${hex}">RED TEAM</></> wins')
}

Prefer single-quoted strings for anything containing markup. Both quote styles interpolate, and single quotes let the attribute’s own double quotes stand without escaping.

Input Glyphs

<inputAction>Jump</> renders the key each player has bound to that action, so a prompt reads correctly for someone on a remapped keyboard or a controller rather than hardcoding a key name. Axes take <inputAxis> instead.

in go: exec

on go {
  BroadcastChatMessage('press <inputAction>Interact</> to draw a card')
}

Fonts

The 25 typefaces the game ships. Anything else falls back.

Aaaiight              BadComic              BlackOpsOne
Bungee                CherryBombOne         Cinzel
EagleLake             GlacialIndifference   GlacialIndifferencePlus
Gotfridus             IosevkaTerm           IosevkaTermSlab
Kurland               MonaspaceArgon        MonaspaceKrypton
MonaspaceNeon         MonaspaceRadon        MonaspaceXenon
MostWasted            NotoSans              NotoSerif
Orbitron              PirataOne             Roboto
RobotoMono

IosevkaTerm, IosevkaTermSlab, and the five Monaspace faces are monospaced, which is what makes grid and table rendering line up.

Input Action Names

Every name accepted by <inputAction> and <inputAxis>. A * marks an axis, which takes <inputAxis>; everything else takes <inputAction>.

Special Functions

OpenEscapeMenu           SelfDestruct             FreeMouse
PlayerList               OpenEnvironmentDialog    OpenAvatarCustomization
OpenOptions              HideHUD                  ToggleSmoothCamera
ToggleFreezeCamera       HoldToZoomCamera         Teleport
TakeScreenshot           TakeScreenshotNoUI

Movement

Turn *             LookUp *           TurnRate *
LookUpRate *       MoveForward *      MoveLeft *
Jump               Sprint             ToggleFlying
ToggleGhostFlying  MoveUp *           SwitchCameraMode
EmoteMenu          ToggleFlashlight   Duck
HoldToWalk         Reload             Inspect
Fire               AltFire            AltFire2
AltFire3

Chat

OpenChatBox          ChatHistoryPageUp    ChatHistoryPageDown
ChatHistoryLineUp    ChatHistoryLineDown  ChatHistoryStart
ChatHistoryEnd

Tools

OpenToolPieMenu              UseBrickTool                 UseHammer
Paint                        UseResizeTool                UseSelectionTool
UseApplicator                UseManipulator               Paint_PaintMaterial
Paint_FillPaint              Paint_PickColor              Hammer_CheckOwner
Selector_SplitGrid           Selector_AddSelect           Selector_ToggleSelect
Selector_SelectContraption   Selector_SwitchMode          Selector_SelectBox
Selector_DeselectBox         Applicator_SwitchMode        PasteSelectionWithOwnership
Resizer_ExtendToMax          Resizer_ShrinkToMin          Resizer_FindSize
ToolAlt                      Connector_BulkConnect        Connector_SwitchMode
Connector_ReselectLastPort   ManipulatorLaunch            Manipulator_SoftPick
Manipulator_Detach           Manipulator_HoldToRotate     Manipulator_DoNotAttach

Building

ToggleBuilding                 BrickRotate                    OrbitMode
UndoAction                     RedoAction                     CopySelection
PasteSelection                 CutSelection                   DeleteSelection
FineSelection                  LockBrickAlignmentPlane        BrickChangePlacementMode
BrickChangeAlignmentMode       BrickSuperAlignmentMode        BrickAlignToWorld
DetachedMode                   Placer_PastePhysics            DeleteBrick
Builder_PickBrick              Builder_PickColor              Builder_PickBrickIntoQuickbar

Building (Keyboard)

ToggleDetachedMode     BrickMoveAway *        BrickMoveLeft *
BrickMoveUp *          BrickDetachedTurn *    BrickMoveUpPlate *
BrickPlant             BrickDetachedReorient  BrickDetachedRotate

Quickbar

Quickbar_Slot0  Quickbar_Slot1  Quickbar_Slot2
Quickbar_Slot3  Quickbar_Slot4  Quickbar_Slot5
Quickbar_Slot6  Quickbar_Slot7  Quickbar_Slot8
Quickbar_Slot9

Misc

Rename  Find

Vehicles

LeaveSeat        Vehicle_ZoomIn   Vehicle_ZoomOut

DisplayText Screen Placement

DisplayText positions text with an anchor and a position offset, and the two use different units. Getting this wrong puts the text off-screen, where it looks identical to the text not drawing at all.

anchorX / anchorY are fractions of the screen. 0 is left / top, 0.5 is center, 1 is right / bottom. This is the only pair that takes a 0..1 value.
positionX / positionY are an offset from that anchor in slate units, which are roughly pixels at 1080p – not a fraction. A realistic offset is in the tens or hundreds. positionX = 0.98 is not “98% across the screen”, it is one pixel from the anchor.

Anchor to the corner you want, then offset inward with the sign that moves you away from that edge:

on show {
  // top-right, inset 40 units from the right edge and 40 down from the top
  ctrl.DisplayText("LAP 3",
    anchorX = 1.0, anchorY = 0.0,
    positionX = -40.0, positionY = 40.0,
    fontSize = 28, justify = "Right")

  // bottom-right, 300 in from the right and 460 up from the bottom
  ctrl.DisplayText("STATUS",
    anchorX = 1.0, anchorY = 1.0,
    positionX = -300.0, positionY = -460.0,
    fontSize = 24)
}

Defaults worth knowing

Unset parameters bake the gate’s own defaults, which are sane – an invisible overlay is a placement bug far more often than a scale or color one:

Field	Default	Note
`Scale`	`(1, 1)`	not zero, so unset scale never hides text
`FontColor`	opaque white	not transparent
`Anchor`	`(0.5, 0.5)`	screen center
`Position`	`(0, 0)`	no offset from the anchor
`Pivot`	`(-1, 0.5)`
`FontSize`	`16`
`OutlineSize`	`2`	text has an outline unless you pass `0`
`Lifetime`	`5.0`	seconds; `0` means infinite, not “vanish now”
`TextId`	`0`	`0` uses the brick’s persistent handle; a non-zero id is shared by every gate using it, which is how several gates update one piece of text

lifetime interacts with how often you redraw. Text redrawn every tick wants a short lifetime so it disappears if the drawing chip stops; text redrawn only on a change wants 0 (infinite), or it blanks itself between updates.

The 2D layout ports are Vector2D composites and the call feeds them one axis at a time, so every one of these is a float named ...X / ...Y. There is no vector-typed position or anchor; passing one is a WS041 error.

Wirescript