Studio
The NEO Studio is the NEO editor, in your browser at /studio and on the desktop: its four modes, its panels and what each version can do.
The NEO Studio is the NEO editor: the tool you use to build, script, play and publish games. It comes in two forms that share the same code, interface and renderer:
- In the browser, at /studio on the platform. It is the NEO editor compiled to WebAssembly and drawn with WebGL 2, so it needs no install. Open it from the Creator Hub's Open Studio button or the Studio link in the side bar.
- On the desktop, as a native app for macOS, Windows and Linux.
What you see in the Studio's viewport is the real engine running your real game, not a preview. Play in the Studio runs the same game players get.
The four modes#
The mode switcher at the top of the Studio has four modes:
| Mode | What it's for |
|---|---|
| Scene | Editing the world: the viewport with its transform tools and + Add menu, and the Scene panel listing what's in the world. See Scene and objects. |
| Play | Running the game in the viewport, with pause, step, eject and stop. See Play in the Studio. |
| Build | Publishing to the NEO Platform and, on the desktop, packaging the game for each platform. See Publishing from the Studio. |
| Source | A full code editor for the project: explorer, tabs, search and highlighting. See Source mode. |
The panels#
| Panel | Where | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Viewport | Centre | The live world. In Scene mode it has the transform tools and + Add (top left) and the camera menus (top right). In Play mode it shows the game camera and the play bar. |
| Scene | Right | The outliner: every object in the world. Selecting an object here selects it in the viewport. It hides in Source mode. |
| Bottom panel | Bottom | Assets (the project's content) and Console (the log). In Source mode it adds Problems, Output and Terminal. |
| Status bar | Along the bottom | The project's state, and in Source mode the cursor position, language and similar details. |
The Project ▾ menu in the top bar holds the project-wide tools: Plugins… (see Plugins and neo.toml), Scripts… (see The Scripts panel), Animation browser, the list of projects in your workspace and New Project… (see Projects and templates).
Browser and desktop#
The browser Studio runs everything a browser can: Scene, Play, the Scripts panel, Source, the Assets panel (Import uses the browser's file picker), the animation tools, the Project menu and publishing. A few things need the desktop, and the browser Studio greys out those controls and says why:
| Desktop only | Why |
|---|---|
| Packaging the game for macOS, Windows, Linux or the web | It builds with cargo, which needs the desktop. |
| Opening a folder elsewhere on your disk | A web page can't open arbitrary folders. Browser projects live in the browser's storage. |
| Language servers and Git in Source mode | They run as separate processes. |
| The terminal and the AI assistant | They run processes and need keys. |
| Recompiling a project's Rust code | The browser Studio runs the template's game as it was built. |
Publishing to the NEO Platform works from the browser Studio. On the desktop, the publish commands report that publishing runs in the browser Studio.
Signing in#
When you open /studio while signed in, the platform hands the Studio a short-lived session for publishing. The Studio keeps it for the tab: a reload or a project switch stays signed in, and closing the tab ends it. If you aren't signed in, or you're playing as a guest, the Studio still works for building and playing; only publishing needs the session.
Every action is a command#
Everything in the Studio's interface is also a named command, so the same actions are open to scripts and AI agents. In the browser Studio, the page answers them through await neo.command(name, args); on the desktop, the editor's MCP server exposes them. This documentation names the matching command next to each feature, for example editor.scene.add for + Add and editor.platform.publish for publishing.