Docs
How Cognivo works, from your first game to making your own levels and art. Search with the box above, or start below.
Guides
How to play, invite friends, run a tournament and use the Labs.
- Getting started
What Cognivo is, how to start a game in seconds, and where everything lives. No account needed.
- Playing the computer
Choose a game, a strength and who moves first, then play. Undo, voice moves and themes included.
- Playing a friend
Send a private link, and the first person to open it takes the other seat. No accounts, no chat, a three-minute move clock.
- Tournaments
One link for a group of 3 to 32. A random bracket, every match in a round played at once, and the whole bracket visible to everyone in the room.
- Arcade games
Ember and Delve, played on your own with the keyboard or touch. Controls, worlds, checkpoints, progress, best times, and playing your own levels and art.
- Level Lab
Paint a level for Ember or Delve on a grid, check it can be finished, play it in the game with one click, and download it.
- Sprite Lab
Draw and recolour Ember's and Delve's pixel art, frame by frame, play it in the game, and download it in the format the games ship.
- Animation Lab
Put a sprite's frames in order, set the speed and whether it loops, watch it play as the game will, and play the game with it.
- Accessibility
Playing with the keyboard, a screen reader, voice, or with motion turned down, and how to tell us what doesn't work.
- Your data at a glance
What stays in your browser, what reaches Cognivo's server and for how long, and how ads and consent work. The full detail is on the Privacy and Cookies pages.
- Troubleshooting
What to do when a game won't start, a friend can't join, your progress has gone, voice doesn't listen, or a lab won't play your work.
Reference
The file formats, shortcuts and terms, exactly as the code has them.
- Level file
The level format Level Lab downloads and Ember and Delve ship, version by version, with every field, limit, tile and thing.
- Sprite sheet file
The pixel art format Sprite Lab downloads and Ember and Delve ship, with its palette, frames, animations and rules.
- Keyboard shortcuts
Every key in the arcade games, the Labs and the docs, in one place.
- From Labs to the catalogue
How something made in the Labs can ship in a game, and what happens to everything else you make.
- Glossary
The words Cognivo's pages and docs use, in one place.
Updates
What has changed on Cognivo, and what is coming next.