name: custom-agents description: How to set up and use Claude Code custom agents for game development — specialized sub-agents for engineering, narrative, and design work.

Custom Agents for Game Dev

Claude Code supports custom agents: specialized sub-agents defined as markdown files in .claude/agents/ within your project. Each agent has a focused role, a curated tool allowlist, and a system prompt that injects domain context automatically.

What Custom Agents Are

• Location: .claude/agents/*.md in your game project root
• YAML frontmatter: defines name, description (how Claude routes to the agent), and tools (allowlist)
• Body: becomes the sub-agent's system prompt — it receives this context before every task
• Routing: Claude reads the description field and invokes the right agent based on task context

Setup

1. Create the directory in your game project:

   mkdir -p .claude/agents
   

2. Copy the three agent templates from this skill:

   cp path/to/skills/game-dev/infrastructure/claude-code-game-workflow/templates/game-agents/*.md .claude/agents/
   

3. Customize the skill paths in each agent's body to match your actual project layout.

The Three Game Dev Agents

game-engineer — Backend Implementation

---
name: game-engineer
description: Use for server-side game systems — schemas, API routes, WebSocket, queues, Redis, auth, payments.
tools: Bash, Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep, TodoWrite
---

Has Bash access: needs to run migrations, tests, and Biome formatting.

Trigger phrases:

• "implement [feature]"
• "add endpoint for..."
• "create schema for..."
• "set up BullMQ job..."
• "write migration for..."
• "fix backend bug in..."

narrative-writer — Narrative Content

---
name: narrative-writer
description: Use for quests, characters, NPCs, world lore, story arcs, dialogue.
tools: Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep, TodoWrite
---

No Bash access: narrative work is text-only; never needs to run code.

Mandatory behavior: always runs the coherence check (reads quest-narrative-coherence/SKILL.md, loads world-lore.md and quest-registry.md) before producing any content.

Trigger phrases:

• "create quest..."
• "add character / NPC..."
• "write dialogue for..."
• "world lore for..."
• "faction backstory..."

game-designer — Design Documents

---
name: game-designer
description: Use for core loops, economy balance, level design, progression systems, UX flows, feature specs.
tools: Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep, TodoWrite
---

No Bash access: design documents go to docs/design/; no code execution needed.

Trigger phrases:

• "design [feature]..."
• "balance the economy..."
• "level design for..."
• "progression system for..."
• "UI flow for..."

Tool Allowlist Rationale

Explicit Invocation

Claude will auto-route based on task context, but you can always invoke explicitly:

Using the game-engineer agent: implement the quest progress tracking endpoint

Using the narrative-writer agent: create a merchant guild quest that ties into the Thornwood faction

Using the game-designer agent: balance the gem earn rate for the first 7 days of play

Cross-Agent Workflow Example

For a full quest feature (schema + narrative + game design):

Step 1 — game-designer: design the quest reward structure and unlock conditions
Step 2 — narrative-writer: create the quest content (coherence check first)
Step 3 — game-engineer: implement schema + API + WebSocket events for quest completion

This separation keeps narrative work out of the engineer's context and vice versa — each agent loads only the skills it needs.

Cross-References

• worktrees.md — run each agent in its own worktree for parallel development on large features
• SKILL.md — subagent parallel execution patterns for dispatching multiple agents simultaneously