---
title: "Game feel"
package: "@phaser-ae/feel"
tier: Free
version: 3.0.0-4
released: 2026-10-14
updated: 2026-10-19
description: "Camera shake, trauma, screen flash, hit-stop, slow motion and zoom punch, the screen effects that make every impact land, in 2D and 3D."
url: https://phaser.io/packs/feel
site: Phaser - https://phaser.io
---

# Game feel

The screen-level juice every action game wants when something hits: a camera shake, a trauma meter, a full-screen
flash, a hit-stop, a slow-motion beat and a zoom punch, each one call on `game.feel`. They touch only what is drawn,
so the simulation never moves and a replay is unchanged.

## What it does

`shake` jitters the camera by up to a given power and lets it fall away over a duration, linearly, with a strong
start and a long tail, or at full strength until it stops. It can shake both axes, one axis or along a single
direction, which makes a knock that pushes the view the way the bullet was going. A frequency turns the per-step buzz
into a slower rumble, and a `roll` also tips the view by a few degrees while the HUD stays level.

`addTrauma` is for impacts that pile up. Each knock adds to a meter between 0 and 1, the shake follows the meter
raised to a power so small knocks stay small and big ones jolt, and the meter drains by itself. Three quick hits shake
harder than one, and a chain of explosions builds instead of each replacing the last.

The rest are timing and framing. `flash` washes the whole screen in a colour and fades it out. `hitstop` freezes the
game's clock for a few frames of real time, so a heavy hit lands with a pause. `slowMotion` runs the game at a
fraction of its speed for a moment and eases back. `zoomPunch` kicks the camera in and eases out. In a 3D world the
shake becomes a small turn of the look and the punch a narrower lens, because sliding a 3D eye sideways would move the
whole scene instead of reading as a knock. The jitter comes from the game's seeded random stream, so it repeats on
every replay, and everything resets when the scene exits.

## Features

- **Camera shake** — power, duration and decay, on both axes, one axis or one direction, as a buzz or a rumble.
- **Rotational shake** — `roll` tips the view by up to 30 degrees while the HUD stays level, in 2D and 3D.
- **Trauma** — `addTrauma` builds a meter that drives its own shake and drains, so repeated knocks accumulate.
- **Screen flash** — `flash` with a colour, duration and opacity, following a resized screen.
- **Hit-stop** — `hitstop` freezes the simulation for a few frames of wall time, with overlapping calls taking the
  longer.
- **Slow motion** — `slowMotion` at a scale for a time, easing back, with a hit-stop able to freeze on top.
- **Zoom punch** — `zoomPunch` kicks in by a fraction and eases back.
- **Replay-safe** — shake and punch write only render offsets, and the jitter is seeded.
- **2D and 3D** — the same calls work in a 2D world and in `world-3d`.

## Good for

- **Shooters** — a directional knock on every hit and trauma that builds under heavy fire.
- **Brawlers and fighting games** — a hit-stop and a flash on every heavy blow.
- **Platformers** — a short shake and a tipped view on a heavy landing or a boss stomp.
- **Breakout and arcade games** — a small punch and shake when a brick or an asteroid breaks.
- **Boss defeats and finales** — a hit-stop, slow motion, a warm flash and a zoom punch together.
- **Pickups and power-ups** — a quick flash and zoom to mark the moment.

## Make it yours

Each call takes its own strength and timing, and `shake` takes an axis, a direction, a decay, a frequency and a roll.
The pack's options set the default decay for shakes, and tune trauma: its power at full strength, how fast it drains,
the exponent that keeps small knocks small, its frequency and how far it tips the view.

Two very different feels: a twin-stick shooter where every bullet hit is a tiny shake in the bullet's direction and
every explosion adds trauma, so a big fight rattles the screen and calms the moment it ends; and a slow, heavy
platformer with a low-frequency rumble on each landing, a tipped view when the boss stomps, and a hit-stop, slow
motion and flash when it falls.

## A quick look

A knock in the bullet's direction, trauma for explosions, and a boss defeat:

```ts
game.feel.shake(5, 0.15, { angle: Math.atan2(bullet.vy, bullet.vx) });
game.feel.addTrauma(size > 2 ? 0.6 : 0.25);
game.feel.hitstop(0.1);
game.feel.slowMotion(0.25, 0.8, 0.4);
game.feel.flash('#fff4d0', 0.3, 0.8);
game.feel.zoomPunch(0.15, 0.5);
```

## Works with

- `world-screen` — needed for the screen flash, which is a screen-space object.
- `post` — needed for the rotational shake, which turns the finished world image.
- `world-3d` — turns the shake into a look offset and the punch into a narrower lens.
- `tween` — for motion that belongs to an object rather than the screen.
- `effects-2d` — to flash one sprite rather than the whole screen.
- `transition` — for fades between scenes.

## Good to know

- A new `shake` replaces the running one rather than adding to it; use `addTrauma` to accumulate.
- Hit-stop and slow motion set the clock's time scale and count real time, restoring the scale they found.
- Without `world-screen` a flash does nothing and warns once; without `post` a roll throws in development.
- The shake is a random offset, not noise with a spectrum, and two packs shaking the camera at once overwrite each
  other.

---

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