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Game Event Script

Editor packages and syntax highlighting

Download highlighting for Game Event Script source (.ges) and assembler dumps (.gesa), together with optional CLI commands, syntax completions and snippets. Each ZIP includes installation notes and the Apache-2.0 license. Highlighting works without the CLI; commands require ges on the editor process’s PATH. No compiler or language server is bundled.

Visual Studio Code

The local VS Code extension includes both GES and GESA highlighting, embedded source highlighting, language configuration and snippets. It also offers Check, Run and Dump editor buttons using an installed GES CLI, plus Compile in the Command Palette. Dump opens a read-only highlighted document. Markdown blocks tagged ges or gesa are highlighted in both the source editor and the built-in Markdown preview using the same grammars. In VS Code, run Extensions: Install from VSIX… from the Command Palette and select the prebuilt GameEventScript-VSCode.vsix under tools/editors/VS Code. No build step, Marketplace account or GES CLI installation is required for highlighting. Maintainers update the package with bash scripts/package-vscode.sh after synchronizing the editor assets.

Downloads

Download Grammar format Use with
TextMate bundles — JSON .tmLanguage.json and .tmPreferences.json Tooling that accepts JSON TextMate grammars
Sublime Text and bat .sublime-syntax, build system and completion plugin Sublime Text; syntax files also work with bat
TextMate Classic bundles — XML .tmLanguage and .tmPreferences plist CodeRunner 4 and importers that require classic plist bundles

The downloads are generated from the same repository revision as this website. They follow development syntax and are not pinned to a published library version. For an older version, use the bundles under tools/editors at the corresponding Git tag.

TextMate installation

  1. For TextMate itself, choose the Classic XML download. Choose JSON only for importers that explicitly support JSON TextMate grammars. Extract the ZIP.
  2. Import or copy GameEventScript.tmbundle and GameEventScriptAssembler.tmbundle into the editor’s bundle location. Install both so assembler dumps can also highlight embedded source code.
  3. Reload the editor’s bundles or restart it, then open a .ges or .gesa file.

Use the editor’s bundle/grammar import workflow; support for whole .tmbundle directories and raw grammar files varies by editor. Choose one format rather than installing both variants, which describe the same syntax and scopes.

Sublime Text installation

Since: Unreleased

Extract the download and copy its GameEventScript directory into the directory opened by Preferences → Browse Packages. Keep that directory name: the completion plugin loads its shared data from Packages/GameEventScript. Restart Sublime Text or reload the package, then open a .ges or .gesa file.

bat installation

Copy only GameEventScript.sublime-syntax and GameEventScriptAssembler.sublime-syntax from the Sublime download into the syntaxes subdirectory printed by bat --config-dir, then run:

Terminal window
bat cache --build
bat --list-languages
bat example.ges
bat example.gesa

Both grammars are required for GESA’s embedded GES source. This only adds local syntax assets; it does not replace your bat theme or install editor commands. To update, replace those two files and rebuild the cache. To uninstall, remove those two files and rebuild the cache again.

CLI actions

Since: Unreleased

Install the GES CLI and make ges available on the editor process’s PATH. Launching an editor from the Dock need not inherit an interactive shell’s PATH. Configure the editor’s path settings if necessary; shell aliases are not used. There is no dotnet ges fallback and no automatic tool installation.

Save the current document before invoking an action. TextMate commands request saving the active file. In Sublime, keep save_all_on_build enabled (the usual build setting). These actions operate on a single file, with its containing directory as the working directory:

Action Command Result
Check (default) ges check file.ges Validate without execution or a binary output
Compile ges compile file.ges Write the sibling file.gesb
Run ges run file.ges Execute the CLI Main(args) contract with an empty argument list
Dump ges dump file.gesb Display the sibling binary’s assembler dump; compile first

In Sublime choose Tools → Build System → GameEventScript. Build runs Check; Build With… selects Compile, Run or Dump. In TextMate, use the bundle’s GES: Check / Compile / Run / Dump commands; Check also uses Command-B. The GESA TextMate bundle provides Dump for the same-named sibling .gesb.

Sublime output captures source locations for next/previous build-result navigation. TextMate uses clickable source links in an escaped HTML output window. The TextMate adapters use Bash and Perl with core modules available on macOS; no additional language package is required. Other TextMate grammar importers may support only highlighting, not these commands or completion hooks.

Run is a batch command: delayed messages can keep it running. Use the editor’s cancellation controls to stop it. Interactive REPL use belongs in a terminal. Project-wide compilation, custom arguments and scenarios are not configured by these single-file actions.

Syntax completions and snippets

Since: Unreleased

Sublime offers completion through its popup; TextMate uses its normal completion command (Escape by default). Suggestions are deliberately syntax-only:

  • After as or is: built-in type names, with : supplied when needed.
  • After [:: collection selectors such as fold, reduce and count.
  • After a type colon: built-in type names.
  • Otherwise: language keywords, outside comment and string scopes.

The rules inspect the current line before the caret. They do not infer receiver types, visible variables, user-defined functions or native extensions. Suggestions are editing aids, not a statement that every offered type/selector is valid for the surrounding expression; ges check performs validation.

Both editors provide the same Tab-triggered snippets: ges-on, ges-iflet, ges-fold, ges-reduce and ges-after. Tab moves between placeholders.

Repository sources

  • TextMate Classic/: XML plist bundle for CodeRunner 4 and older TextMate-compatible importers.
  • TextMate/: JSON TextMate bundle for modern TextMate-compatible tooling.

Both editor folders contain bundles for GameEventScript source (.ges) and GameEventScript assembler (.gesa). The modern and classic bundles describe the same grammars; only the file format is different.

The JSON grammars under TextMate/ are the maintained source. The XML plist grammars under TextMate Classic/ must be regenerated from them whenever syntax support changes so both editor generations remain semantically identical.

.ges is the only canonical GameEventScript source extension. The assembler grammar follows the current dumper output, including .program-version, current opcodes and bytecode types, and debug-symbol register annotations such as r20(total). Embedded source archives use .segment source "name.ges"; its content continues until the next .segment directive. Mapped source lines use .source-line "name.ges" 4 | source. Both forms embed the normal source.gameeventscript grammar in assembler dumps.

The dumper wraps source, text, list, binding, and code segments in free .region "Name" / .region-end "Name" presentation blocks with visible comment separators and surrounding blank lines. The assembler grammars render the region directives with a comment scope and publish them as TextMate folding markers for editors that support grammar-defined folding. Regions do not change .gesb or runtime semantics.

Sublime grammars, editor commands and snippets are generated by scripts/sync-editor-bundles.py (--check checks freshness). TextMate JSON is the syntax source; tools/editors/support/completions.json owns the syntax completion catalog and snippet templates. Adapter sources are also in support. Do not edit generated copies in the bundles. Run python3 scripts/test-editor-bundles.py for generator and adapter checks; when bat or batcat is installed it additionally loads both grammars into an isolated cache and checks highlighted GES/GESA output. No user editor configuration is modified by these tests.