Game Porting Skills

Game Porting Toolkit 4 — Skill reference

See the top-level README for installation and the workflow overview.

Expert skills

Expert domain knowledge for porting games to Apple platforms.

Expert skill	Description
translating-to-metal4-api	API reference and cross-API translation tables (Metal 3, D3D12, Vulkan → Metal 4), TBDR architecture
managing-metal4-synchronization	Barriers, fences, events, cross-API state transition translation
managing-metal4-resources	Buffers, textures, residency, descriptor heaps
creating-metal4-shader-pipelines	Pipeline state creation — render/compute/mesh PSOs via MTL4Compiler from already-compiled metallibs, flexible PSOs, color-attachment mapping, caching
presenting-metal-drawables	Drawable presentation, frame pacing, vsync control, CAMetalLayer, CAMetalDisplayLink
managing-metal-cpp-lifetimes	Metal object lifetime management for Obj-C/ARC and metal-cpp
integrating-metal-shaderconverter-shaders	Metal shader converter integration — argument buffer binding, descriptor tables, root signatures
compiling-with-metal-shaderconverter	Shader conversion — compile DXIL to metallib, reflection output, debug info management
using-metalfx-temporal-upscaler	MetalFX temporal upscaling (MTLFXTemporalScaler) integration
using-metalfx-frame-interpolation	MetalFX frame interpolation (MTLFXFrameInterpolator) with PresentThread
setting-up-macos-window	Window management, CAMetalLayer setup, input handling, fullscreen, bridging D3D concepts to Metal
using-game-controller	GCController API — porting from XInput, DirectInput, RawInput, or GameInput
using-metal-validation	Enable, configure, and interpret Metal API validation, shader validation, and load/store-action visual indicators
using-gpucapture	Capture a .gputrace from a running Metal application via the gpucapture CLI
using-gpudebug	Inspect, navigate, and extract resources from a .gputrace via the gpudebug CLI
debugging-rendering-issues	Diagnose any Metal rendering issue — blank screens, visual corruption, incorrect colors, depth issues, binding problems

Workflow skills

Work with the porting assistant agent to orchestrate milestones.

Workflow skill	Description
porting-methodology	Core methodology — porting goals, milestone lifecycle, escalation, stub conventions
porting-discover	Analyze the codebase before porting — produces a discovery report with Game Porting Toolkit evaluation, trace analysis, and feature coverage
porting-plan-goal	Define the next porting goal with milestones
porting-start-milestone	Prepare for the next milestone — study code, load skills, produce prep summary
porting-execute	Write code for the current milestone
porting-validate	Run the validation checklist before committing
porting-handoff	Close out a milestone — commit, update status, write handoff note
porting-status	Show current porting status (read-only)