🎯 The point of these templates
The Monster Truck game is overwhelming if you've never coded before. These three are not. Each one is a complete working game in a single HTML file (no separate CSS, no separate JS, no build process). You can open one in Notepad, change a number, refresh the browser, and see what changed.
Recommended workflow for beginners:
- Click Play to make sure it works for you
- Click Download to get the zip with HTML + README
- Open
index.htmlin your favorite text editor (VS Code is free at code.visualstudio.com) - Change one thing — a color, a number, a word. Refresh the browser. See what happened.
- Read the README for "extend it" ideas
- Open an AI chat (Claude, ChatGPT) and paste the file with "add feature X" — you've just done what the founder of this academy did
🍪 Cookie Clicker
Click the cookie, score goes up. Buy upgrades that auto-click for you. The simplest "idle game" pattern in <120 lines.
No canvas
DOM only
setInterval loop
~120 lines
⌨️ Typing Speed Test
60-second typing race. Tracks WPM and accuracy in real time, with color-coded feedback per character. ~170 lines.
Text comparison
Live stats
Color states
~170 lines
⚡ Reaction Time
Click when the screen turns green. Tracks your last 10 attempts in localStorage. Demonstrates state machines & precise timing. ~120 lines.
State machine
performance.now()
localStorage
~120 lines
🎓 Suggested learning order
- Cookie Clicker — simplest. Understand DOM events, intervals, simple state.
- Reaction Time — state machines, precise timing, persistence.
- Typing Test — string manipulation, live UI updates, more complex logic.
- Then graduate — read the Monster Truck game source. Canvas, parallax, physics, AI competitors. You'll recognize the same patterns scaled up.
💬 How to use these with an AI assistant
Open Claude (or ChatGPT). Paste the entire HTML file. Then say:
- "Add a save feature to this so my score persists across page reloads"
- "Make this work on mobile with touch instead of clicks"
- "Change the cookie to a planet, and the upgrades to space ships"
- "Add a multiplayer mode — explain what server changes I'd need"
That's the whole skill. You name what you want; the AI rewrites the file; you save and refresh.