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Slices

A Slice is a small, interactive prototype that Aura builds and runs inside the Aura app. Describe an idea, such as a gameplay mechanic, a 3D scene with a settings panel, a shader, or a menu flow, and Aura builds a working version you can play with next to the chat. When you like it, export it to your Unreal or Unity project as a starting point.

💡 Slices is in preview. It works in Aura for Unreal and Aura for Unity, in the standalone Aura app only.

What Is a Slice?

A Slice is a self-contained web page that Aura's Slice Agent writes, runs, and tests for you. 3D Slices are built with three.js. A Slice can have:

A scene or interface you control with the keyboard, mouse, or a gamepad.
A settings panel with sliders, toggles, color pickers, dropdowns, curves, and gradients. The values you set are saved with the Slice.
Assets such as images, 3D models, character animations, and sounds, generated by Aura or added by you.

A Slice runs in a sandbox, apart from your project. Building one doesn't touch your levels, assets, or code. Nothing goes into your project until you export it.

What Slices Are For

Slices let you try an idea before you spend engine time on it. Use them to:

Prototype a mechanic. Try a movement model, a turn-based combat loop, or a puzzle rule, and play it right away.
Tune values. Put the numbers you care about in a panel, adjust them while the Slice runs, and keep what feels right.
Explore visuals. Try shaders, particle effects, procedural surfaces, and lighting moods.
Mock up UI. Build a HUD, an inventory screen, or a menu flow and click through it.
Watch a system run. Simulate a wave spawner, a physics toy, or a procedural generator.
Start the real version. Export a Slice, and Aura turns it into C++, Blueprints, or C#, imports its assets, and builds a level to test it in.

Enabling Slices

Slices live in the workspace canvas, the area next to the chat in the standalone Aura app. They aren't available in the in-editor chat.

Open the standalone Aura app with your project. For Unreal, the editor must be connected. For Unity, pick your project.
Go to Settings → Chat Options. In the Project group:
- Make sure Enable Legacy UI is off. Legacy UI has no workspace canvas, so it has no Slices.
- Turn on Workspace canvas.
- Turn on Slices.

Both switches are on by default.

💡 If there is no Slices row in Chat Options, Slices isn't available for your account yet. If the row is greyed out and says "Turn on the workspace canvas first", turn on Workspace canvas above it.

The canvas shows when the window is wide enough to fit it beside the chat (about 900 pixels). In a narrower window, a Slice opens over the chat instead, with a Chat button to get back.

Turning Slices off stops any Slice that Aura is building or editing.

Accessing Slices

Each Slice belongs to the project it was made in, so you see the Slices of the project you have open. You can reach them from:

The left navigation. The Slices section lists your Slices. Click one to open it, click the Slices heading to open the Slices page, or click + New to make a new one.
The Slices page. Every Slice in the project, and a New Slice button. While Aura generates assets, an In progress list shows what's being made.
A new chat. The Build a Slice card appears with the other starter cards.

Each Slice has a … menu with Duplicate and Delete….

Building a Slice

Click + New in the left navigation, New Slice on the Slices page, or the Build a Slice card in a new chat.
Describe what you want, or pick one of the ideas Aura suggests. If you aren't sure what to build, ask Aura to look through your project and suggest ideas.
The Slice Agent writes the Slice and opens it in the canvas. As it works, it runs the Slice, takes screenshots, reads its console, and playtests it to check that it works.
A progress panel above the Slice shows what Aura is doing. Click Details to see more, or Stop to end the run. When Aura is done, the panel says Aura finished with a summary of what it built.

Examples

"Build a top-down twin-stick shooter: WASD to move, mouse to aim, enemies that chase the player, and a panel to tune player speed and fire rate."
"Make a procedural lava planet I can orbit, with sliders for flow speed, crust amount, and glow color."
"Prototype a grid-based tactics battle with two squads, click to move and attack, and an enemy turn."
"Build an inventory screen with drag-and-drop slots, item tooltips, and stacking."

Using a Slice

Click the Slice to interact with it. Until you do, your keyboard input stays with Aura. Some Slices show a Click to play prompt.

The bar above the Slice has three buttons:

Reload restarts the Slice. Your saved panel values come back.
Add files adds your own images, models, and sounds to the Slice (see Adding Assets below).
Export to project turns the Slice into engine code and assets (see Exporting a Slice).

Below the Slice, the Console shows what the Slice logs, including errors.

Only the Slice on screen plays sound. When you open something else, it's muted.

Editing a Slice

With a Slice open, type the change you want in the chat next to it. Aura knows which Slice is open and hands the change to the Slice Agent. The progress panel on the Slice says Started from the chat.

Editing needs Agent mode. In other modes, Aura can't change the Slice.
Aura works on one change to a Slice at a time.
If you stop a run from the Slice, click Continue to pick it up again.

Adding Assets

The Slice Agent can generate images, 3D models, character animations, and sounds for a Slice. These use credits and follow your plan, like Aura's other generation tools. Progress shows above the Slice. Long jobs, like a v3.0 character animation, keep running in the background and finish even if you reload Aura.

You can also use assets you already have:

Assets Aura made for your project. Ask for them by name, or say "use the image I just made". Aura copies its own generated images, models, animations, and sounds into the Slice for free. In Aura for Unity, use Add files instead.
Your own files. Click Add files, or drag files onto the bar above the Slice. Then ask Aura to use them.

Supported files:

Images: PNG, JPG, or WebP, up to 7 MB and 4096 pixels per side.
Models and animations: GLB, up to 20 MB (4 MB for a file that holds only animations).
Sounds: MP3, WAV, or OGG, up to 7 MB.

A Slice can hold up to 200 files and 128 MB in total.

⚠️ Slices only take models and animations as GLB. FBX and OBJ files are refused, so export them as GLB first. GLBs that use Draco compression, or that need meshopt or KTX2 decoding, are refused too.

Managing Slices

Duplicate makes a copy, like "Lava Planet copy", with the current panel values.
Delete… removes the Slice for good. It can't be undone, and it isn't available while the Slice is being exported.

Slices are saved inside your project folder, in Saved/.Aura/Slices/ for Unreal and .Aura/Slices/ for Unity. They stay on your machine and are normally kept out of source control. A project can have up to 200 Slices.

Exporting a Slice

Export to project converts a Slice for your engine. Aura's main agent does the work with the tools it already uses for your project:

Unreal: C++ or Blueprints, imported meshes, textures, animations, and sounds, shaders rebuilt as Materials, particles as Niagara systems, on-screen UI as UMG widgets, and one new level that recreates the Slice's main interaction.
Unity: C# MonoBehaviours written for your project's input system and render pipeline, shaders for that pipeline, the Slice's assets (GLB models import through glTFast), and one prefab in a new scene.

The result is a starting point, not a 1:1 port. A three.js prototype doesn't map exactly onto actors and components. You get code that compiles, the assets in place, and a report of what Aura couldn't convert.

How to Export

Save your work. Building the new level discards unsaved changes in the level you have open. If Aura finds unsaved changes, it stops and asks you to save.
Open the Slice and click Export to project. The button is disabled while Aura is working on the Slice.
Aura opens a new chat in Plan mode and reads the Slice.
Aura asks what to export:
- Scope: Plan to export the entire Slice, or Only certain parts of the Slice. If you choose parts, pick them on the next card, such as gameplay logic and input, materials and VFX, UI and panel controls, or level and assets. Aura only builds a new level if you export the gameplay logic or the level.
- Logic (Unreal projects that already have C++): Build the logic as C++, or Build the logic as Blueprints. A Blueprint-only project gets Blueprints and never a new C++ module. Unity always uses C#.
Aura looks at your open level or scene so the new one can reuse what fits, like a PlayerStart or lights, and writes a plan.
Review the plan, then click Start.

Aura then imports the assets, writes and compiles the code, builds the new level or scene, and tests it with the Verification Agent. It ends with a report that names the level, what it reproduces, and anything left to do.

💡 If Export to project opens a panel over the Slice instead of asking questions, Aura has put the export prompt in a new chat for you. Click Generate plan in the panel, or send the prompt from the chat, then click Start plan when the plan is ready. This flow builds Unreal logic in C++, and adds a C++ module to a Blueprint-only project.

⚠️ An Unreal export that writes C++ rebuilds and restarts the editor. If the Filesystem Sandbox is on, imported assets stay in the sandbox until you keep them.

Where Exports Go

The folder name is a code-safe version of the Slice's name, like TacticsPrototype.

Unreal

C++ code: Source/<Module>/Aura/Slices/<SliceName>/
Assets and Blueprints: /Game/Aura/Slices/<SliceName>/
Level: /Game/Aura/Slices/<SliceName>/Maps/L_<SliceName>

Unity

Everything goes in Assets/Aura/Slices/<SliceName>/: assets in Textures, Models, and Audio, C# in Scripts, the prefab in Prefabs, and the scene in Scenes.
The new scene isn't added to Build Settings.

An export never overwrites anything. Exporting the same Slice again creates <SliceName>_2, then _3, and so on. It never changes the Slice itself or your other levels.

Best Practices

Building

Start small and specific. One mechanic or tool per Slice works better than a whole game. Say how it's controlled, what the camera does, and what you want to tune.
Ask for a panel. Name the values you want to tweak, like "a slider for jump height", so you can tune them yourself instead of asking Aura each time.
Change one thing at a time. Ask for one change, play the result, then ask for the next.
Duplicate before a big change. A copy is the easiest way to keep a version that works.
Let Aura debug. If something breaks, tell Aura what you see. It can read the Slice's console and take screenshots itself.

Assets

Generate only what you need. Generation uses credits, and simple shapes are often enough to test an idea. Add real assets once the idea works.
Reuse before you regenerate. Bringing in assets Aura already made for your project is free.
Bring models in as GLB. Export FBX or OBJ files as GLB, without Draco compression, before you add them.

Exporting

Commit or back up first. An export writes code, assets, and a new level. Source control, or the Filesystem Sandbox on UE 5.8, lets you review the changes and roll them back.
Export only what you need. If you only want the materials or the UI, choose Only certain parts of the Slice. A smaller export is faster and easier to review.
Read the plan before you click Start. It's your chance to change the approach or leave parts out.
Treat the result as a first draft. Read the report, check its TODOs, and keep building from there.

Limitations

Standalone app only. Slices need the workspace canvas, which the in-editor chat doesn't have.
Needs an internet connection. Slices load three.js from the internet. Without a connection, a Slice can't start.
No access to your project. A Slice only sees its own files, not your levels, assets, or code. Describe what you want, or add files to it.
Most Character Motion clips can't be used. Clips made for the UE5 Mannequin and other Unreal skeletons are FBX files, which a Slice can't load. Clips made for your own uploaded character are GLB, and work in a Slice that has that character's model.
Tied to one project. A Slice belongs to the project it was made in, and switching projects stops it.