VFXBeginner

Flick

Flashing the hit object itself white (or a color) for a few frames — also known as hit flash.

impactvfxcombatfeedback

Examples

Captured from this page's own interactive demo below.

Overview

Flick (also called hit flash or damage flash) overrides the sprite's or model's colors with a solid white (or colored) fill for 2–6 frames the instant it takes damage, then snaps back to normal rendering.

Where screen flash punctuates the whole frame, flick marks exactly which thing got hit — it's the clearest possible answer to 'did my attack connect, and to what?' It reads instantly even in a crowd of enemies.

It's a fighting-game and classic-arcade staple: enemies in nearly every SNES-era action game blink white or invert on hit, and modern indies keep the technique because nothing cheaper communicates per-object damage as clearly.

Interactive Demo

Flash Duration100ms

Flash Count1

Use Cases

CombatPlatformerRPGMatch-3

Best Practices

Do

✓Keep single flashes very short (50–120ms) — it should read as a blink, not a state change.
✓Use a dedicated shader/material property for the flash so it works regardless of the sprite's own colors.
✓Reserve multi-blink flashes for special states (invulnerability frames), not ordinary hits.

Don't

✕Don't tint the sprite by multiplying color — multiplying can't reach pure white; you need an additive or replace-color shader.
✕Don't leave the flash material active if the object dies mid-flash — reset on disable.
✕Don't flash so frequently during rapid hits that the object appears permanently white and unreadable.

Common Mistakes

⚠Using SpriteRenderer.color = Color.white, which is already the default and does nothing — the flash needs a shader that replaces the texture's colors.
⚠Forgetting to cancel the in-flight flash when a second hit lands mid-flash, causing flicker or a stuck white sprite.
⚠Flashing UI/shadow elements attached to the character that shouldn't react to damage.

Implementation

Paste this into your AI assistant (Cursor, Copilot, Claude) to add the effect to your project.

Prompt

Add the "Flick" game-feel effect to my project: Flashing the hit object itself white (or a color) for a few frames — also known as hit flash.

How it works: Flick (also called hit flash or damage flash) overrides the sprite's or model's colors with a solid white (or colored) fill for 2–6 frames the instant it takes damage, then snaps back to normal rendering.

Guidelines:
- Keep single flashes very short (50–120ms) — it should read as a blink, not a state change.
- Use a dedicated shader/material property for the flash so it works regardless of the sprite's own colors.
- Reserve multi-blink flashes for special states (invulnerability frames), not ordinary hits.

Avoid:
- Don't tint the sprite by multiplying color — multiplying can't reach pure white; you need an additive or replace-color shader.
- Don't leave the flash material active if the object dies mid-flash — reset on disable.
- Don't flash so frequently during rapid hits that the object appears permanently white and unreadable.

Implement the effect in whatever engine/stack the project already uses and follow its existing code style. Wire it up where it makes sense.