What You Need

Install and set up the following before your first session. Stadium 8 runs on Windows, macOS and Linux.

What	Why you need it	Where to get it
Claude Code	Runs the workflow. The VS Code extension is recommended. Sign in with your Anthropic account.	claude.ai/code
Node.js 22 or later	Runs the application Claude builds. npm comes with it.	nodejs.org
Git	Version control. Claude runs the git commands for you.	git-scm.com
GitHub CLI (gh)	Claude uses it to open and merge pull requests	cli.github.com
A GitHub account	Hosts your repository and runs the quality gates on GitHub Actions	github.com
A web browser	Opens the approval pages, the manual tests and the dashboard	Any modern browser

Check your setup

Run these in a terminal:

node --version
git --version
gh auth status

node --version must report v22 or higher. Installing dependencies stops with an error on an older version.

If gh auth status says you aren’t signed in, run gh auth login and follow the prompts.

If Node.js isn’t found after you install it

VS Code reads your PATH when it starts, so it won’t see a Node.js you installed while it was open. Fully close and reopen VS Code, then try again.

The browser for end-of-epic tests

At the end of each epic, Claude runs browser tests in a copy of Chromium (about 130 MB). Claude downloads it automatically in the background the first time you run /start, so you don’t need to install it yourself. If the download stalls, see If Setup or Browser Tests Get Stuck.