A multiplayer board game in Rust and WebAssembly

A multiplayer board game in Rust and WebAssembly

A multiplayer board game in Rust and WebAssembly

Click to play!

Click to play!

Pont is an online implementation of Qwirkle, a board game by Mindware Games. It was written for my parents, so they could play with friends and family during the COVID-19 stay-at-home era.

Pont is an online implementation of Qwirkle, a board game by Mindware Games. It was written for my parents, so they could play with friends and family during the COVID-19 stay-at-home era.

Play is split into rooms, which are identified by a three-word code (size moody shape in the image above). Within each room, the game distributes pieces, enforces the game rules, and provides a local chat window.

Play is split into rooms, which are identified by a three-word code (size moody shape in the image above). Within each room, the game distributes pieces, enforces the game rules, and provides a local chat window.

Unusually, it's a web-based multiplayer game without any Javascript: both the client and server are written in Rust, which is compiled into WebAssembly to run on the browser. (There's a Javascript shim to load the WebAssembly module, but I didn't have to write it myself)

Unusually, it's a web-based multiplayer game without any Javascript: both the client and server are written in Rust, which is compiled into WebAssembly to run on the browser. (There's a Javascript shim to load the WebAssembly module, but I didn't have to write it myself)

Architecture

Architecture

Keep in mind, I'm not a web developer, so this is probably a weird outsider architecture for web applications. Here's what the system looks like:

Keep in mind, I'm not a web developer, so this is probably a weird outsider architecture for web applications. Here's what the system looks like:

The system uses Let's Encrypt for certificates: both static assets and WebSocket communication are encrypted between the client and the server. The game server does not communicate securely with the NGINX proxy, but if anyone is on the server watching, I've...