- Introduce the BUILD deck slot on planet surfaces: full-screen BuildWindow
(looping feed video, category tabs, build list, dossier + cost + BUILD
button) backed by pure BuildModel/BuildState rules
- Move tether level 2 from a research effect to a one-off planet build
(200 minerals, 20 s, requires L1 tether on the world); home world starts
with tether-l1 pre-installed as a rule re-asserted after load
- Add `node dev/server.mjs` static server sending Cache-Control: no-store to
stop browsers heuristically caching ES modules (the "new data + old JS" bug)
- Fix world-name casing leak: CommsPanel keeps canonical spelling in the
landing payload; GameScene.startLanding normalizes via WorldNames.canonicalPlanetName
so name-keyed build/tether lookups match
- Add in-game diagnostics (orbitDiag/orbitDiagBrief), dev/build-check.html
self-check page, and Node tests for builds, world names, and save staging
- Persist builds (built records + in-flight remaining time) in the save bank;
tick on the game-loop clock so a build survives takeoff mid-build
- Define the two-sided unlock contract: research nodes declare `unlocks.builds`/`unlocks.research`, builds declare `requires` as "category/node id" (authoritative gate); ResearchModel exposes `unlocksOf`, `buildDefs`, `unlockIssues`, `buildIssues`
- Add `tether-l2` build entry (planet/station targets, credits+minerals cost, level-2 tether effect) and link it from `exploration/tether_l2`
- Show an UNLOCKS line in the research dossier so the console surfaces what a tech opens
- Extend dev/research-builds.test.mjs to validate both sides of the gate and the new model helpers
- Update data/builds.json, research.json, exploration.json `_comment`s and PROJECT_NOTES to document the contract
- Full-screen RESEARCH window: looping archive feed, category tabs, branching
DAG tech tree (top-down layout), per-tech dossier + RESEARCH button, deck
progress bar
- Pure rules layer (ResearchModel / ResearchState) is Node-testable; the
window is a passive view and GameScene owns effects, toasts, and saves
- First category **Exploration** (Tether Level 1–4, Tether Anchoring, Signal
Amplification) lives in data/research/exploration.json; adding a category
= one JSON file + one registry line + one manifest line
- Effects seam: `tether.level` grows the home tether via TetherField.setLevel;
`capability` flags land on scene.researchCapabilities for future systems
- Save/restore round-trips an in-flight project (remainingMs captured at save,
startedAt rebuilt on load); old saves without research still load
- Dev tooling: dev/cdp-shot.mjs (CDP screenshot with readiness wait),
dev/research-shot.html/.mjs (boots the console + starts a run for a shot)
- Assets: gasgiant planet frame 03, takeoff/landing clips, research-computer
feed; planets.png/.psd updated
- SaveManager.latest() picks the filled slot with the newest savedAt
(unparseable timestamps count as oldest; ties break to the higher slot)
- MenuScene wires a Continue button above New Game, grayed out while the
bank is empty, that stages the restore via prepareLoad and cuts into
GameScene without a confirmation beat
- Shift menu layout down to make room and park the Reroll button fully
outside the seed field so its edge no longer bites the field
- Cover latest() behavior in dev/saves.test.mjs and update README and
PROJECT_NOTES to reflect the finished save/load feature
- New shared audio voices: js/utils/Sfx.js (playSfxOn/stopSfxOn/sfxPlayingOn)
and js/utils/Music.js (loop voice + shuffle playlist), both with v4 guard
rails (cache.audio.has, stopByKey, isPlaying) so missing assets never throw.
- data/music.json: menu loop, shuffled deep-space soundtrack for GameScene,
and per-world surface loops keyed by planets.png frame; new mp3 assets in
assets/music/.
- data/sfx.json: add ui_hover/ui_click/ui_window/ui_close/mining_loop and a
dedicated scan track; wire UI components (buttons, panels, popups, save
vault) to the shared voice via scene.playSfx seam.
- GameScene: start/stop the shuffle on create/shutdown, stop both soundtrack
and mining hum on 'sleep' (landing launch+sleep) and resume on 'wake';
mining hum loops while beam is live and stops quietly on 'stopped'.
- SurfaceScene: preload and loop the world's track from landing through
takeoff; fix landing frame hand-off to pass sheetFrame instead of the
texture Frame object.
- MenuScene: preload SFX + menu music, start the menu hum in create, stop it
on the 'shutdown' event (v4 never calls shutdown() on transition).
- data/ship.json → stats: hullIntegrity/shields/cargoHold/mineralStorage,
exposed as ship.stats for future combat/trading/mining systems.
- Tests: dev/sfx.test.mjs and dev/music.test.mjs cover the shared voices,
guards, and data contracts; ship-behavior and system-hud tests extended
for base stats and the mining hum lifecycle.
- New CommsPanel UI: world-anchored rusty-metal/green-phosphor console that opens on planet or station click, showing name decode, reputation bar (41 marks, -20 to +20), and REQUEST LANDING / LAND / CANCEL buttons
- New Station entity with procedural rendering (deep-space station ring + solar wings, or waypoint beacon), solid collision, and comms-target support
- data/stations.json configures station kinds, sizes, ship clearance; added to manifest
- GameScene wires click-to-fly + panel open together, handles button/outside/ESC close race, ESC priority, and commsAction seam for future landing logic
- Reputation.marksFor() computes lit-mark count for the gauge; covered by new unit tests in dev/reputation.test.mjs
- Dev tooling: comms-click (real-input interaction test), comms-shot (screenshot states), wdshot setup-step logging
- Introduce Reputation module (js/reputation/Reputation.js) tracking player standing on planets and space stations on a −20…+20 scale, with the home world pinned at +20
- Add data/reputation.json config for scale bounds, neutral default, and home-world standing
- Assign stable seed-deterministic ids to planets (<systemId>-p<ordinal>) and settlements (<systemId>-s<n>) in SystemGenerator so saved standing lines up with regenerated galaxies
- Wire reputation into the save system (captureState/prepareLoad/resetRunState) with backward-compatible loading of pre-reputation saves as all-neutral
- Add faction-check placeholder: standingFor() resolves home → stored → owner/faction → neutral, with factionStanding() stubbed for the upcoming factions layer
- Register a single Reputation instance in GameScene via the shared registry (same pattern as Discovery)
- Add dev/reputation.test.mjs covering scale clamping, home pinning, serialization round-trips, legacy/corrupt record handling, save integration, and place-id stability
- Replace the annular-band scatter (minOrbit/maxOrbit/minEdgeGap) with a ring-based placement: objects sit on one or two orbits around the home world, governed by center-to-center `minSpacing` and `maxNeighbor`
- Free-space stations (deep-space stations, waypoints) are now layout objects alongside planets; planet-bound settlements stay features of their planet
- Handle the N=11 case (9 planets + 2 stations) with an inner 3-ring + outer 8-ring; chain outward defensively for any larger N
- Update tests to verify the new spacing invariants, the two-orbit case, and determinism including station positions
- Refresh PROJECT_NOTES and the data-file comment to describe the orbit model
Two small naming/labeling fixes:
1. The home planet was always the generic "Terra". It now takes the first
name off the STARTING system's planet-name deck (SystemGenerator), so it
reads as a real place and can never clash with one of that system's
planets. Stored as content.homeName (only the starting system has one);
the old planets.homeName stays as a fallback. Used for the compass
home chip and the tether anchor label.
2. Confirmed/sharpened the compass name tag: each discovered off-screen
object's arrow chip already renders TYPE + NAME — now the home world
shows its bank name too (e.g. "HOME WORLD · ESHKAELURA").
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Planets and space stations were previously made by stitching a root word to
a kind noun ("Kest Skyspire", "New Natick IV"), which read like labels, not
names. They now draw from deep, hand-picked name BANKS in data/naming.json:
- banks.planet — colonial "New Denver"/"Port Tucson" worlds mixed with
alien "Klaxoria"/"Vexithunhal" worlds (269 names).
- banks.station — official designations ("Deep Space SC-145", "Nav Relay
V-77") mixed with smuggler hangouts ("Hell's Hideout",
"The Rusty Anchor") (165 names).
Assignment is a seeded shuffle of the whole bank (NameGenerator.planetDeck /
stationDeck), dealt out per-system in order, so a system never repeats a
name until the pool is exhausted (impossible at these sizes). The decks come
from dedicated Rng.derive(...) streams, keeping generation order-independent
(lazy === eager). Stars and the galaxy still synthesize from syllable pools
(unbounded), and the home world keeps its configured name.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
The player starts with a level-1 tether anchored on the home world:
a circular zone 5120 px from the planet's center. The ship may fly
anywhere in the UNION of its tethers' zones — where zones overlap there
is no line and no wall — and the union's boundary is a hard barrier,
rendered as a thick cyberpunk glitch dotted line (marching dashes,
additive glow + RGB fringe, ambient glitch bursts with dash flicker,
radial displacement and data drops, contact shudder + camera kick +
throttled console toast where the ship bumps it).
- data/tether.json: level radii (5120 x 1.25^lv), the starting tether,
barrier line/look, glitch and contact tuning (manifest-registered)
- js/tether/Tether.js: pure range math (union membership, clamp to the
nearest union boundary point + normal, visibleArcs = each tether's
share of the union boundary) — Node-tested
- js/tether/TetherField.js: scene-facing field — add/remove/setLevel
seam for future builds/upgrades, per-frame ship constraint, and the
barrier renderer (on-screen dot culling only)
- js/scenes/GameScene.js: home tether at the system origin, HUD
readout (level / range / anchor per tether), click-to-fly and
autopilot targets clamped to the union boundary, contact feedback,
destruction on shutdown
- dev/tether.test.mjs: 29 checks incl. the two-direction boundary
property (no line in overlaps, no gaps in the line) and a numeric
nearest-boundary cross-check (worst 0.79 px)
- dev/smoke-game.mjs: ?tethers / ?homeLevel / ?report dev hooks for
manual and headless verification
- README + PROJECT_NOTES: the system, its rules and its layering
Verified in headless Chromium: clean boot (menu + game), barrier
rendering (calm and glitch-burst frames), union boundary with two
tethers (arcs meet at the rim crossings, lens is line-free), ship
clamped exactly onto the rim from outside, contact toast fired.
- Load `assets/images/ships-player.png` as a Phaser spritesheet via
`data/ship.json` (`texture`, `frameWidth`, `frameHeight`, `frame`)
- Add `artFacing` config; Ship applies a constant `artOffset` so heading
math is unchanged while the frame art (facing north) renders correctly
- Scale sprite as `(size * scale) / frameWidth` to preserve the 46 px world
hull size and collision radius regardless of frame dimensions
- Fall back to the built-in procedural dart when the sheet is missing or
fails to load, with a console warning in GameScene.create()
- Update ship-behavior tests to account for `artOffset` in heading checks
- Add source art (`ships-player.psd`, landed-ship reference) and a demo
video; document the new pattern in README and PROJECT_NOTES
- DiscoveryCompass name tags are now interactive buttons with hover/press feedback; firing onSelect hands the target id to the scene, which retargets the ship via GameScene.autopilotTo (aim at the keep-out rim on the approach side).
- Compass layout reserves the command-deck strip (reserveBottom) so chips/arrows are never buried under the deck.
- Click-to-fly now ignores clicks that land on a compass chip (DiscoveryCompass.contains), keeping autopilot and fly-here from colliding.
- Tests cover the chip hit test, onSelect seam, and reserveBottom clamping; docs updated to describe the new autopilot behavior.
- Port the menu's GlitchText chromatic fringe to ActionBar: additive
magenta/cyan icon ghosts, label ghosts with per-slot phase, and a panel
outline ghost that activates during glitch bursts.
- Add a tiled-scanline overlay (1 dark row per pitch) matching CyberOverlay,
configurable via actionbar.scanline with theme.overlay.scanline defaults.
- Replace idleGhost with animation.rgb (idleOffset/burstOffset/idleAlpha/
burstAlpha); level now decays ~90 ms after triggerBurst for the fast-snap
GlitchText feel while slice bars linger.
- Update README, PROJECT_NOTES, and research-builds tests to cover the new
scanline and rgb config keys.
- New ActionBar component (js/ui/ActionBar.js) renders a procedural cyberpunk
bottom bar with six slots (Research, Build, Ship, two reserved, Menu),
boot flicker, rail comet, glitch bursts, and RGB shimmer; fully driven by
data/actionbar.json
- Data contracts for the player's progression loop: research.json (time-based,
one project at a time, gates builds/research) and builds.json (credits +
minerals, ship/planet/station categories), both with _template docs and
empty maps; registered in manifest.json
- GameScene wires the deck in, routes clicks over it away from fly-to, pins
the hint above the bar, and drives per-frame update/shutdown
- New dev/research-builds.test.mjs pins the data contract (manifest entries,
rule knobs, template fields, six-slot order)
- cdpshot.mjs: cross-platform temp dir + --no-sandbox for container/CI
- README and PROJECT_NOTES updated with the new loop, deck docs, and a Phaser
v4 scrollFactor-on-screen-fixed-container quirk
- Discovery rule: ship within `discovery.distance` (540 px) of a world's edge discovers it once per system; state is pure, save-ready (`Discovery.toJSON/fromJSON`)
- Off-screen compass (`DiscoveryCompass`): themed screen-edge arrows with type/name chips point back at discovered worlds; geometry helpers (`edgeAnchor`, `circleInView`, `lerpAngle`) exported for Node tests
- Solar-system layout: `layoutSystemPlanets` places generated worlds in a deterministic annular band around the home world, enforcing edge-to-edge separation and per-class scale/tint from `data/planets.json`
- All system planets are solid to the ship (collision + click-clamp), not just home
- Rim ping + HUD toast on discovery (`celebrateDiscovery`)
- New planet class pools (rocky/gas/ice/lava) with frames, `classScale`, `classTint`, and `typeLabels`
- Smoke-game dev hooks: `?ship=x,y` and `?near=px` for screenshotting discovery/compass states
- Node test suite (`dev/discovery.test.mjs`) covering rule boundaries, per-system state, JSON round-trip, layout bounds/determinism, compass geometry, and class pools
The galaxy was settled long before the player arrives. Systems now
host colonies on habitable worlds, mining stations over resource
worlds, cloud bases riding gas giants, stations adrift in open
space, and beacons — or report "charted · unclaimed" when empty.
- data/settlements.json: the shared kind vocabulary (label, theme,
population range, anchor type); add a kind = JSON + naming pool.
- Per-archetype rates in data/systems.json (chance + required
planet class) and a core→rim density gradient in data/galaxy.json
(falloff/floor), keyed off each record's new rNorm.
- Draws stay in a stable order on the system's own Rng stream, so
lazy and eager generation still produce identical content.
- Every settlement keeps owner: null, a reserved seam for the
factions/pirates that will claim them later.
- NameGenerator.station() names from anchor + kind ("Kest Skyspire").
- SystemReport.js is a pure, testable formatter (dossier lines,
"charted · unclaimed" for empty); GameScene's HUD renders it and
Node tests cover structure, mix, gradient, naming, lazy === eager.
- Main menu Galaxy Seed panel: displayed, editable, rerollable; the menu
previews what the seed builds (galaxy name, scale, archetypes) before
committing. Same seed always generates the same galaxy.
- js/galaxy/Galaxy.js: seeded roster of 40k systems (disk + core + spiral
arms, type weights, radial bands) with spatial hash for neighbor queries;
contents generated lazily on arrival — identical to eager generateAll()
because each system draws from Rng.derive(seed, 'system', id).
- js/galaxy/SystemGenerator.js + data/systems.json: six themed archetypes
whose attributes (star classes, planet count spread, class weights,
moons, belts, habitability, hazard) steer content generation.
- data/galaxy.json layout/distribution knobs, incl. distribution.rules[]
hook for future proximity/clustering rules; data/naming.json name pools.
- GameScene: current system name/identity HUD (lazy content generation
on arrival); dev boot without a menu falls back to a dev galaxy.
- dev/galaxy.test.mjs: determinism, distribution, bands, lazy==eager,
neighbor brute-force checks (40k roster in ~70ms).
- Docs: world model, determinism rules, roadmap update.
- Boot the game from a static server with no build step (Phaser 4 vendored in lib/)
- Main menu (New Game button) and GameScene where clicking makes the ship fly there
- All tunables live in data/*.json (game/menu/ship), loaded via manifest + Config singleton
- Ship behavior driven by arcade physics (thrust, drag, maxSpeed, arrival) with a Node test harness (dev/ship-behavior.test.mjs) and a dev smoke page that boots straight into GameScene
- Project conventions documented in docs/PROJECT_NOTES.md; README rewritten to describe layout, run instructions, and dev tools
Brian Fertig
Brian Fertig