node-multiplayer-snake

A multiplayer snake game built on NodeJs, Express, socket.io, and JavaScript ES6. No unnecessary libraries.

Live demo Here

Getting Started

Install the latest Node.js 8 Stable

git clone https://github.com/simondiep/node-multiplayer-snake.git

cd node-multiplayer-snake

npm install

npm start

Open your web browser to localhost:3000

Game Features

• Quick join and play (no sign-ups)
• Player settings
  • Change colors
  • Change names
• Admin controls
  • Change game speed
  • Change amount of food
  • Change player starting length
  • Add or remove bots
• Different food types
• Upload your own snake image and background image
• Player statistics including kills/deaths/score
• Steal player scores and length by killing them
• Game notifications
• Kill announcements
• Randomized spawns
• Spectate
• Local storage of name and image
• Add and remove walls by clicking
• Sound effects

Contributing

1. Fork the code base
2. Create a new git branch
3. Find or create an issue with a description of what you will be adding
4. Start making changes
5. Run tests npm test
6. Pull and rebase changes
7. Submit a pull request

Tech Debt

• Additional Client-side validation to reduce unnecessary emits to server
• Additional Server-side optimization to reduce unnecessary emits to client
• Validate sizes of base64 Strings
• Toggle view of admin options as a menu item
• Remove relaxed eslint checks from .eslintrc.js
• Refactor into more testable code
• Higher test coverage
• Create more convenient build steps (dev vs prod) that don’t require unbundling on pull
  • Ignore bundle that gets placed into public/js/config.js
• support spinners - input type=number to replace existing admin buttons
• animate/smooth out the scrolling to top and bottom of page
• sprite-maker (convert all images into one)
• high level jsdoc
• convert innerHtml to templates (handlebars or mustache)
• e.keyCode and other more reused values should be cached (stored in a local variable) to increase performance
  • such as ‘click’
• DomHelper extract all strings into an Object
• an easy way to create new banner gifs as the game adds features
• optimize data sent to each client, to only what’s necessary, and not the entire game state
  • don’t clear the entire canvas after each turn (look into canvas alternatives/ WebGL such as PixiJS)
  • smarter client code that can render snakes moving in a single direction without needed server state
  • smarter server code to send change events
• clean up class constructors that take a lot of params, and instead pass in a single object
• add game instructions possibly to a dismissible dialog
• add a legend for different power ups
• Issues

Longer-term Tech Debt

• Chai does not support –use_strict mode, yet. Replace chai or wait for support.
  • This means “use strict”; is needed in all node modules, even though it is redundant
• Switch to SASS when Windows makes it easier to install node-gyp dependencies.
  • PR still open as of March 22, 2016.

Technologies to look into

• Replace console.log with logging framework
  • https://www.loggly.com/ultimate-guide/node-logging-basics/
  • https://strongloop.com/strongblog/compare-node-js-logging-winston-bunyan/
• Unit test mocking frameworks for ES6 classes
• Performance testing tools
• Lightweight unit testing frameworks, such as Tape
• ECMAScript 7

Potential Features To Implement

• Spin buttons for admin controls
• Multiple rooms
• Incremental death (head no longer moves, but tail does)
• Randomize board to contain walls
• Allow players to skip across the screen if they visit an edge without a wall
• Increase game speed based on different conditions (faster if 1v1) or random
• Choose your own color
• Show a glowing outline when player is growing
• Text chat
• Support resolutions lower than 1225x550
• Support mobile
• Smarter bots (prioritize food, don’t trap themselves, have a sense for other player movements)
• Leave a message for the killer
• Audio
  • Background music
  • Volume control
  • Voice chat
  • DOTA/CS kill-streak sounds
• Images
  • Food image
  • Support animated gifs (snake and food)
  • Upload head image vs body images (head, body, L-turn, tail)
  • Preset images for use
• Stats
  • Global high score
  • Custom sort stat board
  • More stats (max length)
• Power-ups or Perks
  • very long
  • individual speed (2 or more steps for a player)
    • variant: limited turbo (press key to activate)
  • invulnerable
  • width increase
  • reverse controls
  • be able to draw on canvas
  • choice of power-up to start with
  • random power up on kill
  • activatable skills such as swap
• Game Modes
  • head to head with preselected spawn points
    • variant: four player start at middle facing away from each other
  • infinite length
  • fog of war
  • random walls
  • elimination
  • maze
  • diagonal movement
  • defined win conditions
  • pictionary

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