GAMENIGHT / DOCUMENTATION

Game settings

GameNight can display a game's settings in the lobby and phone interface. Games must declare their options and implement the changes. Having the protocol or SDK in a project does not expose its gameplay rules automatically.

Available controls

The shared LÖVE pack now declares these settings. These are source capabilities; installed releases need newly built packages before the controls appear.

The default values preserve the existing games. Blast Party's pickup chance controls drops from crates; its two opening prizes remain. Neon Siege's enemy count remains capped. Disabling gravity also removes the black hole.

Godot game controls

These independent game repositories use the same typed contract. Source builds have been tested against the real daemon, including setting changes and Undo.

Defaults preserve the existing games. Percentages are relative to those defaults, not raw engine units. Growing Guns multiplies its round modifiers and replicates the applied round snapshot to network peers. Ballkickers' charge rate only changes passive refill; successful actions still earn charge. Frog Fighter's gravity control applies to frogs, including rope movement, not every object in the world.

The host still owns seats and controller assignments. Settings cannot remap controllers, create human players or write arbitrary engine variables.

Run each game's headless settings suite in its own repository. For the complete source-to-host path, build the GameNight daemon and run:

export GODOT=/path/to/godot
export GAMENIGHT_GODOT_SOURCES='{"spaceracer":"/path/to/spaceracer","growing-guns":"/path/to/growing-guns","ballkickers":"/path/to/ballkickers","frog-fighter":"/path/to/frog-fighter"}'
python3 scripts/test-godot-settings.py

This launches isolated game processes and a daemon without using physical controllers. It verifies the declared controls, received values and Undo. The games' simulation tests separately check gameplay effects and apply timing. Source checks do not certify older downloadable binaries or physical input.

Ion Rush still has source declarations for laps and graphics quality in a local game import; it is not a catalog release. The lobby and retired demo games are not playable catalog entries and are excluded.

Declare and apply

The wire protocol accepts toggle, choice and integer number settings. Labels must include units and say when a change takes effect. For fractional durations, use readable choices such as "1.4 s" and convert inside the game. Unknown keys, wrong types and out-of-range values must leave the last valid value intact.

In a shared LÖVE game:

local Game = { id = "my-game" }
require("shared.settings").bind(Game, {
    { key = "speed", label = "Speed % (next round)",
      kind = "number", default = 100, min = 50, max = 175 },
    { key = "pickups", label = "Pickups (next round)",
      kind = "toggle", default = true },
})

function Game.new(players)
    return { players = players, settings = Game.preferences() }
end

function Game.update(state, dt, inputs)
    local speed = 200 * state.settings.speed / 100
    -- Use speed in your movement simulation.
end
return Game

The helper provides settings, setting(key, value) and preferences(). The shared runner declares the specs after welcome and forwards setting_changed. preferences() returns a copy. A running round keeps its copy until the game creates the next round. Call it in an internal reset too if the game starts rounds without returning to the runner. Do not mutate active state just to make a slider look responsive.

A declaration makes controls available once the game connects, usually during preloading. It is not static catalog metadata. GameNight remembers party choices and sends them back when a game declares settings again. It does not yet have a separate acknowledgement for "applied in gameplay". A saved value may therefore be pending the next round. See the protocol reference.

Mineclonia maps its integer percentages onto the existing world physics factors. It applies them on a worker, coalesces repeated edits and retries mailbox conflicts. Mod installation waits for an in-flight settings update. These two controls do not install arbitrary mods. Edits made directly through the separate world bridge are not automatically republished into GameNight's setting values.

Phone and lobby assistant

The standard desktop cloud bridge and the custom lobby relay publish these same declarations for the active game, or the prepared game if none is running. Numeric values, toggles and named choices all use the same contract. No engine-specific model integration is needed: declare your settings and handle setting_changed.

The assistant sends a typed batch through control_settings. The daemon checks the player, game session and settings revision, then validates every value before changing any of them. Undo restores the preceding batch; Keep clears that undo. A stale request is refused instead of overwriting a newer change. Normal set_setting writes also advance the revision.

Host acceptance does not mean a next-round setting is already active in gameplay. Keep the timing in the label and description. The assistant must not promise an immediate gameplay change when your game waits for a new round or match. Account configs store these scalar values, not world saves or arbitrary mod code.

Voice and account features belong to the optional GameNight service. The public game contract remains usable offline, without an AI provider.

Verify changes

From the repository root:

python scripts/test-love-simulation.py --love /path/to/love
# Linux, with LÖVE installed: real host and game processes, no display needed.
cargo build -p gamenight-daemon
python scripts/test-live-settings.py
cd examples/mineclonia
python -m unittest test_settings test_managed test_mod_lifecycle

The live-settings process test checks typed batches, stale/invalid rejection and undo against observations from all seven running games. It does not test a microphone, physical controllers or newly downloaded release packages.

The LÖVE suite checks all seven active modules: declarations, host message routing, invalid values, snapshots and gameplay effects. --settings-output settings.json exports the tested declarations for UI previews. The Mineclonia tests cover value validation, nonblocking updates, coalescing and mailbox conflicts. Packaged process tests also require a nonempty declaration and prepare each game with non-default values. Native integration tests check lifecycle and input. Run a real host/world test before claiming a downloaded build or a physical controller session is verified.

Build new .love packages with scripts/package-love-party.py. Publishing those packages and updating catalog URLs/checksums is a separate release step.