RuneSpace

Status: Playable pre-alpha — active development. RuneSpace is a browser-first, low-fi sci-fi RPG with a real early-game vertical slice: server-authoritative Play orchestration, Travel/Scavenging, Ferrite Shale Mining, Refining, Welding/Cargo Hold repair, Inventory/Equipment, locations, Power Cell/Power Annex, NPC interactions, the Holo Hollow settlement with Local Places, character Credits, and NPC merchant Trade, missions, and skill progression. Still early and under active development.

RuneSpace is a planned browser-first, mobile-friendly, low-fi sci-fi RPG inspired by the progression, quests, social texture, and long-term grind of old-school MMORPGs and action-point games. It is not a RuneScape clone.

The architecture is a modular monolith with a server-authoritative game model: the browser is never the trusted source of progression. Gameplay outcomes are resolved by server-side domain logic and persisted server-side. The generic transaction/locking/action-cursor/lazy-resolution lifecycle lives in server/action-resolution.ts; server/play.ts owns composed activity resolution and shared Play state assembly (server/play-state.ts) and the client shell (features/play/). Activity resolvers (Mining, Refining, Travel, Welding) own only their activity; feature-specific UI stays feature-owned.

Stack

Concern	Choice
Language	TypeScript (strict)
Framework	Next.js (App Router) + React
Styling	Tailwind CSS
Database	PostgreSQL
ORM	Drizzle ORM
Validation	Zod
Unit tests	Vitest
Browser tests	Playwright
Package mgr	pnpm (committed lockfile)
Deploy	Docker / Coolify
Minigames	Phaser (later, isolated boundaries)

Pinned versions: Node 22, pnpm 9.15.4 (see package.json engines/packageManager).

Local setup

Prerequisites: Node 22, pnpm 9.15.4, Docker (for Postgres), and optionally Playwright browsers.

# 1. Install dependencies (frozen lockfile)
pnpm install --frozen-lockfile

# 2. Start PostgreSQL (writes to a docker volume)
docker compose up -d

# 3. Configure environment
cp .env.example .env
#   (default DATABASE_URL matches docker-compose.yml)

# 4. Apply committed migrations
pnpm drizzle-kit migrate

# 5. Run the dev server
pnpm dev
#   open http://localhost:3000

To install Playwright browsers for local e2e tests:

pnpm exec playwright install --with-deps

Environment variables

See .env.example. Validated at startup by server/env.ts (Zod).

Var	Required	Notes
NODE_ENV	no	development | test | production
DATABASE_URL	yes	PostgreSQL connection string for the pg Pool

Common commands

Command	Purpose
pnpm dev	Start the dev server
pnpm build	Production build
pnpm start	Start the production server
pnpm lint	ESLint (next lint)
pnpm format	Prettier write
pnpm format:check	Prettier check
pnpm typecheck	tsc --noEmit (strict)
pnpm test	Vitest unit tests
pnpm test:integration	Disposable PostgreSQL integration tests
pnpm test:e2e	Playwright browser tests (local)

Testing

• Unit: pnpm test (Vitest, pure domain/schema logic — fast, no DOM).
• Integration: pnpm test:integration (Vitest against a fresh disposable PostgreSQL database; migrations and cleanup are automatic).
• Browser: pnpm test:e2e (Playwright, focused journeys, using a disposable database). CI runs the 70-test canonical browser-journey selection across 13 behavioral specs via pnpm test:e2e:canonical; smoke, ownership, design-system, and QC Studio specs remain outside that merge-gate selection. See docs/testing-strategy.md for the sharded runner and opt-in screenshot lane.
• Strategy: risk-based — pure rules, server/persistence boundaries, and a few critical mobile journeys. See docs/testing-strategy.md.

Coolify

• The current Coolify application uses Nixpacks. nixpacks.toml retains the package build and start behavior while asserting the committed Drizzle migration assets are available to the runtime.
• Database migration and recovery instructions are in docs/deployment-database.md.
• docker-compose.yml provides a local PostgreSQL for development. The app itself is run with pnpm dev on the host (the container only covers the DB).

Architecture & docs

Read these before contributing:

• AGENTS.md — rules for coding agents (scope, SSOT, extraction, testing, PR workflow).
• docs/architecture.md — modular monolith, server-authoritative model, boundaries, dependency direction, and Play orchestration.
• docs/game-rules.md — current design direction (implemented vs. approved vs. future).
• docs/gameplay-foundations.md — server-authoritative timing, progression, inventory, and action contracts.
• docs/missions.md — declarative mission framework and authoring contract (single-phase, server-authoritative).
• docs/component-boundaries.md — extraction rules.
• docs/art-cookbook.md — art direction, generation workflow, asset preparation, and visual QA.
• docs/testing-strategy.md — risk-based testing.
• docs/development-workflow.md — one issue/branch/PR workflow and CI.
• docs/admin-console.md — admin/operator console authorization, commands, and audit (issue #113).

License

RuneSpace is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0). See LICENSE.