Distributed Chess

In this hobby project, we aim to design a fully functional chess game leveraging Holepunch, a powerful networking protocol. The goal is to create an innovative, decentralized, peer-to-peer networked chess game, offering real-time play without relying on a central server.

The project employs Holepunch to handle NAT traversal and create direct connections between players, allowing for low latency and high-performance gameplay. It explores the possibilities of modern networking technologies to provide a robust, distributed gaming experience that ensures privacy and ownership of data, as game data is stored directly on users' devices rather than on a central server.

By implementing a traditional chess game using these advanced technologies, this project seeks to bridge the gap between classical gaming and modern distributed systems, demonstrating the potential of peer-to-peer technologies in the gaming world. This hobby project provides an engaging platform for chess enthusiasts and an educational exploration of Holepunch and distributed system design.

Creating a chess game using Hypercore

This is a simplified explanation; further implementation could get complex depending on the features, paying closer attention to testing and handling edge cases to ensure a smooth gaming experience.

1. Install necessary dependencies: You'll need Node.js and NPM (Node Package Manager) installed on your computer. You can install Hypercore, Hyperbee, and any other libraries you'll use with the npm install command.

2. Define the game state: In a chess game, the state can include the positions of all pieces on the board, the players' names, whose turn it is, and any other necessary information.

3. Create a Hypercore for the game state: You can create a new Hypercore for each game. Every move can be an append operation on the Hypercore log, with the value being the new state of the game after the move.

4. Set up game logic: code handles the game's logic, i.e., checking if moves are legal, if the game is over, and who has won.

5. Set up peer connections: Use the Hyperswarm library to establish peer-to-peer connections between the two players. This can allow the players to receive updates from each other's Hypercores.

6. Persist data using Hyperbee: If you wish to keep a persistent game state that can be fetched and viewed later, you can use Hyperbee to store key/value pairs. For instance, you can store the current game state with the game ID as the key.