gqlobby-server

npm install gqlobby-server

Attempting to make an npm module for easily creating a realtime game lobby

Built on GraphQL subcsriptions for real time updates

Warning: Still a very early version

Usage

With default options (games with 2-4 players)

import startLobbyServer from 'gqlobby-server';

void startLobbyServer();

With custom values for min and max players

import startLobbyServer from 'gqlobby-server';

void startLobbyServer({ lobbyOptions: {minPlayers: 3, maxPlayers: 6}});

A server will be created automatically using Apollo-Server and GraphQL. If you need to change the port from the default of 4000, simply pass a value to the port option.

void startLobbyServer({ port: 8080 });

Simply open up http://localhost:4000/ to access Apollo studio and see all the queries, mutations and subscriptions available.

You can use the server as is and redirect to another server to start the games, or extend the server with your own GraphQL schema, as shown below:

import { makeExecutableSchema } from '@graphql-tools/schema';
import { gql } from 'apollo-server';
import startLobbyServer from 'gqlobby-server';

const typeDefs = gql`
    #Your typeDefs...
`;

const resolvers = {
    //Your resolvers...
}

const schema = makeExecutableSchema({ typeDefs, resolvers });

void startLobbyServer({ schema });

The provided schema will be merged with the existing schema for the lobby server, so it may be a good idea to check over it to make sure you don't overwrite anything important.

If using TypeScript, you may also want to make use of and extend the existing types for Game and Player. For example in a poker game, you could reuse the Player type, which already includes the player name and unique id, and extend it to keep track of their hand and amount of money.

import { Player } from "gqlobby-server/lib/types";

type Suit = 'SPADES' | 'CLUBS' | 'HEARTS' | 'DIAMONDS';

interface Card {
    value: number
    suit: Suit
}

export interface PlayerInGame extends Omit<Player, 'ready'> {
    money: number,
    hand: Card[]
}

Scope of the project

This project is just to take away the tedious task of creating the lobby. Handling the games is all up to you! They could be realtime, turn based or anything in between.