The 1972 Atari classic, right in your terminal. 🏓

"Avoid missing ball for high score."

🚀 Quick Start

npx pong-cli

One command. No install. Just play.

Want it installed? Run npm install -g pong-cli then just type pong.

🕹️ What Is This?

A faithful recreation of Pong — the game that started it all in 1972. Black and white. Two paddles. One ball. Pure arcade action, running at 30 FPS in your terminal.

✨ Features

• 🤖 1-Player — Battle the CPU on Easy, Normal, or Hard
• 👥 2-Player — Grab a friend, share a keyboard
• 🏓 Real Physics — Angle changes based on where the ball hits your paddle
• ⚡ Speed Ramp — The ball gets faster with every volley
• 🔊 Sound Effects — Terminal beeps for hits and scores (disable with --no-sound)
• 🏆 First to 11 — Or set your own target with --score
• ⬛ Monochrome — Black-and-white aesthetic, faithful to the original CRT
• 🖥️ 30 FPS — Smooth real-time terminal rendering

🎮 Controls

| | Player 1 | Player 2 | |---|---|---| | Move Up | W | ↑ | | Move Down | S | ↓ |

| Key | Action | |---|---| | Space / P | Pause | | Enter | Select | | Esc | Quit |

💡 In 1-Player mode, both W/S and arrow keys control your paddle.

⚙️ Options

| Flag | Description | Default | |---|---|---| | --score <n> | Winning score (1–99) | 11 | | --difficulty <level> | easy · normal · hard | normal | | --no-sound | Disable beep sounds | — | | --help | Show help | — | | --version | Show version | — |

# Hard mode, first to 21
npx pong-cli --difficulty hard --score 21

💡 Pro Tips

🏓 Aim with your paddle — hitting the ball near the edge creates a steep angle. Center hits go straight.

⚡ Stay sharp — ball speed increases with every rally and resets after each point.

🤖 Hard mode is no joke — the CPU predicts where the ball will land.

🛠️ Development

git clone https://github.com/engelde/pong-cli.git
cd pong-cli
npm install

| Command | Description | |---|---| | npm start | Run the game | | npm test | Run tests | | npm run lint | Lint with Biome | | npm run format | Format with Biome |

Husky runs linting + tests on pre-commit and enforces Conventional Commits. CI runs on Node 18 / 20 / 22. Releases via release-please.

📜 Credits

Inspired by the original Pong arcade game by Atari, Inc. (1972), designed and built by Allan Alcorn. Pong was the first commercially successful video game and launched the arcade era.

📄 License

MIT