ARG Minigames

A scoring system for GPS based alternate reality games.

Architecture

A websocket server is created in order to receive data about events in the game world. The data from all data sources is collated, de-duplicated and sorted in order to create a summary as is needed for scoring.

The websocket connection is also used to set the parameters of the game, and the parameters are sent to the clients in order to determine which information should be sent.

Game parameters are saved and loaded from a JSON file.

Running

Prerequisites

• nodejs
• openssl

Setup

• Create an SSL Certificate by running generate-server-cert.sh. Make sure to enter you domain name when asked for a "Common Name". This may well be 'localhost'.
• Run the server as below and navigate to it using https (e.g. https://example.com:6543) in order to make your browser trust the server.

Running

• Run node minigame-server.js example.json to create a new game config saved to example.json.
• Connect your minigame helper clients to the server.

Protocol v1

Clients communicate with the server using text/json over a websocket.

All messages have a msg field specifying the message type as a string.

Connection

• connect client -> server: initiate or continue a connection
  • version number: the version to use
  • session string (optional): the session to continue
• connected server -> client: connection initiated
  • session string: the id of the session that is currently being used
• failed server -> client: connection failed. Either the version is unsupported, or the requested session no longer exists.
  • version number: the version that the server speaks
• badLlama server -> client: the client has misbehaved and is being kicked
  • reason string
  • insult string

Game Configuration

• poi: information about a POI
  • guid string: the POI identifier
  • data object: the info, including at least:
    • latE6 number: latitude * 10^6
    • lngE6 number: longitude * 10^6
    • included boolean: if the POI is part of the game
    • tag string: a tag for the POI in the game

Game Data

• worldState server -> client: send events that describe constructing the current world state from the blank state

• start server -> client: start sending events as they happen

• end server -> client: stop sending event as they happen

• event client -> server: an event occurred

  • type string: the event type
  • timestamp number: when the event occurred
  • team string: which team caused the event
  • player string (optional): the player who caused the event
  • various other fields as needed

Events of the following type can be reported:

• capture
  • poi
• neutralise
  • poi
• build
  • poi
• destroy
  • poi
• createLink
  • poiFrom
  • poiTo
• destroyLink
  • poiFrom
  • poiTo
• createLink
  • poiFrom
  • points

For each of these, poi is an object with either guid (string) or latE6 and lngE6 (numbers).