Development Journal
This journal is a publication-safe narrative, not an invented diary. Contemporary entries are supported by dated repository/user evidence; retrospective sections interpret preserved artifacts without inventing dates, motivations, conversations, or authorship.
Retrospective — A Flash game preserved in numbered versions (exact dates unverified)
The preserved RaketenspielOLD/ directory contains Flash SWFs and HTML launchers, including variants with names ending in 3, 4, 41, and 42. The separate raketenspiel.html uses legacy Flash embedding and a 550 × 400 game area. These files show multiple historical artifacts but do not by themselves explain which features changed between versions or when they were created. A local file listing showed an old February 2009 timestamp on raketenspiel.html; this is a file metadata clue, not reliable proof of first publication or development chronology.
What can be said responsibly for a future portfolio: the project has a preserved Flash-era lineage rather than beginning with the recent GitHub import. The original design motives, stage-by-stage evolution, and meaning of the title still need Babuni.dev's first-hand account or dated records.
Retrospective — Rebuilding the game without Flash (exact dates and sequence unverified)
The imported source/README.md identifies the modern browser version as an HTML/JavaScript/SVG reconstruction recovered from the v1.42 portable Electron executable, explicitly not the original editable .fla. The code supports that description: assets.js stores embedded vector representations, runtime.js implements a lightweight scene graph and legacy clip behavior, and gameplay.js describes a faithful ActionScript-style translation.
An instructive technical thread survives in comments. The Flash-era update rate of 16 FPS was adapted to 48 Hz logic, with movement, probabilistic events, and timing scaled so that a smoother simulation would not automatically make the game play three times faster. The comments describe compatibility choices, but without earlier revisions they cannot reveal the discussion that led to them or prove exact parity.
The modern snapshot includes additional visible systems: a player laser, colored asteroids with distinct effects, a score-driven stockpile of blue seeker missiles with curved flights and retargeting, local high scores, an instructional menu, and sound. These make useful portfolio case studies, but their order of invention and individual authorship cannot be established from this snapshot.
Retrospective — Portable distribution at v1.42 (release date unverified)
The v1.42 user readme describes a self-contained 64-bit Windows portable build, no installation or network connection required, local score data stored alongside the executable when writable, and possible unsigned-publisher warnings. source/main.cjs documents a stable custom origin to preserve score storage even when portable extraction directories change. source/package.json defines an Electron portable build. These are concrete packaging choices; the current audit did not launch or rebuild the executable.
2026-10-27 — Documentation audit #29: separating the game's generations
After the original Flash materials and the reconstructed browser/Electron game had been imported, Babuni.dev's next practical concern was how other people could experience it. The request for a Serve on Wi-Fi button arose from the wish to share a working game at a gathering without turning a small demonstration into a command-line exercise. That user-facing simplicity became the design target; the internal mechanism was the assistant's implementation choice.
The resulting code puts a small HTTP server inside the trusted Electron host and exposes its controls through a narrow preload bridge. The menu shows addresses that other devices can open, while browser visitors receive the game without the server-management interface. The game remains single-player for each visitor: this was not a request for—and does not implement—a synchronized LAN scoreboard or common game state.
This audit inspected the current repository, including source/main.cjs, source/preload.cjs, source/game/wifi.js, and the earlier concept and source records. It reconciled the preservation narrative with the later implementation rather than rewriting the unknown history of the Flash originals. The original 2009 file timestamp is kept as a clue, not promoted to a dated release. Likewise, the historical v1.42 executable is not conflated with newer unbuilt source changes.
Current result: Documentation clarified; executable code and assets left intact. Still unverified: browser and Windows packaged play, sound delivery, LAN second-device access, firewall behavior and historical gameplay fidelity. This entry records inspection, not a successful field test.
2026-10-26 — A shared repository and documentation foundation
Babuni.dev direction: Babuni.dev created babunidev/Rocketgame42 and requested a lasting structure for developing and documenting the game. Babuni.dev then connected the existing local folder, initialized Git, configured the remote, excluded generated/dependency/packaged files, and pushed an import.
AI contribution: The assistant initially made a generic documentation scaffold because the repository was empty. It then guided local Git initialization, selective staging, and safe synchronization with the new remote.
Implementation: Twelve development documents were committed to GitHub; Babuni.dev's push of commit 4d50ce6 added 33 project files. Earlier versions of the scaffold incorrectly stated that no game implementation existed—an accurate statement only for the empty repository at that moment, but obsolete after import.
Verification: User-shared terminal output confirmed the successful push and upstream tracking. The GitHub connector subsequently fetched source and documentation.
2026-10-26 — Reading the recovered code as project history
Babuni.dev direction: Review the imported code, discover existing devlogs/changelogs, and make the material suitable for a future portfolio section.
AI audit: The assistant inspected source README, package metadata, gameplay, runtime, missiles, score handling, HTML shell, sound helper, Electron launcher, legacy HTML, and the available documentation. No dedicated historical devlog/changelog was evident in the initial 33-file import. The most useful historical evidence was instead the numbered SWF archives, v1.42 readme, code comments, and the recovered-source description.
Documentation correction: The assistant replaced the generic “not yet implemented” documents with evidence-labeled descriptions of the existing project, its code architecture, observed gameplay, archival assets, and unresolved historical questions. The journal separates dated repository actions from retrospective reconstructions and Babuni.dev's still-unrecorded recollections.
Code review observations: The Electron request allowlist may exclude the OGG files loaded by the audio helper; the package configuration references an icon absent from the imported file list; comments point to uncommitted recovered-source/*.as files. These are audit findings to verify, not confirmed runtime bugs.
Tests: No game or build was executed during this review. No claims of successful gameplay or parity testing are made.
2026-10-26 — A desktop button for spontaneous LAN play
Babuni.dev direction: Babuni.dev wanted the local game application to have an explicit button labelled Serve on Wi-Fi. The intention was to host a game at gatherings without entering terminal commands each time, so friends on the same network could open it in their browser. This is a separate requirement from eventual public hosting and possible mobile controls.
AI interpretation and implementation: Because web browsers cannot directly open arbitrary LAN server sockets, the assistant placed hosting in the Electron main process and exposed narrow start/stop/status actions to the local desktop game's interface through a preload bridge. The menu button opens a small panel showing local IPv4 URLs, a sharing control, and status. Remote browser players do not receive host controls. The server serves an explicit list of static game assets and uses TCP 4173.
Constraints and verification: The HTTP listener binds to all IPv4 interfaces, so it must be used only on trusted networks with appropriate firewall settings. It does not create shared multiplayer or a combined leaderboard. Source files were committed directly to GitHub. The feature has not been executed or tested over a LAN, and the earlier Windows EXE does not automatically inherit the change; a new build is required.