Bytes

Terminal-based multiplayer games over LAN. Written in C.

About

Bytes is a multiplayer game platform that runs entirely in the terminal. Players can host, join, or spectate games over a local network using nothing but a compiled binary and a terminal emulator.

The first game is Pong. The architecture supports adding more.

Quick Start

make
./bin/bytes

One player hosts, the other joins with the host's IP. That's it.

Building

Linux

sudo apt install build-essential libncursesw5-dev    # Debian/Ubuntu
make

macOS

xcode-select --install    # if needed
brew install ncurses      # if needed
make

Windows (cross-compile from Linux)

sudo apt install gcc-mingw-w64-x86-64
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/wmcbrine/PDCurses.git deps/PDCurses
cd deps/PDCurses/wincon && make CC=x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc AR=x86_64-w64-mingw32-ar WIDE=Y && cd ../../..
make windows

Produces bin/bytes.exe -- a statically linked Windows binary with no runtime dependencies.

Windows (native)

Install MSYS2, then from a UCRT64 shell:

pacman -S mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-gcc mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-pdcurses make
make

Usage

./bin/bytes                 # default port 7500
./bin/bytes --port 8080     # custom port
./bin/bytes --solo          # single player vs CPU
./bin/bytes --test-keys     # input diagnostics

Host a game, join by IP, or spectate an ongoing match. Navigate menus with arrow keys, confirm with Enter.

Features

• LAN multiplayer over TCP
• Host, join, or spectate
• Solo play vs CPU
• 30 Hz server-authoritative game loop
• Automatic pause & reconnect on disconnect (30s window)
• Persistent local win/loss stats (~/.bytes_stats)
• Cross-platform: Linux, macOS, Windows
• Unicode box-drawing UI

Architecture

src/
├── main.c       Entry point, menu loop, host/join/watch flows
├── game.c       Game registry, session lifecycle
├── pong.c       Pong implementation
├── network.c    TCP server/client with length-prefix framing
├── protocol.c   Message pack/unpack (little-endian wire format)
├── ui.c         ncurses menus, overlays, screens
├── stats.c      Persistent win/loss tracking
└── platform.c   OS abstraction (sockets, time, paths)

Games implement a simple vtable (game_def_t) -- init, input, update, render, serialize, deserialize, win check. The engine handles networking, protocol, and session management.

Adding a Game

1. Create include/<game>.h and src/<game>.c
2. Implement the game_def_t function pointers
3. Add an enum value to game_type_t in common.h
4. Register in game_registry[] in game.c

No changes needed to networking or protocol code.

License

MIT