Building & deploying

Dacha does not provide a build system. Use any bundler that fits your project. Dacha is included as a dependency like any other.

A built game is a set of static files: an HTML page, a JavaScript bundle, and the asset files. Any server that serves static files can host it.

The starter project comes with Vite and builds with npm run build. If you use another bundler, or write your own configuration, this page lists what that configuration has to do.

Get the configuration to the engine

new Engine({ config }) takes the game configuration as a plain object. Where the object comes from is your choice.

The simplest way is to import the JSON file, so that the bundler puts it in the bundle:

import config from '../data/data.json';

This needs JSON imports, which means resolveJsonModule in tsconfig.json and support in the bundler. Most bundlers handle JSON out of the box.

The other way is to fetch the file at runtime and start the engine once it arrives. The configuration then stays a separate file, and you can replace it without rebuilding the game.

Keep the asset paths intact

Every asset in the configuration stores the path to its file, such as player.png. The engine loads that path exactly as written, relative to the URL of the page. The build must therefore copy the asset files into the output next to the page, with the same names.

Bundlers usually call this a static or public directory. In the starter project it is Vite’s publicDir, pointed at data/assets. Whatever you use, keep those files out of the hashing and inlining that the bundler applies to code.

Compile the decorators

DefineComponent, DefineSystem and DefineBehavior set the static name that the engine looks for. A class that reaches the engine without its name stops the game at startup.

Your bundler has to compile the decorator syntax, because not every browser runs it yet. TypeScript and esbuild (which Vite uses) do this. So does Babel with its decorators plugin.

Register your classes explicitly

The engine takes arrays of classes. The starter project fills those arrays with import.meta.glob, which is a Vite feature. With another bundler, use its equivalent or import the classes by hand. See how scripts are found.

Expect ES modules

Dacha is published as ES modules, compiled to modern JavaScript. A bundler reads that without any extra setup.

If you support older browsers, transpile the engine together with your own code. Many setups skip node_modules by default, and then the modern syntax reaches the browser untouched.