Roadmap & bugs

After a long break with no changes, a team of AI coding agents started a careful review of everything on newfiecards.com.

The site gained a working way to send email, so forgotten passwords can be reset and invitations can go out.

The computer seats now play their turns by themselves, so a round runs without anyone pushing it along.

For the first time a full game of Scat, round after round, ended with a named winner.

The owner played a whole game against three computer players on the site and won, the first time anyone had done so.

Every game is now recorded, and the record survives even when the room is cleared away.

Computer players got things to say at the table, and the dealer changes each round as in a real game.

Players can add a profile photo, the player whose turn it is glows, the winner gets a crown, and every player and character has a record of games played.

A six-part security review was run and every serious problem it found was closed the same day, with outdated software components upgraded.

Go Fish, Cribbage, Rummy and Crazy Eights were each written as a working game engine on a shared base.

The owner wrote down the drumpf order, trick values, bidding and reneging for 120s, so the game could be built to his family's rules.

Walking out of a game counts as a loss, but only when you choose to leave, and the site warns you before you do. A dropped connection costs nothing.

Krazy 8's became the second game you can play on the site, labelled beta until the owner signs it off.

Members can be invited by email, and anyone can ask to be told when invitations open.

The game the site had promised longest, 120s, can now be played from the deal to the last trick.

The 120s score box moved to the corner, and your side is always on the left.

120s now has its proper end-game: a side is capped at 115 until it wins a bid, and you must bid and make it to win.

A token ledger was built and a page explains what tokens will be for. No game charges anything yet.

Whoever opens a room chooses its house rules, and your own settings apply to your solo games.

The room chat announces arrivals, departures and people taking a seat, and a watcher can sit down at a free chair.

The owner is emailed when a new member is waiting for approval.

A Terms & Copyright page was added, room chat is now saved, and chat has a rate limit.

In 120s each trick is laid out in the middle where everyone can read it.

Go Fish now shows each request and lays completed sets down as cards.

Every game has a rules page, the lobby can open filtered to one game, and the table fits a phone screen.

A host can make a room private and invite people by name; room passwords were retired the next day.

A notification bell tells you good news, and cards now shuffle and deal out from the dealer's seat.

The Request Invite button now reaches the host, who can say yes, no, or no and don't ask again.

Seats sit on a ring around the table at every table size the site supports.

The site's play coin was given its name and a page that explains it honestly.

The owner played Scat, 120s, Go Fish and Krazy 8's to the end by hand, and each named its winner.

Krazy 8's now uses the family's special cards: kings reverse, the queen of spades draws five, and twos stack.

On a phone or tablet a card is played by dragging it toward the pile, never by an accidental tap.

Scopa, an Italian game from the owner's family, got its own section on the front page and a rules page.

On an upright phone the player whose turn it is lifts out of the strip and the view follows the game.

Pressing, moving and releasing with a mouse plays a card exactly as dragging with a finger does.

You can reorder your own hand by dragging a card left or right.

You draw by dragging from the deck or pile, and at Go Fish the player who is asked answers for themselves.

A finished trick lingers, then slides to the winner like a train with the winning card on top.

Holding 31 in Scat, you now declare it with a button rather than the game taking it for you.

Scopa became the fifth game you can play, built to the owner's family rules.

Visitors can send the owner a message from the footer.

The winning bidder now picks up the kitty themselves, and the table does it for them after ten seconds.

Two more Italian games, Briscola and Tre Sette, got panels on the front page marked Future Plans.

The engine for Escoba del 15, a Spanish cousin of Scopa, was built; its table is not ready yet.

The owner paused the project with everything finished and live at version 0.5.45.0.

Escoba del 15, where you capture cards that add up to fifteen with the card you play, got its table and opened in beta beside Scopa. The owner has played a full game of it; it stays in beta while more of its combinations are played out.

Dragging the end card of your hand outward with a mouse no longer plays it: the card goes back into your hand. A short click still plays the card.

If a player leaves in the middle of a game, a computer player now takes over their hand and the game carries on; the host can also end the game deliberately, and a player who comes back is put back into the same game.

The last of the hands-on moves: the dealer deals by dragging the deck, you drag your card out of the pool when told to go fish, and you lay down your own Catches and draw your own hand back up.

The piece that lets more than one copy of the site share what is happening in each room is switched on, so the site can grow without players in the same room losing sight of each other.

Added to an iPhone's Home Screen, NewfieCards now opens full screen at the lobby with a proper icon. The menu no longer sits under the clock, and your hand no longer sits under the bar at the bottom of the screen.

Someone watching a game who presses Leave Game now gets a short, friendly message and a single Leave button. There is no forfeit warning and no mark against them; only a player holding a seat is warned.

An account administrator can now add a member to the Help Desk, or take them off it, from the members page. Only approved, active members can be added, and every change is recorded.

The bright blue is gone from the whole site. The Help button is now a matte grey, links are felt green, and the other blue touches were changed to match the site's colours. The Help button also lifts a little when you point at it with a mouse.

Every time on the site, such as a scheduled game, a notification or a bug report, is now shown in the time zone of the device you are using, instead of in Newfoundland time or UTC.

On the members list, clicking or tapping anywhere on a row now opens that member's record, and every action lives on the record itself. Buttons across the site are smaller and sit side by side where there is room, instead of stretching across the page.

Each player's information bubble now opens during their turn. When their score or cards change, it stays open for five seconds, with the old number struck through beside the new one, so you can see at a glance what changed.

At a four-player partnership table, the end-of-round count on the felt now goes player by player, showing each partner's cards and sweeps, and the team is scored only once both partners have been counted. The count also fits a phone held upright.

At the end of a hand of 120s, the tricks are counted out on the table: the bidding side first, each player's tricks with the winning card raised, then the team's total and whether the bid was made.

On a bigger screen, the bottom of your own cards used to hang off the bottom of the table. Your hand now sits a little higher, so every card is fully in view, overlapping the middle of the table, which keeps its size. Cards and piles under it still work as before.

At the end of a hand, each player still holding cards has them laid out in front of their seat with each card's value, and the total ticks up. Then the points fly to where they are scored.

The players online figure on the front page and in the lobby used to count seats, computer players and long-finished tables included, so it could say 63 when fewer than 10 people were on. It now counts the people who are actually signed in and active.

The messaging and Help chat system was upgraded. It now comes with a written privacy note listing what it stores, who can see it and when it is deleted, and its limits on how many messages can be sent in a short time now count over a rolling window.

At the end of a hand, each player's leftover cards are laid out in front of their seat and counted, then the points go where they are scored. A rummy is called out as counting double before the points move.

At the end of a round, every hand is laid out in front of its seat with its counting cards lifted to show the score. A declared 31 is counted first, and only then do the lives come off.

Each hand, and then the crib, is called the way a player says it, "fifteen two, fifteen four, a pair is six", with each item's cards lifted, and only then does the peg move. Muggins shows the true count first, then the claim.

At the end of a game, each player's Catches are laid out in front of their seat and counted. When the most Catches are tied, the tied players' Catch values add up to break the tie, and only then is the winner called.

When a game ends, the winner is no longer announced while the last round is still being counted. The game over message, the crown and Start Another Game now wait until the count has finished.