Games overview
People start your game from a chat in the Xara app, with one friend or with members of a group. Your game is a web page that you host; the app opens it full screen and connects to it with the Xara game SDK. Xara keeps who is playing, whose turn it is, and every move, so players can leave and come back.
Guess the Number is the short example: a guess, a result, and a paid hint. Tic-Tac-Toe is a full board on top of the same calls.
To have a coding assistant build the game from a description, install the Xara game skill once in the project, then describe the game.
How a game works
- A player taps + → Game in a chat and picks your game. In a group they also choose who plays.
- Xara posts a game card in the chat. Everyone invited taps Accept; the game starts once they all have.
- Players tap Play on the card to open your page. Group members who aren't playing can Watch.
- The player whose turn it is moves. Xara records the move, passes the turn to the next player, updates the card for everyone, and notifies whoever is next.
- Your game reports the result with the last move (or with
complete). The card shows who won, or a draw.
Turns go round the players in the order they were invited, starting with the player who started the game. A player can leave a game from the menu on the game screen; leaving a game being played forfeits it to the others.
What Xara checks, and what your game checks
| Xara checks | Your game checks |
|---|---|
| The player is in the game and it is their turn. | Whether the move is legal. |
The move follows the latest move (revision), so two moves can't race. | How the game is drawn and who has won. |
| Only invited players accept, and the game starts when all have. | Anything specific to your game's rules. |
Every phone receives every move, so replay the moves the same way on each phone and they all agree. A move can be any JSON up to 4,000 characters.
Selling in your game
Your game can ask a player to buy something, like a hint or an extra life. The app shows its own approval sheet and asks for the player's transaction PIN; nothing is paid until they approve. The money goes from the player's wallet to the business that submitted the game. See Payments.
Submit your game
- Host your game over https. The app only opens https games, only answers SDK calls from the origin of the URL you submit, and won't navigate anywhere else, so keep every page of your game on that origin.
- In the business dashboard, open Games and select Submit a game. Only the business owner can.
- Enter the game URL, how many players it takes (2 to 8), and the SDK version you used.
- Optionally upload an icon: a PNG, JPEG, or WebP, at least 128×128 pixels and under 1 MB. Xara crops it square and stores it small, so it loads instantly in chats; a square image of 512×512 looks best.
Our team reviews every game. Once approved, it appears in every chat's game list and its status in the dashboard reads Live. If a game is rejected, the dashboard shows why; fix it and save to send it for review again.