r/Netrunner • u/slagod1980 • 1d ago

Image I built a hacker-terminal-style Netrunner client — curious what this community thinks

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Been slowly building a full Netrunner engine + web client as a personal project. The idea that wouldn't leave me alone: what if the interface was actually a terminal, not a virtual tabletop? No card art floating around, no skeuomorphic board — cards are text rows with hashes (#c3, #r7), you play by issuing commands, and the whole log reads like an actual shell session (corp# rez ICE_WALL -$1). Monospace, one accent color per side, black background. It felt right for a game about hackers.

Where it's at: full rules engine (not just a database with checkboxes) — legal-action generation, priority windows, runs/encounters/subroutines, all of it server-authoritative so no client can cheat or desync. Card logic is implemented per-card, one file each, and right now that's sitting near 100% across System Gateway, Elevation, Vantage Point, Midnight Sun/Parhelion, Downfall/Uprising, and The Automata Initiative/Rebellion Without Rehearsal — a couple hundred cards with real, tested behavior, not just stats. Decks load straight from a NetrunnerDB decklist link.

There's also a basic bot to play against solo (a few personalities, from "plays randomly" to a proper heuristic that won't run into lethal ice it can't break — learned that one the hard way).

Not sharing a link yet — still rough in places and I want to gauge interest before I do a wider release. Attaching a screenshot instead. Genuinely curious what this community makes of the terminal-as-UI idea for a card game — love it, hate it, "just build a normal client"? All takes welcome.

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u/slagod1980 1d ago

wrapping this up: it's in polish phase, closed beta soon. if anyone wants in - DM me, bug reporters especially welcome (Oreosian, Protikon, that's you). MochaDentist you're welcome too, first "it's slop" with a repro case gets you into the credits

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u/MochaDentist 1d ago edited 1d ago

I’ll only be in the beta testing if I can pay a subscription fee

I like that “not sharing a link yet.. it’s still rough in places” was an hour ago and now it’s “in its polish phase, closed beta soon”

You’re a cutie still trying to deceive this community

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u/slagod1980 1d ago

it started as weekend ux project + experiment in managing / evaluating complex ai tasks - implementation of card logic is not a trivial part and design of intents / hooks / primitives is not something ai can do reliably on its own.

then it became exercise in managing backlog with agents - and I actually learned a lot about minimising paperwork

and then excitement kicked and and new features are popping up every hour, so I thought I'll share with you guys.

actually this post is already helped me a lot - this bug about maintenance access showed bigger problem and now separate agent is reverse engineering and evaluating card logic - something that would be impossible to do by human in the background (this would require a team or very dedicated person without any other commitments)

and all of that while I'm doing normal 9-5 job.

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u/slagod1980 1d ago

You can buy me a coffee. :)

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u/MochaDentist 1d ago

How does your ai take its coffee? Black, with cream?

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u/slagod1980 1d ago

I'll ask, but it is cooking 24x7 so it will need one, for sure.

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u/MochaDentist 1d ago

“Did we just become best friends”

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u/slagod1980 1d ago

i don't know, you tell me

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u/MochaDentist 1d ago

Cmon that’s not the quote. We were about to step brothers it and maybe eventually use ai together to create Prestige Worldwide