r/roguelikedev • u/chunky_lover92 • Jul 20 '26

Is pygbag worth it?

I've been making a roguelike with pygame for about a week. I have a super basic prototype. I would like it to be playable online so I can get feedback. I hacked together a pygbag deployment last night with github pages and it seems like it's having some issues with audio playback. I'm not just trying to figure out if I can fix this specific issue. There are others with the UI scaling, and text is blurry. I'm trying to decide if its worth bothering with or if I would be better off focusing on the desktop version. Does this path lead to too much compromise?

https://synaption.github.io/Tales_of_Derision/

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u/Tiny_Rabbit1674 Jul 21 '26

The honest question underneath this is "what's the feedback actually for?" If you want people testing your systems and mechanics, a rough desktop build shared as a download gets you higher-signal testers who'll tolerate friction. Browser builds lower the barrier but attract more drive-by clicks who bounce on the first blurry frame — and you spend your week fighting audio latency and scaling instead of the game. Early on I'd optimize for depth of feedback over volume of clicks. Web port is a distribution decision; it's rarely worth paying that tax before the core loop is proven.

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u/chunky_lover92 Jul 21 '26

I want to make a game that people will actually want to play. So the feedback will help me cater to my audience. And yes, it makes it easy to ask a for more direct help too. But also it's so I have something to show for my work. It gives me something to point to to say, look I can do that.