Fix: live games never spawn food after turn 0#130
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The live game loop (game_runner -> apply_turn) never called rules::food::maybe_spawn_food -- it was only wired into the run_game_with_random_moves simulation helper. Live games advertised food_spawn_chance=15 / minimum_food=1 on the wire but no food ever spawned after the initial board (confirmed in prod: game 54be71a6 had 5 food at turn 0 and zero from ~turn 30 onward). Add engine::spawn_food, called by the game runner after each turn and before the frame is recorded so the viewer and the snakes' next /move requests both see the new food. Constrictor games (in-flight PR #128) never spawn food, so the helper is mode-aware from the start. Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
coreyja
approved these changes
Jul 15, 2026
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The bug
Live games advertise
food_spawn_chance: 15/minimum_food: 1on the wire, butrules::food::maybe_spawn_foodwas only called in therun_game_with_random_movessimulation helper — never in the production path (game_runner→engine::apply_turn). Once the initial 5 food were eaten, no food ever spawned again.Confirmed in prod: game
54be71a6-f06e-402c-b4a9-01e5b3bc5ddb(Standard 11x11 ranked) — 5 food at turn 0, zero food from ~turn 30 through game end at turn ~114.This shortens/starves out every ranked game and diverges from the Go engine, which spawns food between turns. Worth landing before the launch announcement.
The fix
New
engine::spawn_food(game)helper, called by the game runner after each turn and before the frame is recorded, so the viewer and the snakes' next/moverequests both see the new food. It's mode-aware from the start: constrictor games (in-flight #128) never spawn food; all other modes use the standard settings.Deliberately does not touch the
run_game_with_random_movesinline spawn or the dispatch matches, so it merges cleanly alongside #128 and #129 — I'll unify the inline call into the helper when rebasing whichever of those lands last.Tests
test_spawn_food_standard_respects_minimum_food— empty board respawns up tominimum_foodtest_spawn_food_constrictor_never_spawns— 100 iterations, guard holds🤖 Generated with Claude Code