Mochia, a virtual pet browser game, built with Rust, SolidJS, Postgres
Around three years ago, I was reminiscing about how much I loved playing Neopets as a kid. Meanwhile, I was also looking for a project to better learn Rust and SolidJS. So.. I figured making my own virtual pet browser game would be a fun way to practice! Since then, I’ve been working on it nearly every day, and.. it’s grown quite a bit! Here are some bulleted lists for your convenience: Technical Details: * Backend monolithic Rust server runs on a single $5/month VPS * Lean frontend with just 3 dependencies (SolidJS, Solid Router, and Mutative) * Around 130,000 combined lines of code…
Mochia, a virtual pet browser game, built with Rust, SolidJS, Postgres launched on July 3, 2025 with 24 votes, #707 of 9,223 launches that month and more than 90% of that year's launches. The site was still online in September 2026, 1 year on.
In plain words
Mochia is a browser-based virtual pet game built with Rust and SolidJS. Players care for and interact with digital pets in a Neopets-inspired experience. The game runs on a minimal $5/month server with a lightweight frontend using only three dependencies, featuring over 500 SVG graphics for crisp mobile and desktop play. The backend, written in Rust, has maintained zero crashes and data loss over three years of development.
written from the facts on this page · September 2026
From the sources
Explore the world of Mochia!
In the maker’s words, at launch
Around three years ago, I was reminiscing about how much I loved playing Neopets as a kid. Meanwhile, I was also looking for a project to better learn Rust and SolidJS. So.. I figured making my own virtual pet browser game would be a fun way to practice! Since then, I’ve been working on it nearly every day, and..…
Does a similar job
all alternatives →- IMI made a web game called Almost Pong2022 · lessmilk.com · ▲1,135
Hi HN! I made many small web games in the past with Unity or Phaser. But this time I wanted to make something completely on my own. So I coded a basic game framework in plain JavaScript, and used it to make Almost Pong. This was a really fun project that taught me a lot about JavaScript, and I plan to make more minimalist games with this framework. Interesting fact: Almost Pong doesn't load any assets, all sprites and sounds are generated with code. Happy to answer questions, and please let me know if you have any feedback on the game. Thanks!
- IBI built an indie, browser-based MMORPG2024 · alpha.reconquer.online · ▲340
I've been working on an MMORPG that is now in alpha as a solo developer. Here are the major open source technologies that I use: Blender - 3D modeling software for creating the overall environment and every game object. I've gotten a lot of CC and Public Domain assets from https://poly.pizza GLTF - I export assets from blender to the GLTF asset format JSON - I write a JSON config for every game object that describes things like its name, its interactions, its collisions, etc. Node.js exporter - I iterate over the environment and every asset to create a scene hierarchy. I use…
- AOAn online 2D MMO game, written in Rust and JavaScript2024 · polyfight.io · ▲171
I made a game (https://polyfight.io/) which revolves around a player (a tank) leveling up and upgrading by killing shapes and other tanks (partially inspired by https://diep.io). It has a bunch of features, a vast number of tanks, an inbuilt chatting system, clans to make teams with your friends, a colour scheme maker, controllable sandboxes which can be public or private, a last man standing gamemode, and an inbuilt 1v1 system with its own ELO rankings and a global leaderboard. The game has a few players right now, and I'd hope to spread the joy players have with…
- IMI made a browser-based RTS game2022 · battle-of-flags.com · ▲212
I've posted this game here before, hopefully a repost is fine as the game has changed quite a bit (improved AI, improved mapeditor, much quicker gameplay, etc). Game is based on JavaScript/Canvas and WebSockets. On the browser side the map is pre-rendered (as a background image), just the mobile units/buildings and animations are dynamically rendered. The lobby server is made in node.js, but the game server is C++ for performance reasons (mainly the pathfinding). I found the C++ WebSocket libraries out there to be too difficult to use so I made my own based on the rfc. Overall I…
I've been making JavaScript sandbox alone for 6 years2022 · playcode.io · ▲397Hi HN! Thanks for your attention to my post. It was a big challenge to run most of Node.js packages in browser, fast moreover. Virtual File system, resolve import/export. I got cold many times, depressions, burned out, yet still alive and finished it. Many guys helped me with an advice. Many users give a lot of positive feedback. There are 200,000 monthly unique users. I work full time now because of the freemium business model. To be honest - I am happy after many years of hard work.
A tiny web browser implementation with V8 JavaScript engine and Rust2021 · github.com · ▲144An example implementation of a tiny Web browser for educational purposes. - lmt-swallow/puppy-browser
More dev tools this month
the category →
open-source IDE for thoughtful software design. Contribute to devdotfast/whiteboard development by creating an account on GitHub.
Dev tools · 28d ago · github.com
Contribute to reladraw/reladraw development by creating an account on GitHub.
Dev tools · 26d ago · github.com
OpenBot▲362Grok Bot alternative: free, local, open-source, multiplayer
Dev tools · 24d ago · openbot.run
Talanoa▲346Hi HN, I’m a fullstack developer, and honestly, I’ve lost count of how many side projects I’ve worked on over the years. But one idea kept coming back to me: a different kind of email client. It first came to me in 2014: “What if we could handle emails more like conversations?” Every year, I’d revisit this concept in my “Build Notes.” Ten years later, no one had built exactly what I had in mind — so I finally decided to do it myself. That’s how Talanoa was born. I wanted something focused on people, not timelines. I was tired of marking messages as unread just to remember to reply later, or…
Dev tools · 21d ago · talanoa.email
CoreSpeed▲332One MCP for everything your agents need: apps, memory, tools
Dev tools · 29d ago · corespeed.io
Source: Show HN post ↗ · launch text quoted in part
Launched alongside, July 2025
the whole month →
Trickle - Magic Canvas ▲1,064Hey HN! Introducing Trickle Magic Canvas: the world’s first Agentic Canvas, where you can visually co-create apps and websites with AI, from idea to production. Why is a canvas better? Most AI tools today rely on linear chats or text prompts. We believe that limits creativity and clarity. Canvas changes the game. 1. Every version & page at a glance. Each page and sub-page lives on a timeline. You can quickly browse, edit, and preview progress like a living, visual document — no more digging through chat logs or scattered states. 2. The canvas is the context. Unlike linear chats, you can…
AI · 2025 · trickle.so
- TB
Life & fun · 2025 · trytender.app
Today marks ten years, 3653 consecutive days, of running at least one mile every day under the USRSA rules [1]. To celebrate, I built an interactive dashboard that turns a decade of GPX files into charts you can explore. Running has truly changed my life: I've made lifelong friends, explored beautiful places, and more importantly invested into my own health and fitness, which I'm starting to see the positive benefits as I get older. The stack is pretty simple: a NextJS app, with a Postgres database to keep all my running data, and all the stats are pre-computed and cached in Redis, so I…
Dev tools · 2025 · nodaysoff.run
Made this website as an exercise in vibe-coding and GCP. It was posted about a few times around the internet, on sites like Morning Brew (https://www.morningbrew.com/issues/business-buzzkill), MetaFilter (https://www.metafilter.com/209703/Draw-A-Fish), boingboing.net, etc. I think it's cute! I built a basic CNN trained against penises and swastikas, and then anything that doesn't hit the 63% confidence score gets sent to a mod queue, a vibe-coded fish-tinder…
AI · 2025 · drawafish.com
Hi HN - I made a site that takes a UK postcode, grabs the local MP's information and generates an AI mockup of what their ID might look like. It's a small, silly protest at the stupidity of the Online Safety Act that just came into force. edit - My open AI credits got hugged to death, please use a known postcode (like one from Kier Starmer's constituency, WC2B6NH) in the meantime.
AI · 2025 · use-their-id.com