Bugdom (browser port)
Pangea Software's 1999 Mac game Bugdom running in the browser, ported with Claude Code, with extra mods such as low gravity and Dance Party mode.
Official site reallyeli.com, verified Nov 3, 2026. Linked from the developer's own Show HN post and hosted on the developer's own site (reallyeli.com).
Rights holder / original work: Bugdom (Pangea Software)
A browser port of Pangea Software's 1999 game Bugdom, built from Iliyas Jorio's modern port, which Jorio re-released under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 with Pangea Software's permission (artwork © Toucan Studio, music © Mike Beckett; Bugdom is a Pangea trademark). The browser port's page states no licence and we found no published source for it. Its Dance Party mode streams video files named after songs and artists (including MGMT's “Little Dark Age”, John Prine, Animal Collective and Jamiroquai), for which no licence is stated. (GitHub (Iliyas Jorio))
VibeGameDB lists this game only to document that it was made with AI coding tools. We do not host it, we do not represent the rights holder, and listing it does not mean it is licensed.
Where to play
Every platform this game is on. Links are checked against official sources; we never host or mirror games.
- Play free — official siteBrowserReleased · Port of an existing game, with added modsFree
Runs in a desktop browser. No download.
Browser (no download) · Official link verified Nov 3, 2026.
About Bugdom (browser port)
A browser port of Bugdom, the 1999 Macintosh 3D action-adventure by Pangea Software in which Rollie McFly, a pill bug, sets out to rescue ladybugs from fire ants and bees. This is not a new game: the developer, Eli Rose, took Iliyas Jorio's modern port of Bugdom, which Jorio re-released with Pangea Software's permission, and compiled it to run in a web page with Emscripten. In the Show HN post the developer says they expected AI coding tools to be able to do the whole project and spent perhaps 20 hours on it with Claude Code. The page adds a mod menu on top of the original game: a start level from 1 (Training) to 10 (the Ant King boss), speed, kick-strength, gravity and music-speed multipliers, Primary Colors and Psychedelic texture effects, flying slugs and caterpillars, a rideable dragonfly on every level and a Dance Party mode that plays a video on the terrain. Free in a desktop browser; the game data is a download of about 68 MB.
How it was built
VerifiedIn the Show HN post the developer says they figured AI coding tools “should” be able to do the entire port for them and ended up spending perhaps 20 hours on it with Claude Code; the mods were added after the port worked. No model is named, and the post does not say whether any code was written by hand. The game itself is Pangea Software's 1999 code as modernised by Iliyas Jorio, not code written by the AI.
A port of Iliyas Jorio's modern C port of Bugdom (github.com/jorio/Bugdom) to WebAssembly with Emscripten, done with Claude Code over about 20 hours by the developer's estimate. A mod menu on the page passes settings to the game as URL parameters; the Dance Party mode loads one of five MP4 files from the site and draws it onto the terrain.
- Engine / framework
- Emscripten (WebAssembly build of Iliyas Jorio's Bugdom port)
- Languages
- C
- Team size
- Not disclosed
- Initial build time
- Perhaps 20 hours with Claude Code (developer's estimate)Developer ReportedHacker News (reallyeli)
- Development time
- Not disclosed
- Development cost
- Not disclosed
- AI-written code
- Not disclosed
“I figured it should be able to run entirely in-browser nowadays, and also that AI coding tools "should" be able to do this entire project for me.”Verification notes: AI use and time spent come from the developer's Show HN post of 9 Feb 2026 (03:07 UTC). The mod list comes from the game page itself (start level 1–10, speed, kick strength, gravity, music speed, two visual effects, flying slugs and caterpillars, dragonfly ride, Dance Party with five choices). The page is titled “Emscripten-Generated Code”, so the title used here is descriptive. The game data file (Bugdom.data, 67,917,521 bytes) was last modified on 31 Mar 2026, so the port has been updated since the post. No source code for the browser port was found, and the page states no licence of its own. Bugdom's original source and assets: Iliyas Jorio's repository says his port is approved by Pangea Software and re-released under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 with Pangea's permission; Bugdom is a registered trademark of Pangea Software, the artwork is credited © Toucan Studio and the music © Mike Beckett. The Dance Party mode streams MP4 files from the developer's site named after songs and artists (Sombr; MGMT, “Little Dark Age”; John Prine; Animal Collective; Jamiroquai); we did not play the videos, and no licence is stated for them. Release date: the Show HN post is the earliest dated public mention we found. The game was not played through.
Development history
The developer posts the browser port on Hacker News as a Show HN, with recommended mod and level combinations.
OfficialHacker News (reallyeli)The game data file on the developer's site is updated (file date observed on 4 Nov 2026).
ObservedEli Rose (reallyeli.com)
Game performance
Each figure measures something different — concurrent players, owners, downloads and sales are never interchangeable and are never added together. Labels show where each number comes from.
Browser (official site)
Free in the browser; the page downloads about 68 MB of game data before it starts.
No public metrics recorded for this listing.
Not publicly available: Concurrent players (site), Monthly revenue, Gross revenue.
Sales & revenue (all platforms)
Browser game — there are no downloads to count.
Reviews & rankings
Not yet reviewed by our editors.
Prototype: your vote is kept only in this browser and is not counted anywhere.
Not currently ranked.
No player reviews yet.
Prototype: reviews are stored in your browser only and are not published or sent to a server. Reviews are shown in the language they were written in.
Sources
| Source | Type | Published | Accessed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Show HN: Ported the 1999 game Bugdom to the browser and added a bunch of mods Hacker News (reallyeli) | Social post | Feb 9, 2026 | Nov 3, 2026 |
| Bugdom browser port (game page and mod menu) Eli Rose (reallyeli.com) | Official site | Not confirmed | Nov 3, 2026 |
| jorio/Bugdom — README and LICENSE.md (Pangea Software's Bugdom for modern systems) GitHub (Iliyas Jorio) | Repository | Not confirmed | Nov 3, 2026 |
| Official game page (language check) Eli Rose | Official site | Not confirmed | Nov 3, 2026 |
