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July 16, 2026

Graph schema v3 carries one validated preferred Wikipedia article URL from the acquired sitelinks into the immutable entity record and public API. The node inspector now offers a compact “Read on Wikipedia” link below the description, preferring English and omitting the action when no acquired article exists. Article text is never copied into the bundle.

Opening node details now places a soft blur and low-opacity paper wash over the map while keeping the inspector crisp and readable. The backdrop closes the popover when selected, and the retained WebGL map scene explicitly redraws when the browser restores or refocuses the game tab so the paper texture remains visible after following an external article link. Inspector open and close changes also issue an explicit redraw after the compositor adds or removes the blur layer, preventing the flat temporary canvas that previously disappeared only after the next camera move.

Local verification now names one of four distinct surfaces: Compose acceptance at localhost, split Vite development at :5173, Playwright isolation at :4173, or the API alone at :8000. Compose remains the canonical manual check and must be rebuilt before a source-server result is reported as product acceptance.

Ten-category atlas refresh

The atlas taxonomy expanded from four broad branches to ten player-readable subjects: People, History & Society, Science & Technology, Nature & Life, Places & Architecture, Art & Design, Literature & Language, Music & Performance, Film & Media, and Sports & Games. The v2 seed catalog contains 200 live-verified Wikidata anchors, twenty per category. The round budget remains stable at 100 candidates and 40 published routes, now balanced as ten candidates and four published routes per category.

The refresh is a real data acquisition rather than a relabel. It adds newly expanded Wikidata entities, reruns ranked media discovery for every node, reuses only files whose existing Commons manifest and content hash still match, and downloads every new or changed selection. The media manifest exposes reused and downloaded counts separately and the final build still fails closed unless every entity has an attributed local image.

Documentary images across the route

The full-node Commons atlas now has a consistent product treatment instead of exposing images only at the round endpoints. Compact map nodes use square crops, result-trail cards use a less panoramic 5:4 frame, and the non-modal inspector shows a larger square image beside the entity identity. The introduction, active map, inspector, results, Sources drawer, and attribution model all resolve the same locally bundled media record; no gameplay screen fetches an external image at runtime.

Reachable-node cards now read in one direction: a narrow 1:3 relationship-color strip and glyph, the complete fact sentence, then the square entity image. Location, part, work, origin, nature, and influence relationships use the established signal, cartographic, ochre, moss, and mixed token palette. Counts such as “documented links” were removed from decision cards because the inspector already preserves every stored connection. The reachable-goal card uses paper and ink for readable copy while retaining the signal-colored finish action.

Clearer decision and hint controls

The Hint tools dock drops keyboard-like numbering that was not an actual shortcut contract. Compass, Lens, and Map fragment instead use larger names, their existing symbols, the score cost, and a short explanation of what each deterministic graph hint reveals. The map controls remain available to pointer, touch, and keyboard users, and the semantic button labels include the same help text for assistive technology.

The front page route preview is randomized without publishing its connecting middle entities, the play-mode chooser uses direct Solo, Daily challenge, and Multiplayer language, and the Daily leaderboard stays available from global navigation. Together these changes make route variety, mode choice, image provenance, and optional help visible before a player needs an end screen or a separate explanation.

Deterministic corridor recovery

The route-safe frontier now detects a single forced continuation that can reach neither the target nor another genuine choice. It treats the current node as exhausted before the player is led deeper into that terminal corridor, allowing the existing one-move Back action to return to the last real decision. The rule is derived from the pinned graph and active route, so it needs no entity blacklist and still permits a forced corridor when it reaches the goal or a new branch. Direct one-move dead ends remain available alongside other choices.

Choice-first round eligibility

Round curation excludes any candidate whose starting node exposes fewer than two distinct playable targets before deterministic hashing and publication. Parallel statements to the same entity count once. The API applies the same graph-derived policy before history-aware or date-hash selection as a defense-in-depth check. Explicit round IDs and already-pinned Daily assignments remain available for reproducible sessions, but the generated candidate and publication sets contain no forced-opening route.

Source-to-map intro handoff

The round introduction now renders only the real source and goal cards once the category title clears. Decorative Three.js card silhouettes and the implied direct route between the endpoints were removed, so no empty nodes compete with the playable entities. The cards fade in at an editorial scale, then shrink and spread toward the source-left and goal-right game composition. During the final 450 milliseconds, the intro crossfades into the already-mounted map instead of zooming into the source and hiding the goal. The five-second round contract and a static reduced-motion presentation remain unchanged.

Release-facing documentation

The repository front page now explains the three modes, round loop, current ten-category atlas, runtime architecture, test surfaces, and complete local quality gate. Two optimized screenshots were captured from the rebuilt Compose acceptance surface rather than the demo test server; their Commons provenance is documented beside the image assets. The documentation home, pipeline activation command, licensing totals, and inspector rules now match the active July 16 ten-category bundle.

Verification

The repository gate covers Python formatting, lint, typing, unit and data-quality tests, OpenAPI drift, frontend formatting, Svelte checks, unit tests, production builds, Chromium flows, strict MkDocs output, deterministic smoke-pack construction, Compose validation, and container builds. The final browser pass additionally checked the icon-text-image ordering, exact 1:3 icon strip, square map and inspector images, absence of node connection counts, readable goal contrast, and number-free hint controls against the real local API.