# arcade.ly blog

> Posts by Bart Read about building arcade.ly's browser games, JavaScript and web performance, running a small site, and AI-assisted software delivery.

For the games themselves, see https://arcade.ly/llms.txt.

## Posts

- [arcade.ly now has an MCP server](https://arcade.ly/blog/2026/10/27/announcing-the-arcadely-mcp-server/) (2026-10-27): arcade.ly now has a free, read-only MCP server, so AI assistants and agents can look up its games, controls, hiscores and blog posts. Here's what it does, how to connect, and how I built it so it doesn't slow the site down.
- [Agentic Software Delivery & The End Of Source Code As We Know It](https://arcade.ly/blog/2026/09/25/agentic-software-delivery-human-readable-code/) (2026-09-25): With increasingly powerful AI agents and models, will there come a point where we no longer want or need human-readable source code any more? Will we instead prefer representations that are better optimised for use by LLMs? Will the concept of source code simply disappear? I don't think so, and in this post I'll lay out why.
- [Why is Agentic Coding so Tiring? An Incomplete Hypothesis](https://arcade.ly/blog/2026/08/29/why-is-agentic-coding-so-tiring/) (2026-08-29): Some personal thoughts on why, at least sometimes, agentic coding can feel oddly exhausting
- [Thank You Joan Stark](https://arcade.ly/blog/2026/08/10/thank-you-joan-stark/) (2026-08-10): A short tribute to the art and artistry of Joan G Stark, an ASCII artist who was highly active in the ASCII art community during the early years of the web.
- [Not many people are mourning for Stack Overflow](https://arcade.ly/blog/2026/07/23/not-many-people-mourn-Stackoverflow/) (2026-07-23): Stack Overflow is basically dead, killed by LLMs. Not many are mourning, and plenty seem gleeful. The site, and the community, both had their problems, but should we be so dismissive of a site that was so valuable to so many for so long?
- [Today I learned: destructuring assignment in JavaScript](https://arcade.ly/blog/2020/05/01/today-i-learned-destructuring-assignment/) (2020-05-01): Is it faster to use JavaScripts built-in Math functions, or a lookup table? Does the context matter? How do you decide which to use?
- [JavaScript: Microbenchmarks and their pitfalls - trig, random numbers, sqrt, and lookups](https://arcade.ly/blog/2020/04/02/javascript-pitfalls-of-microbenchmarks-trig-functions-math-random-vs-lookups/) (2020-04-02): Is it faster to use JavaScript's built-in Math functions, or a lookup table? And what can the answer tell us about microbenchmarks in general?
- [How to debug NaN and NaN propagation bugs in JavaScript](https://arcade.ly/blog/2020/02/23/how-to-debug-nan-and-nan-propagation-bugs-in-javascript/) (2020-02-23): Debugging NaN related bugs is a common challenge, particularly for JavaScript devs building games, or other real time front-end apps that handle numeric data
- [Shoot The Rocks: tips and tricks for dealing with black holes in my version of Asteroids](https://arcade.ly/blog/2020/02/01/shoot-the-rocks-tips-and-tricks-for-dealing-with-black-holes-in-my-version-of-asteroids/) (2020-02-01): Black holes are feature that didn't exist in the original Asteroids or Asteroids Deluxe arcade games, and they need some unique handling
- [Making gravity fun: adding black holes to Shoot The Rocks, my version of Asteroids](https://arcade.ly/blog/2020/01/25/making-gravity-fun-adding-black-holes-to-my-version-of-asteroids/) (2020-01-25): I wanted to spice Asteroids up by adding black holes with gravity effects to it, but is it possible to make this fun?
- [Perceived performance part 2: load assets asynchronously or on-demand](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/03/06/perceived-performance-part-2-load-assets-asynchronously-or-on-demand/) (2017-03-06): Defer loading, and load assets asynchronously and/or on demand to improve perceived performance
- [Perceived performance part 1: what is perceived performance?](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/03/04/perceived-performance-part-1-what-is-perceived-performance/) (2017-03-04): Perceived performance is arguably more important than measured performance - but what is perceived performance?
- [Is that Star Castle in The Expanse on Netflix?](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/02/09/Is-that-star-castle-in-the-expanse/) (2017-02-09): Have I just spotted somebody playing Star Castle in The Expanse on Netflix?
- [How good is Cloudflare's Always Online™ technology?](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/01/22/how-good-is-cloudflare-always-online/) (2017-01-22): How good is Cloudflare's Always Online™ technology - can it keep your website online when it's down?
- [How to run a Node.js app as a service on Ubuntu](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/01/21/running-a-nodejs-app-as-a-service-on-ubuntu/) (2017-01-21): How to run a Node.js app as a service on Ubuntu using upstart (pre-15.04) or systemd (15.04 and later)
- [Welcome to the arcade.ly blog](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/01/20/hello-world/) (2017-01-20): Our first post - welcome to the new arcade.ly blog
- [Licensing and attributions](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/01/01/licensing-and-attributions/) (2017-01-01): What do you need to do if you want to license arcade.ly's games or use them in a public setting? Also includes attributions for relevant assets used by arcade.ly
- [Privacy and compliance](https://arcade.ly/blog/2017/01/01/terms-and-conditions/) (2017-01-01): arcade.ly's privacy policy which describes how we handle personal information, cookies, your rights, and related topics