Magnetic Hound
URL: https://shipdefense.jasonwang.us
Stack: TypeScript, Three.js, Vite, MediaPipe
What It Is
Magnetic Hound is a 3D browser game about the HOUND, a magnetic quadruped robot with a goose-neck sensor and gun mast, sent aboard the hijacked freighter Meridian. Every surface — floor, ceiling, walls — is walkable. There is no global “up.” The surface you are standing on defines which way is down.
This is not a conventional shooter. The ship is hijacked, and the HOUND is a retrieval unit, not a wrecking crew. A rifle round through the exterior hull opens the Meridian to space and ends the run. So the quiet tools are the real ones: a capture net, a claw, and a magnetic grapple — one stealthy approach at a time.
What It Does
- Walk on any surface — floor, ceiling, walls. Magnetic feet keep you planted; corners are stepped onto, not climbed
- Jump through zero-G gaps — launch from one surface, fly through free fall, land and magnetically adhere to another
- Switch cameras — third person for spatial reasoning, first person for aiming, with a blended transition that preserves your aim
- Fight with quiet tools — capture net (T), claw strike (F), magnetic grapple (right mouse). The rifle opens the hull and fails the mission
- Optional webcam head tracking — MediaPipe adds an embodied aim offset on top of the mouse, fully toggleable
- Seven decks — Test Chamber, Deck 7 Promenade, Junction 12, Jefferies Spine, Shuttle Bay, Reactor Gallery, Outer Hull — plus a map builder and component gallery
- Browser-based — no install, just open the URL and play
How It Works
You open the game in your browser and start in the test chamber. The robot walks with W/A/S/D, looks and aims with the mouse, and jumps/launches with Space. When you step onto a wall or ceiling, your body reorients so that surface becomes “down.” Jump and you become a projectile in zero-G, drifting until you magnetically latch onto a new wall.
In third person you read the geometry — all four feet, the surface you are on, the space ahead. Press V and you are in first person, aiming the centered AR-style gun. The mouse owns the aim; an optional webcam layer shifts your viewpoint like a window without rotating the shot.
Drones patrol on different surfaces — floor, wall, ceiling — so you must actually turn to find them. You can net them, claw them, or grapple them. Or you can sneak (Shift) and close the distance silently.
The game is built entirely in the browser: Three.js for rendering, TypeScript for logic, Vite for building, MediaPipe for the optional head tracking. It is deployed as a static site.
Tech Stack
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Renderer | Three.js 0.186.x |
| Language | TypeScript |
| Build tool | Vite |
| Testing | Vitest (463+ tests, 96% coverage) |
| Head tracking | MediaPipe @mediapipe/tasks-vision (self-hosted model) |
| Physics | Custom surface controller + raycasts |
| UI | Plain DOM/CSS |
| Audio | Web Audio API / Three.js positional audio |
| License | MIT |