tcgreplay

Running it on your desktop

You can run the playmat on your own computer and use it with the Claude desktop app. There is no sign-in, no limits on players, and your games stay on your machine. It runs one game at a time.

What you need

  • Go 1.27 or newer and Node.js 22 or newer.
  • git, to download the source.
  • The Claude desktop app.
  • Tested on Linux and macOS. Windows is untested.

Install

Download the source and build it:

git clone https://github.com/nicholasjackson/tcgreplay.git
cd tcgreplay
make install

make install builds the board and puts the tcgreplay program in Go’s install folder. To see where, run:

echo "$(go env GOPATH)/bin/tcgreplay"

Connect the Claude desktop app

Open the Claude desktop app’s MCP settings file, claude_desktop_config.json (in the app: Settings → Developer → Edit Config), and add tcgreplay with the path from above:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "tcgreplay": { "command": "/home/you/go/bin/tcgreplay" }
  }
}

Replace /home/you/go/bin/tcgreplay with your path. Save the file and restart the Claude desktop app.

Check it works. In a new chat, ask:

What can the tcgreplay playmat do?

Card data

The playmat downloads its card data (every card’s text and art addresses) from the project the first time it runs, so the first run needs an internet connection. It keeps a copy on your computer and plays from it whenever you are offline. While you are online it checks for new card data every few minutes, so new sets and fixes appear within minutes, with no update to install. A game you already have open keeps the cards it started with; the next game you start or import uses the new data.

The board

The board is at http://127.0.0.1:7777. Open it in your browser while you play: there is no sign-in on the desktop. It keeps running across app restarts.

For more about building and running it, see the source repository.