A free, open-source collection of party games called Pocket Circle is now published on GitHub, offering four pass-and-play titles that run on a single phone. According to the project page, the app has no accounts, no advertising, no analytics and no game server. Everything a player saves stays in the browser on that device. The project is hosted under the GitHub account LucaSforza, and its description highlights three features: it is free, it is ad-free, and it works offline.
A party format built around one phone
Pocket Circle is built for groups gathered in one room. Instead of each person installing an app or signing in, the group hands one phone around the table. Players keep their secrets to themselves, and the conversation does the rest. That design suits game nights, gatherings of friends and family, and any setting where a shared device is more practical than a set of individual ones.
New players see the app in English by default. If someone chooses another language, the app remembers that choice. The project’s own documentation describes its localization work as ongoing, and it invites contributors to help improve bilingual content.
The catalogue has changed over time. The GitHub page notes that a game called Stessa Onda has been retired from the playable list. Its saved sessions and historical statistics are still supported, so players who opened it earlier will not lose that data when they open the app.
Privacy by design
The app is a static web application, which means it is served as files and runs entirely in the browser. The project states that there is no gameplay backend. Player names, optional photos, settings, active sessions and statistics are stored in IndexedDB, a storage system built into modern browsers, and the data is tied to the current browser origin.
That design has practical consequences. Saved data does not move between devices, and it does not follow a player from the GitHub Pages website to a local development server. Clearing a browser’s site data erases everything. The project also advises using one game tab per device to avoid conflicts between open sessions.
- Player names and optional photos
- Settings and language preferences
- Active game sessions
- Statistics and historical results
The project makes a specific point about usage data. Because the app has no telemetry, it does not publish any public ranking of how popular each game is. For a free app that wants to limit data collection, that is a notable choice.
Playing offline and installing the app
Offline play requires a short setup. A player must open the published app online and wait for the message ‘Download complete’ before relying on offline startup. Once that cache is in place, all four games and their content are available without a network connection. The GitHub page says no service is needed during play.
There are limits to keep in mind. Browsers can evict cached files to free storage, and a first visit made while offline cannot load the app at all. The project notes that offline startup depends on that initial online visit and on the browser keeping its cache.
Where supported, players can use the browser’s install option or Add to Home Screen. On iPhone and iPad, the path is Safari, then Share, then Add to Home Screen. The project states that no installation popups appear. To receive an update, a player should return online, close every Pocket Circle tab or app window, and reopen the app. Cached updates do not delete saves stored in IndexedDB.
Sharing is also built in. Players can share the full catalogue or a single game from the setup or results screens. The app uses native sharing where available, falls back to copying a link, and offers a selectable link if clipboard access is denied. The project says shared links never include players or private game state.
Open source, licensing and contributions
Pocket Circle is released under the GNU Affero General Public License version 3.0 or later. Anyone can inspect and modify the source code in the repository. The AGPL is a copyleft licence from the GNU project, and its distinctive feature is that its source-sharing terms extend to software run as a network service. If someone runs a modified version for other people over a network, the project’s page notes that those terms apply. Readers who plan to host a modified copy should read the licence text itself.
The codebase uses TypeScript, the Vite build tool and IndexedDB. Developers can run npm test to execute the Vitest test suite, and npm run build to type-check the code and generate the GitHub Pages build in a dist folder. The repository’s CONTRIBUTING.md file contains further development notes.
The project welcomes contributions of several kinds, including focused bug reports, accessibility checks, bilingual improvements and clear, tested patches. Contributors are asked to read CONTRIBUTING.md before opening a pull request.
Deployment and what comes next
The site is published with GitHub Pages, a free static hosting service from GitHub. According to the project, the Pages source must be set to GitHub Actions. A deployment workflow tests and builds the app on each push to the main branch and then publishes the dist folder. Other branches and pull requests are checked without being deployed.
The project has a naming detail worth knowing. The product is now called Pocket Circle, but the base path remains /ImpostorGame/. The maintainers explain that the legacy URL remains in place so existing links and saved data keep working. They warn against renaming the Pages site without a migration plan.
Pocket Circle is a useful example of a privacy-focused, open-source party app that avoids accounts and servers. Its success will depend on how many people contribute fixes, translations and accessibility improvements in the months ahead. For now, the project offers a simple promise to players: a phone, a group, and a game that works without an internet connection once it has been set up.
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