A game you come back to has not begun

Reported by Jesse, 2026-08-30: "when you are continuing the saved game
out of that screen, do not post a message that says 'The game has
begun.' … it needs to say 'The game has resumed.'"

A restored game draws exactly like a dealt one — mid-Day, mid-phase,
with a log already several turns deep — and solitaire said nothing at
all to tell the two apart. It flashes "The game has resumed — Day 3,
Stage 7" now, on both ways back in: the setup screen's Continue saved
game, and a bare reload that restores the save.

THE SAME LINE WAS WRONG ON THE MULTIPLAYER SIDE, IN THE OTHER
DIRECTION. noteFirstFrame guards on firstFrameSeen, which is per
page-load — so re-entering a game this browser already held a seat in,
by reloading mid-game or picking it out of the lobby's list, announced
that the game had BEGUN to somebody who had been playing it for an
hour. beginRemote carries whether this is a rejoin now, and the line
reads "resumed" when it is.

Both halves are pinned, including that a brand-new game does not claim
to be a resume — an announcement that fires either way says nothing.

Stays in the unshipped v0.7.9. 878 tests pass, eleven new.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01AdG46Ja2PEDBkpqiDazMoX

CHANGELOG.md

@@ -235,6 +235,25 @@ Three more from Jesse reading the two screens side by side.
   train may be discarded" — ships **on** in all four types, not just Co-op. The note now says only
   what is true of all of them: "Each one changes how the game plays."
 
+### A game you come back to has not begun
+
+Jesse, 2026-08-30: "when you are continuing the saved game out of that screen, do not post a message
+that says 'The game has begun.' … it needs to say 'The game has resumed.'"
+
+A restored game draws exactly like a dealt one — mid-Day, mid-phase, with a log already several turns
+deep — and **solitaire said nothing at all** to tell them apart. It flashes "The game has resumed —
+Day 3, Stage 7" now, on both ways back: the setup screen's **Continue saved game**, and a bare reload
+that restores the save.
+
+**The same line was wrong on the multiplayer side, in the other direction.** `noteFirstFrame` guards
+on `firstFrameSeen`, which is per page-load — so re-entering a game this browser already held a seat
+in, by reloading mid-game or picking it out of the lobby's list, announced that the game had **begun**
+to somebody who had been playing it for an hour. `beginRemote` carries whether this is a rejoin now,
+and the line reads "resumed" when it is.
+
+Both halves are pinned, including that a brand-new game does *not* claim to be a resume — an
+announcement that fires either way says nothing.
+
 ### Three wording and layout fixes
 
 - **The collision entries** on all three screens now read "The game ends immediately and results in
@@ -249,7 +268,7 @@ Three more from Jesse reading the two screens side by side.
   cost, not a danger, and red would outrank the actual rules above it. The buttons say **Continue
   Existing Saved Game** and **Deal New Game** rather than "Continue saved game" and "Deal".
 
-877 tests pass, ten of them new; one existing test asserted the opposite of the collision ruling
+878 tests pass, eleven of them new; one existing test asserted the opposite of the collision ruling
 above and says so where it was reversed.
 
 ---

src/web/main.ts

@@ -506,7 +506,7 @@ const lobbyHandlers = {
     const record = readStore().games[gameId];
     if (!record) return;
     if (record.stage === 'game' && record.seat !== undefined) {
-      beginRemote({ ...record, seat: record.seat });
+      beginRemote({ ...record, seat: record.seat }, true);
       return;
     }
     // Still seated in a lobby that had not started: the stream puts us back on the seating screen,
@@ -533,6 +533,8 @@ const HANDOFF_STALL_MS = 8000;
 let handoffOpenedAt = 0;
 let handoffStall: number | null = null;
 let firstFrameSeen = false;
+/** Set when this page entered a game it was already seated in, so the first frame says so. */
+let rejoiningRemote = false;
 
 function setText(id: string, text: string): void {
   const el = document.getElementById(id);
@@ -612,7 +614,7 @@ function noteDayEnd(f: Frame): void {
  * nothing saying this was the game just set up. `#phasenote` cannot help: it announces a CHANGE of
  * phase, and there is no previous phase to have changed from.
  */
-function noteFirstFrame(f: Frame): void {
+function noteFirstFrame(f: Frame, rejoining = false): void {
   if (firstFrameSeen || isLocal(session)) return;
   firstFrameSeen = true;
   const held = Date.now() - handoffOpenedAt;
@@ -621,14 +623,34 @@ function noteFirstFrame(f: Frame): void {
   window.setTimeout(
     () => {
       closeHandoff();
+      /**
+       * "BEGUN" IS ONLY TRUE ONCE. `firstFrameSeen` is per page-load, so re-entering a game this
+       * browser already holds a seat in — a reload mid-game, or picking it out of the lobby's list
+       * — announced that the game had begun, to a player who had been playing it for an hour.
+       * Reported for the solitaire side by Jesse, 2026-08-30; the same line was wrong here.
+       */
       flashAnnounce(
-        `The game has begun — ${type} · ${f.players.length} players · Day ${f.day}, Stage ${f.stage}`,
+        `The game has ${rejoining ? 'resumed' : 'begun'} — ${type} · ${f.players.length} players · ` +
+          `Day ${f.day}, Stage ${f.stage}`,
       );
     },
     Math.max(0, HANDOFF_BEAT_MS - held),
   );
 }
 
+/**
+ * COMING BACK TO A GAME, said out loud — the solitaire counterpart to `noteFirstFrame`.
+ *
+ * A restored game draws exactly like a dealt one: mid-Day, mid-phase, with a log already several
+ * turns deep. Nothing distinguished "this is the game you left" from "this is a game that has just
+ * started", and the multiplayer path had the opposite problem — it announced that the game had
+ * BEGUN to a player rejoining one (Jesse, 2026-08-30: "do not post a message that says 'The game
+ * has begun.' … it needs to say 'The game has resumed.'").
+ */
+function announceResumed(f: Frame): void {
+  flashAnnounce(`The game has resumed — Day ${f.day}, Stage ${f.stage}`);
+}
+
 /** Toggles the three mutually-exclusive top-level screens `play.html` defines — `#lobby` (Phase 4),
  * `#gameui` (the board, whether local or remote), and `#solitairesetup` (asked before the first
  * solitaire deal, the same way `#lobby` is asked before the first multiplayer one — Jesse,
@@ -646,7 +668,7 @@ function showScreen(which: 'lobby' | 'gameui' | 'solitairesetup'): void {
  * earlier visit. Either way the token is what makes reconnection work (`lobby-and-sessions.md` §1),
  * so it is always written back here before anything else happens.
  */
-function beginRemote(ready: LobbyReady): void {
+function beginRemote(ready: LobbyReady, rejoining = false): void {
   saveRemote({ token: ready.token, gameId: ready.gameId, gameCode: ready.gameCode, seat: ready.seat, stage: 'game' });
   gameCode = ready.gameCode;
   showScreen('gameui');
@@ -656,6 +678,7 @@ function beginRemote(ready: LobbyReady): void {
   // banner (`#presence`), and it holds a beat so the game visibly begins.
   openHandoff();
   session = createRemoteSession(ready.token, ready.seat, abandonRemote);
+  rejoiningRemote = rejoining;
   applyCapabilities();
   // A LocalSession has data the instant it is constructed; a RemoteSession does not — its first
   // real Frame only exists once the SSE connection's first push arrives, so the first render waits
@@ -742,7 +765,7 @@ function start(): void {
   // session reports a dead game through `abandonRemote`, which lands in the lobby.
   const remembered = wantsSolitaire ? null : loadRemote();
   if (remembered && remembered.stage === 'game' && remembered.seat !== undefined) {
-    beginRemote({ ...remembered, seat: remembered.seat });
+    beginRemote({ ...remembered, seat: remembered.seat }, true);
     return;
   }
   /**
@@ -799,13 +822,17 @@ function start(): void {
   const seed = requested !== null ? Number(requested) || 1 : Math.floor(Math.random() * 1e9);
   const local = createLocalSession(seed, solitaireDefaults(gameOptionsFromUrl(params)));
   session = local;
-  if (saved && requested === null) local.restore(saved);
+  const restored = Boolean(saved) && requested === null;
+  if (saved && restored) local.restore(saved);
 
   applyCapabilities();
   // Every render goes through the session, so the page redraws whenever the game says it changed —
   // which is what a remote session will use to push. Locally it fires on each accepted intent.
   session.subscribe(render);
   render();
+  // Coming back to a game is not the same event as being dealt one, and the board looks identical
+  // either way — mid-Day, mid-phase, with a log already deep (Jesse, 2026-08-30).
+  if (restored) announceResumed(session.view());
 }
 
 /**
@@ -934,7 +961,7 @@ function rulesSummary(f: Frame): string {
 function render(): void {
   const f = session.view();
   const menu = session.menu();
-  noteFirstFrame(f);
+  noteFirstFrame(f, rejoiningRemote);
 
   // Which squares the selected card or track piece may go on. Highlighting them is what turns the
   // coordinate list into a board: you pick the thing, then click where it goes.
@@ -2224,6 +2251,7 @@ function runSolitaireSetup(params: URLSearchParams, hasSave = false, live: Frame
       ? () => {
           showScreen('gameui');
           render();
+          announceResumed(session.view());
         }
       : () => void (location.search = '');
   }

test/web.test.ts

@@ -4348,6 +4348,30 @@ describe('the solitaire setup screen', () => {
     assert.match(n.search, /coltotal=0/, 'unticking the total-collision condition did not switch it off');
   });
 
+  it('says the game has RESUMED, not begun, when you come back to one', async () => {
+    /**
+     * REPORTED BY JESSE 2026-08-30: "when you are continuing the saved game out of that screen, do
+     * not post a message that says 'The game has begun.' … it needs to say 'The game has resumed.'"
+     *
+     * A restored game draws exactly like a dealt one — mid-Day, mid-phase, log already deep — so
+     * nothing distinguished the two. Checked in both directions here: the wording itself, and that
+     * the multiplayer line which DOES say "begun" cannot be said to somebody rejoining.
+     */
+    const save = JSON.stringify({ seed: 12345, history: [] });
+    const { els } = await load('', { 'station-master.save.v1': save });
+    assert.match(String(els.get('announce')!['textContent']), /has resumed/, 'a restored game said nothing');
+    assert.doesNotMatch(String(els.get('announce')!['textContent']), /has begun/, 'a restored game claimed to be new');
+
+    // A freshly dealt game must NOT claim to be resumed — the announcement has to mean something.
+    const fresh = await load('?hand=sixRandom');
+    assert.doesNotMatch(String(fresh.els.get('announce')?.['textContent'] ?? ''), /resumed/,
+      'a brand new game announced itself as a resume');
+
+    // And the multiplayer first-frame line is conditional now rather than always "begun".
+    const src = readFileSync(join(root, 'src/web/main.ts'), 'utf8');
+    assert.match(src, /rejoining \? 'resumed' : 'begun'/, 'rejoining a table still says the game has begun');
+  });
+
   it('backing out deals nothing and puts the same game back on screen', async () => {
     /**
      * WHAT CANCEL USED TO BE. The dialog had a Cancel button and an Esc key, and this pinned that