What is pretendyourexyzzy?

Pretend You're Xyzzy is an open-source clone of Cards Against Humanity, the popular party game where players complete fill-in-the-blank prompts with funny, absurd, or inappropriate answer cards. The project includes both the server software and a web client, so you can host your own version of the game that friends can join through a browser. It's designed for groups who want to play together online without relying on a third-party service. At a technical level, the project is built in Java and runs on a web server called Tomcat (specifically version 7). Building it requires a tool called Maven, which compiles the code and packages it into something deployable. There's also an optional GeoIP feature that can tell the server roughly where players are connecting from, though you'd need to download a separate location database for that to work. The main audience is someone who wants to run their own private game server for friends, a community, or an event. For example, a Discord group could host a game night where members join a shared URL and play rounds together in real time. Since it's self-hosted, you control who has access and don't depend on an external company's servers staying online. The README also points to a Docker-based version maintained by someone else, which simplifies the setup process considerably. Instead of manually configuring Tomcat and Maven, you can run a single command to start the whole thing in a container. That makes it far more approachable for someone who isn't a Java developer but still wants to get a game server running quickly. The core project itself, though, expects some familiarity with Java build tooling and server deployment.