FAQ

Matchmaking always looks for a live player first. If nobody is free within a few seconds, you are paired with a recorded run: the saved timings and tap positions of a real player, replayed step for step. The first one is your own - your opening round is recorded in your browser and becomes your ghost. Nothing in the arena is played by a script. Recorded runs never appear in leaderboards, and no win or rank is recorded from them.

Yes. Every duel is free and there is no sign-up. Optional accounts will come later, only for saving your name to individual leaderboards - playing stays free either way.

Press START and you are paired within about 3 seconds, preferring a live opponent and a different country than your last match. Every match is a fresh opponent - there are no rematches, so your record reflects play against the field, not one friend.

Because FlagDuel is about the field, not one rival: every match brings a new opponent from a new country. It keeps queues fast for everyone and makes win streaks mean something.

Yes. Every duel works with a finger on a touchscreen just as with a mouse - on phones the arena splits top and bottom instead of left and right.

Leaving a live match forfeits it; your opponent takes the win.

It means no live player was free in your matchmaking window. Busy hours pair humans almost instantly; quiet hours lean on recorded runs more often.

Your own runs live in your browser under the key arena-ghost in localStorage - clearing site data deletes them. When you finish a round, an anonymous copy (game, country code, timings and tap positions) is also kept on our server so other players have someone to face; it carries no name, no IP and nothing that identifies you.

When you connect, our hosting layer derives a two-letter country code from your IP address; the game keeps only that code. If it is unavailable, your side of the arena falls back to the time zone your browser reports - a display-only guess that never counts towards rankings. Your opponent sees your flag, country name and a randomly assigned nickname - never your IP, city or anything that identifies you. Details are on the privacy page.

FlagCoins are the arena's play money. You earn them only by finishing duels - a win pays more, a loss still pays something. They cannot be bought for real money, cannot be cashed out or exchanged for anything of real-world value, and cannot be sent to another player. They exist purely for fun inside FlagDuel.

When a new duel starts in the game you are watching, signed-in spectators get a short window to back one duelist with 5 to 100 coins - one pick per match. A correct call pays double your stake; a wrong one forfeits it, and forfeited stakes go to the winning duelist as a bounty. Duelists only ever see how many people back them, never the amounts. Because coins have no real-world value and cannot be bought or cashed out, this is a game mechanic, not gambling.