AI Dungeon Game

Module 2: Game API implementation

We are going to start by implementing our Game API. To do this, we need to create 4 API’s in total:

1. createGame - this will create a new game instance.
2. queryGames - this will return a paginated list of previously saved games.
3. saveAction - this will save an action for a given game.
4. queryActions - this will return a paginated list of all actions related to a game.

API Schema

To define our API inputs and outputs, let’s create our schema using Zod within the packages/game-api/src/schema directory as follows:

action.ts

import { z } from 'zod';

export const ActionSchema = z.object({
  playerName: z.string(),
  timestamp: z.string().datetime(),
  role: z.enum(['assistant', 'user']),
  content: z.string(),
});

export type IAction = z.TypeOf<typeof ActionSchema>;

common.ts

import { z } from 'zod';

export const QueryInputSchema = z.object({
  cursor: z.string().optional(),
  limit: z.number().optional().default(100),
});

export const createPaginatedQueryOutput = <ItemType extends z.ZodTypeAny>(
  itemSchema: ItemType,
) => {
  return z.object({
    items: z.array(itemSchema),
    cursor: z.string().nullable(),
  });
};

export type IQueryInput = z.TypeOf<typeof QueryInputSchema>;

game.ts

import { z } from 'zod';

export const GameSchema = z.object({
  playerName: z.string(),
  genre: z.enum(['zombie', 'superhero', 'medieval']),
  lastUpdated: z.string().datetime(),
});

export type IGame = z.TypeOf<typeof GameSchema>;

index.ts

export * from './echo.js'
export * from './action.js';
export * from './common.js';
export * from './game.js';

You can also delete the packages/game-api/src/schema/echo.ts file given we will not be using it in this project.

Tip

As you can see above, for each of the schemas we define in Zod, we also export an interface using the z.TypeOf syntax. This converts our zod definition into a Typescript interface without having to duplicate effort!

Entity modelling

The ER diagram for our application is as follows:

We are going to implement our Database in DynamoDB and will be using the ElectroDB DynamoDB client library to simplify things. To get started we need to first install electrodb by running the following command:

pnpm

pnpm add -w electrodb @aws-sdk/client-dynamodb

yarn

yarn add electrodb @aws-sdk/client-dynamodb

npm

npm install --legacy-peer-deps electrodb @aws-sdk/client-dynamodb

bun

bun install electrodb @aws-sdk/client-dynamodb

Note

All dependencies are added to the root package.json as the @aws/nx-plugin follows the single version policy principle. For more information, please refer to the ts#project guide.

Now let’s create the following files within our packages/game-api/src/entities folder to define our ElectroDB entities as per the above ER Diagram:

action.ts

import { Entity } from 'electrodb';
import { DynamoDBClient } from '@aws-sdk/client-dynamodb';

export const createActionEntity = (client?: DynamoDBClient) =>
  new Entity(
    {
      model: {
        entity: 'Action',
        version: '1',
        service: 'game',
      },
      attributes: {
        playerName: { type: 'string', required: true, readOnly: true },
        timestamp: {
          type: 'string',
          required: true,
          readOnly: true,
          set: () => new Date().toISOString(),
          default: () => new Date().toISOString(),
        },
        role: { type: 'string', required: true, readOnly: true },
        content: { type: 'string', required: true, readOnly: true },
      },
      indexes: {
        primary: {
          pk: { field: 'pk', composite: ['playerName'] },
          sk: { field: 'sk', composite: ['timestamp'] },
        },
      },
    },
    { client, table: process.env.TABLE_NAME },
  );

game.ts

import { Entity } from 'electrodb';
import { DynamoDBClient } from '@aws-sdk/client-dynamodb';

export const createGameEntity = (client?: DynamoDBClient) =>
  new Entity(
    {
      model: {
        entity: 'Game',
        version: '1',
        service: 'game',
      },
      attributes: {
        playerName: { type: 'string', required: true, readOnly: true },
        genre: { type: 'string', required: true, readOnly: true },
        lastUpdated: {
          type: 'string',
          required: true,
          default: () => new Date().toISOString(),
        },
      },
      indexes: {
        primary: {
          pk: { field: 'pk', composite: ['playerName'] },
          sk: {
            field: 'sk',
            composite: [],
          },
        },
      },
    },
    { client, table: process.env.TABLE_NAME },
  );

ElectroDB is very powerful and allows us to not only define our types, but can also provide defaults for certain values like the timestamps above. In addition, ElectroDB follows single-table design which is the best practice when using DynamoDB.

Note

Whilst ElectroDB does support collections, we have chosen not to use them in this tutorial for simplicity.

Adding the dynamoDB client to our tRPC context

Given we need access to the DynamoDB client in each of our procedures, we want to be able to create a single instance of the client which we can pass through via context. To do this, make the following changes within packages/game-api/src:

middleware/dynamodb.ts

middleware/dynamodb.ts

import { DynamoDBClient } from '@aws-sdk/client-dynamodb';
import { initTRPC } from '@trpc/server';

export interface IDynamoDBContext {
  dynamoDb?: DynamoDBClient;
}

export const createDynamoDBPlugin = () => {
  const t = initTRPC.context<IDynamoDBContext>().create();
  return t.procedure.use(async (opts) => {
    const dynamoDb = new DynamoDBClient();

    const response = await opts.next({
      ctx: {
        ...opts.ctx,
        dynamoDb,
      },
    });

    return response;
  });
};

This is a plugin that we instrument to create the DynamoDBClient and inject it into the context.

middleware/index.ts

middleware/index.ts

import { CreateAWSLambdaContextOptions } from '@trpc/server/adapters/aws-lambda';
import type { APIGatewayProxyEvent } from 'aws-lambda';
import { ILoggerContext } from './logger.js';
import { IMetricsContext } from './metrics.js';
import { ITracerContext } from './tracer.js';
import { IDynamoDBContext } from './dynamodb.js';

export * from './dynamodb.js';
export * from './logger.js';
export * from './metrics.js';
export * from './tracer.js';
export * from './error.js';

export type IMiddlewareContext =
  CreateAWSLambdaContextOptions<APIGatewayProxyEvent> &
    IDynamoDBContext &
    ILoggerContext &
    IMetricsContext &
    ITracerContext;

Augment our IMiddlewareContext to add the IDynamoDBContext.

init.ts

init.ts

import { initTRPC } from '@trpc/server';
import {
  createDynamoDBPlugin,
  createErrorPlugin,
  createLoggerPlugin,
  createMetricsPlugin,
  createTracerPlugin,
  IMiddlewareContext,
} from './middleware/index.js';

process.env.POWERTOOLS_SERVICE_NAME = 'GameApi';
process.env.POWERTOOLS_METRICS_NAMESPACE = 'GameApi';

export type Context = IMiddlewareContext;

export const t = initTRPC.context<Context>().create();

export const publicProcedure = t.procedure
  .concat(createDynamoDBPlugin())
  .concat(createLoggerPlugin())
  .concat(createTracerPlugin())
  .concat(createMetricsPlugin())
  .concat(createErrorPlugin());

The DynamoDB plugin is instrumented.

Note

The concat api binds our middleware to the procedures we define. For more details please refer to the concat guide.

Defining our procedures

Now it’s time to implement the API methods. To do this, make the following changes within packages/game-api/src/procedures:

query-actions.ts

import { createActionEntity } from '../entities/action.js';
import {
  ActionSchema,
  IAction,
  QueryInputSchema,
  createPaginatedQueryOutput,
} from '../schema/index.js';
import { publicProcedure } from '../init.js';
import { z } from 'zod';

export const queryActions = publicProcedure
  .input(QueryInputSchema.extend({ playerName: z.string() }))
  .output(createPaginatedQueryOutput(ActionSchema))
  .query(async ({ input, ctx }) => {
    const actionEntity = createActionEntity(ctx.dynamoDb);
    const result = await actionEntity.query
      .primary({ playerName: input.playerName })
      .go({ cursor: input.cursor, count: input.limit });

    return {
      items: result.data as IAction[],
      cursor: result.cursor,
    };
  });

query-games.ts

import { createGameEntity } from '../entities/game.js';
import {
  GameSchema,
  IGame,
  QueryInputSchema,
  createPaginatedQueryOutput,
} from '../schema/index.js';
import { publicProcedure } from '../init.js';

export const queryGames = publicProcedure
  .input(QueryInputSchema)
  .output(createPaginatedQueryOutput(GameSchema))
  .query(async ({ input, ctx }) => {
    const gameEntity = createGameEntity(ctx.dynamoDb);
    const result = await gameEntity.scan.go({
      cursor: input.cursor,
      count: input.limit,
    });

    return {
      items: result.data as IGame[],
      cursor: result.cursor,
    };
  });

save-action.ts

import { ActionSchema, IAction } from '../schema/index.js';
import { publicProcedure } from '../init.js';
import { createActionEntity } from '../entities/action.js';
import { createGameEntity } from '../entities/game.js';

export const saveAction = publicProcedure
  .input(ActionSchema.omit({ timestamp: true }))
  .output(ActionSchema)
  .mutation(async ({ input, ctx }) => {
    const actionEntity = createActionEntity(ctx.dynamoDb);
    const gameEntity = createGameEntity(ctx.dynamoDb);

    const action = await actionEntity.put(input).go();
    await gameEntity
      .update({ playerName: input.playerName })
      .set({ lastUpdated: action.data.timestamp })
      .go();
    return action.data as IAction;
  });

save-game.ts

import { createGameEntity } from '../entities/game.js';
import { GameSchema, IGame } from '../schema/index.js';
import { publicProcedure } from '../init.js';

export const saveGame = publicProcedure
  .input(GameSchema.omit({ lastUpdated: true }))
  .output(GameSchema)
  .mutation(async ({ input, ctx }) => {
    const gameEntity = createGameEntity(ctx.dynamoDb);

    const result = await gameEntity.put(input).go();
    return result.data as IGame;
  });

You can also delete the echo.ts file (from packages/game-api/src/procedures) given we will not be using it in this project.

Router setup

Now that we have defined our procedures, let’s wire them into our API. To do this, update the following file as follows:

packages/game-api/backend/src/router.ts

import {
  awsLambdaRequestHandler,
  CreateAWSLambdaContextOptions,
} from '@trpc/server/adapters/aws-lambda';
import { echo } from './procedures/echo.js';
import { t } from './init.js';
import { APIGatewayProxyEvent } from 'aws-lambda';
import { queryActions } from './procedures/query-actions.js';
import { saveAction } from './procedures/save-action.js';
import { queryGames } from './procedures/query-games.js';
import { saveGame } from './procedures/save-game.js';

export const router = t.router;

export const appRouter = router({
  echo,
  actions: router({
    query: queryActions,
    save: saveAction,
  }),
  games: router({
    query: queryGames,
    save: saveGame,
  }),
});

export const handler = awsLambdaRequestHandler({
  router: appRouter,
  createContext: (
    ctx: CreateAWSLambdaContextOptions<APIGatewayProxyEvent>,
  ) => ctx,
  responseMeta: () => ({
    headers: {
      'Access-Control-Allow-Origin': '*',
      'Access-Control-Allow-Methods': '*',
    },
  }),
});

export type AppRouter = typeof appRouter;

Infrastructure

The final step is to update our infrastructure to create the DynamoDB table and grant permissions to perform operations from the Game API. To do so, update the packages/infra/src as follows:

constructs/electrodb-table.ts

constructs/electrodb-table.ts

import { CfnOutput } from 'aws-cdk-lib';
import {
  AttributeType,
  BillingMode,
  ProjectionType,
  Table,
  TableProps,
} from 'aws-cdk-lib/aws-dynamodb';
import { Construct } from 'constructs';
import { suppressRules } from ':dungeon-adventure/common-constructs';

export type ElectrodbDynamoTableProps = Omit<
  TableProps,
  'partitionKey' | 'sortKey' | 'billingMode'
>;

export class ElectrodbDynamoTable extends Table {
  constructor(scope: Construct, id: string, props?: ElectrodbDynamoTableProps) {
    super(scope, id, {
      partitionKey: {
        name: 'pk',
        type: AttributeType.STRING,
      },
      sortKey: {
        name: 'sk',
        type: AttributeType.STRING,
      },
      billingMode: BillingMode.PAY_PER_REQUEST,
      ...props,
    });

    this.addGlobalSecondaryIndex({
      indexName: 'gsi1pk-gsi1sk-index',
      partitionKey: {
        name: 'gsi1pk',
        type: AttributeType.STRING,
      },
      sortKey: {
        name: 'gsi1sk',
        type: AttributeType.STRING,
      },
      projectionType: ProjectionType.ALL,
    });

    // Suppress checkov rules that expect a KMS customer managed key and backup to be enabled
    suppressRules(this, ['CKV_AWS_119', 'CKV_AWS_28'], 'No need for custom encryption or backup');

    new CfnOutput(this, 'TableName', { value: this.tableName });
  }
}

stacks/application-stack.ts

stacks/application-stack.ts

import {
  GameApi,
  GameUI,
  StoryApi,
  UserIdentity,
} from ':dungeon-adventure/common-constructs';
import { Stack, StackProps } from 'aws-cdk-lib';
import * as cdk from 'aws-cdk-lib';
import { Construct } from 'constructs';
import { ElectrodbDynamoTable } from '../constructs/electrodb-table.js';

export class ApplicationStack extends Stack {
  constructor(scope: Construct, id: string, props?: StackProps) {
export class ApplicationStack extends cdk.Stack {
  constructor(scope: Construct, id: string, props?: cdk.StackProps) {
    super(scope, id, props);

    const userIdentity = new UserIdentity(this, 'UserIdentity');

    const electroDbTable = new ElectrodbDynamoTable(this, 'ElectroDbTable');

    const gameApi = new GameApi(this, 'GameApi', {
      integrations: GameApi.defaultIntegrations(this).build(),
      integrations: GameApi.defaultIntegrations(this)
        .withDefaultOptions({
          environment: {
            TABLE_NAME: electroDbTable.tableName,
          },
        })
        .build(),
    });

    // Grant read/write access to each procedure's lambda handler according to the permissions it requires
    electroDbTable.grantReadData(gameApi.integrations['actions.query'].handler);
    electroDbTable.grantReadData(gameApi.integrations['games.query'].handler);
    electroDbTable.grantReadWriteData(
      gameApi.integrations['actions.save'].handler,
    );
    electroDbTable.grantReadWriteData(
      gameApi.integrations['games.save'].handler,
    );

    const storyApi = new StoryApi(this, 'StoryApi', {
      integrations: StoryApi.defaultIntegrations(this).build(),
    });

    // grant our authenticated role access to invoke our APIs
    [storyApi, gameApi].forEach((api) =>
      api.grantInvokeAccess(userIdentity.identityPool.authenticatedRole),
    );

    // Ensure this is instantiated last so our runtime-config.json can be automatically configured
    new GameUI(this, 'GameUI');
  }
}

Note

Notice here that since each procedure is served by an individual lambda function, we can follow the principle of least privilege and assign only the required read/write permissions based on the procedure’s implementation.

Deployment and testing

First, lets build the codebase:

pnpm

pnpm nx run-many --target build --all

yarn

yarn nx run-many --target build --all

npm

npx nx run-many --target build --all

bun

bunx nx run-many --target build --all

Tip

If you encounter any lint errors, you can run the following command to automatically fix them.

pnpm

pnpm nx run-many --target lint --configuration=fix --all

yarn

yarn nx run-many --target lint --configuration=fix --all

npm

npx nx run-many --target lint --configuration=fix --all

bun

bunx nx run-many --target lint --configuration=fix --all

Your application can now be deployed by running the following command:

pnpm

pnpm nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/*

yarn

yarn nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/*

npm

npx nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/*

bun

bunx nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/*

Your first deployment will take around 8 minutes to complete. Subsequent deployments will take around 2 minutes.

Tip

If you’re iterating on lambda function code changes, you can deploy with the --hotswap flag after building the codebase for a much shorter (2-3 second) deployment time.

pnpm

pnpm nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/* --hotswap

yarn

yarn nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/* --hotswap

npm

npx nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/* --hotswap

bun

bunx nx run @dungeon-adventure/infra:deploy dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox/* --hotswap

Once the deployment completes, you should see some outputs similar to the following (some values have been redacted):

dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application: deploying... [2/2]

 ✅  dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application

✨  Deployment time: 354s

Outputs:
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.ElectroDbTableTableNameXXX = dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application-ElectroDbTableXXX-YYY
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.GameApiEndpointXXX = https://xxx.execute-api.region.amazonaws.com/prod/
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.GameUIDistributionDomainNameXXX = xxx.cloudfront.net
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.StoryApiEndpointXXX = https://xxx.execute-api.region.amazonaws.com/prod/
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.UserIdentityUserIdentityIdentityPoolIdXXX = region:xxx
dungeon-adventure-sandbox-Application.UserIdentityUserIdentityUserPoolIdXXX = region_xxx

We can test our API by either:

• Starting a local instance of the tRPC backend and invoke the API’s using curl.
• Calling the deployed API using sigv4 enabled curl

Local

Start your local game-api server by running the following command:

pnpm

TABLE_NAME=dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application-ElectroDbTableXXX-YYY pnpm nx run @dungeon-adventure/game-api:serve

yarn

TABLE_NAME=dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application-ElectroDbTableXXX-YYY yarn nx run @dungeon-adventure/game-api:serve

npm

TABLE_NAME=dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application-ElectroDbTableXXX-YYY npx nx run @dungeon-adventure/game-api:serve

bun

TABLE_NAME=dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application-ElectroDbTableXXX-YYY bunx nx run @dungeon-adventure/game-api:serve

Caution

Use the CDK deploy output value of dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application.ElectroDbTableTableNameXXX to replace the highlighted placeholder.

Once your server is up and running, you can call it by running the following command:

curl -X GET 'http://localhost:2022/games.query?input=%7B%7D'

Deployed

acurl ap-southeast-2 execute-api -X GET 'https://xxx.execute-api.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/prod/games.query?input=%7B%7D'

Caution

Use the CDK deploy output value of dungeon-adventure-infra-sandbox-Application.GameApiGameApiEndpointXXX to replace the highlighted placeholder and set the region accordingly.

Note

The %7B%7D we pass to test the API is a URI encoded empty JSON object ({}).

If the command executes successfully, you should see a response as follows:

{"result":{"data":{"items":[],"cursor":null}}}

Congratulations, you have built and deployed your first API using tRPC! 🎉🎉🎉