Many leaderboard games online want an account before the first round. Bomb Appétit does not: guests can play every mission, freeplay bomb and online room. Signing in with GitHub adds two things, a ranked row on each mission board you defuse and progress that follows you between devices. Sign in before the bomb starts.
Your leaderboard name: which name does the board show?
The board shows the name from your GitHub profile. If your profile has no display name set, it uses your GitHub username instead. Bomb Appétit keeps up to 40 characters of it. There is no separate name to pick inside the game for ranked rows.
The name is read from GitHub each time you sign in. If you change your GitHub display name and sign in again, the boards pick up the new one, since they look up your account's current name when they are drawn. The results page for an individual run is different. It shows the name the run was saved under in its headline, such as "Kai defused it.", so an old result keeps the name you had at the time.
Rooms work a little differently. A guest who opens or joins an online room types a display name of up to 24 characters, and that is the name other players see in the lobby. A signed-in player joins rooms under their account name. If you are an Expert in someone else's room, that room name is what appears in the Experts column beside the Defuser's row.
Pick the GitHub display name you are happy to see in public before your first ranked run. Board rows are visible to anyone who opens the leaderboard, with no sign-in needed to read them.
Signing in with GitHub for a ranked run
Getting ranked takes a GitHub account and one sign-in. Press Sign in in the site header, choose Continue with GitHub, approve the request on GitHub's page, and you come back to your new dashboard as a signed-in player. Every mission you defuse from then on, while still signed in, can take a place on its board.
The order matters. The game decides whether a run is ranked when the bomb is saved, based on who was signed in at that moment. A defusal played as a guest is checked and saved, but it is never added to a board afterwards. The results screen tells a guest exactly that and suggests signing in before the next run.
From guest to ranked: the steps
- Press Sign in at the top of any page and choose Continue with GitHub. Approve the request on GitHub. You land on your dashboard, and the header now shows Dashboard instead of Sign in. The Play page has its own Sign in with GitHub button, which brings you back to Play instead.
- Open the missions page and press Play on a mission. Freeplay bombs have no board, so a ranked run has to be one of the 20 missions.
- Defuse it as the Defuser. Only the player holding the bomb is ranked, so if you are in a room, make sure you have the Defuser role before the bomb is armed.
- Read the results screen. It says whether the server verified the run and, if so, gives your place, such as "You are #12 of 30 on this mission, in the top 40%." Press Shareable result to open the run's own results page.
- Open your dashboard from the header. It counts the missions you have defused and shows your best rank across all boards.
If the result line is missing after step 4, the run did not count for one of a few reasons, such as an unverified replay or a slower time than your existing best. The checklist in why a run did not appear on the leaderboard goes through them in order.
Signing out is on the dashboard. Your rows stay on the boards after you sign out, and they are still yours the next time you sign in with the same GitHub account.
One GitHub account means one player. If two people share a laptop and want separate rows, each needs to sign in with their own GitHub account before taking the bomb, and sign out afterwards. Swapping the Defuser seat without swapping accounts puts both players' defusals on one row, which then shows only the faster of them.
What does the dashboard show after a leaderboard sign-in?
The dashboard is a private page for signed-in players. It greets you by name, then shows four facts: missions defused out of 20, the date you joined, your role, and your best leaderboard rank. Below those are links to Play, Missions and the Leaderboard, and a Sign out button.
Missions defused counts every mission where you have a verified defusal, whatever your rank. A player who has cleared all of Section 1 and two missions of Section 2 sees 7 of 20.
Best leaderboard rank picks the board where you stand highest as a share of that board. It reads as a link, such as "Top 9% on Echo chamber", and under it a line gives the raw place and how many boards you are on, such as "#4 of 44. You are ranked on 7 of 20 missions." The pick goes by percentile, so a high place on a busy board can beat first place on a small one.
Before your first ranked defusal, that tile reads "Defuse a mission to be ranked." It switches over the first time you defuse a mission as a signed-in Defuser and the server accepts the run.
The dashboard also confirms the second thing an account gives you. Its intro says your name goes on the leaderboard and your mission progress follows you between devices. Sign in on a phone and a laptop with the same GitHub account and both show the same defused missions. For the wider picture of what an account does and does not change, read what signing in adds in our guide to what a free bomb defusal game needs.
Leaderboard badges on the missions page
Each mission card on the missions page carries a green badge once you have defused it while signed in. The badge shows your best time left, such as "Defused · 1:34 left". For a signed-in player who is ranked on that mission, it adds the percentile, such as "Defused · 1:34 left · Top 22%".
The badges turn the missions page into a progress map. A glance tells you which missions you have cleared, how much time you had to spare on each, and where you stand on each board. A card with no badge is a mission you have not yet defused.
The Top figure on a badge always uses the whole board, with every ranked player on it. It does not change with the Solo or With Experts filter on the leaderboard page. The leaderboard page's own line does follow that filter, so the two numbers can differ when you have filtered the board.
Each card also has a Leaderboard button that opens that mission's board directly. That is the quickest way to see who is just above you, and how much time you need to pass them.
The badges only cover the current version of each mission. If a mission ever changes in a way that affects times, its board starts again, and your badge rank is measured against the new board. How that works is set out in our post on video game leaderboard resets and board epochs.
When a guest run is the better choice than a ranked one
A guest run is the better choice whenever a rank would get in the way. Teaching someone new, letting a child take the bomb, playing on a borrowed or shared computer, or trying a mission just to see it are all good reasons to stay signed out. Guests lose nothing in play.
Guests can do everything a signed-in player can at the bomb. They play every mission, build freeplay bombs, open and join online rooms, and use any rule seed. The only things missing are a row on the boards and progress that follows them between devices.
A shared computer is the clearest case. If you sign in at a friend's house and forget to sign out, the next person's defusals go on your row. Play as a guest there, or sign out from the dashboard before you leave.
A first run on a mission is another. Nothing is lost by trying it signed in, since a worse run never lowers your row. But a relaxed guest round, with time to read every manual page aloud, often teaches more than a tense ranked attempt. Then sign in for the serious runs.
Device choice matters too. If you plan a ranked attempt on a phone, our comparison of phone and laptop for leaderboard runs covers which missions hold up on a small screen. Many of the best leaderboard games make you choose between playing and competing. Here you can play as a guest tonight and sign in when the team is ready. Start at Play.