After switching apps, my game jumps ahead or the pieces fall all at once

A player leaves for a minute and comes back to a game that has played itself forward, with timers expired and blocks piled up. The game was counting real elapsed time with no limit. This entry shows a steady update loop that forgives long gaps in a controlled way.

Why this works

Small equal time steps make the game behave the same on every phone, and capping the time one frame may add means a long pause costs a bounded amount of work and play.

When not to use it

Skip it for games that should keep running while away, such as slow-growth games; use real elapsed time with its own rules there.

In the full entry

• What to build, step by step
• Starting values and the reason for each
• 3 common mistakes and the fix
• A diagram of every state
• 15 lines of example code with 4 checks that pass
• How your AI shows you that it works

Say this to your AI

Use the Spielerando entry "After switching apps, my game jumps ahead or the pieces fall all at once" (read_entry game-runs-too-fast-after-tab-switch) in my game. Build it step by step, and show me how you checked that it works.

Or skip this and connect the MCP: your AI then finds all of this by itself.Connect the MCP