Retract a meta game

Policy for removed meta games lives in gameslib retractedGames.json. Each entry sets independent knobs:

Field	Values	Effect
`availability`	`playable`, `hiddenProd`, `hiddenAll`	Catalog, Lab, challenges, `/games/:uid` (front + public API)
`recordsGeneration`	`include`, `omit`	`records` Lambda: skip or archive `GAME` rows from the Dynamo dump
`publishStats`	`true`, `false`	`summarize`, stats UI, co-occurrence recommendations
`archiveMetadata`	name, playercounts, variants	Labels when the engine is gone but `include` + stats stay public

DynamoDB is never modified by retraction. omit only stops new S3 archive output; existing GAME rows remain in the table.

Recipe: broken game (Binar-class)

Designer wants the game gone from code and off public surfaces, historical Dynamo rows kept but not re-archived.

Remove engine, locales, and tests from gameslib (no tombstone in gameinfo).
Add registry entry, for example:

{
  "mygame": {
    "availability": "hiddenAll",
    "recordsGeneration": "omit",
    "publishStats": false,
    "reason": "broken",
    "removedAt": "YYYY-MM-DD",
    "archiveMetadata": { "name": "My Game", "playercounts": [2], "variants": [] }
  }
}

Publish gameslib; run npm run sync-deps in node-backend and front.
Deploy crons + API + front.
Run records then summarize (or wait for the daily pipeline). records skips dump rows, rewrites ALL.json without the UID, and deletes orphan meta/{uid}.json.
Optional one-time cleanup before deploy: delete stale meta/{uid}.json on records.abstractplay.com and re-run summarize.

Rights-holder demo checklist

No src/games/{uid}.ts on main; only retractedGames.json mentions the UID.
Registry shows recordsGeneration: omit and publishStats: false.
Stats /stats/games has no row after pipeline run.

Recipe: licence lapse

Play forbidden everywhere (including dev), but batch records and public stats continue with stable names after engine removal.

{
  "mygame": {
    "availability": "hiddenAll",
    "recordsGeneration": "include",
    "publishStats": true,
    "reason": "licence",
    "removedAt": "YYYY-MM-DD",
    "archiveMetadata": {
      "name": "My Game",
      "playercounts": [2],
      "variants": [{ "uid": "foo", "group": "board" }]
    }
  }
}

Remove playable code from gameslib. records uses archiveGameRecord.ts to build APGameRecord headers from stored Dynamo state + archiveMetadata when GameFactory is unavailable.

Pipeline touchpoints

Job	Behaviour
`records.ts`	Skips `omit` rows; post-pass `pruneOrphanMetaShards`
`summarize.ts`	Scans `ALL.json` only; loads meta shards for UIDs in the scan with `publishStats: true`
`records-cooccur.ts`	Drops unreleased meta games from co-play sets
Front `gameOptions.js`	`isCatalogVisible` + `isSummaryStatsVisible`

Do not use `experimental` alone