inspiration
most puzzle games i play nag. lives, energy, a timer going red, an ad after every try. i wanted shikaku (the number box puzzle) to feel like a toy not a worksheet. mistakes just bounce back, nothing to lose.
what it does
- press and drag, a box stretches under your finger and counts cells live. box around a 6 must cover 6 cells. fill the board, no overlaps, no gaps: boxd
- the daily boxd: one board a day, same for everyone
- sticker book: every daily you solve becomes a sticker of your board. gold, silver, bronze, or an "assisted" stamp if you used a hint. miss a day and the slot stays empty
- 10 packs, 420 levels, 4x4 to 12x12, plus shaped boards (hearts, arrows, the whole alphabet)
- the ring: world leaderboard, weekly board closes every monday
- bouts: live races with friends, 2 to 8 players, share a code or a link
- 8 themes, colorblind patterns, procedural music, 13 languages. works offline, sign in only for ring and bouts
how i built it
solo, kotlin multiplatform + compose multiplatform. one codebase for android and ios (also builds for desktop and web). engine, level generator, design system, music and all 13 languages live in shared code. revenuecat in its own mobile source set, firebase for ring, bouts and remote flags. 900+ commits since july 16.
challenges
- revenuecat kmp only ships android + ios, so billing got its own source set and a build guard. a test key still leaked once in 0.3.0 and broke purchases on launch day.. guard catches it now
- an ios crash from a sound effect, the audio player got freed inside its own callback
- release builds had no crash reports for weeks, r8 stripped firebase's registrars
- bouts had to finish rounds right even when the host leaves
what i learned
post the first ugly build early. replies were a better roadmap than my own list.
whats next
blitz, ghost race, fog and zen modes are built and behind flags. galaxy store.
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