The Pearly Whites Challenge

Inspiration

As someone in the dental industry, I see firsthand the devastating toll paediatric tooth decay takes on children and young families. It compromises physical health, damages self-esteem, and causes children to miss out on valuable school days. Research shows it takes 21 days to form a solid habit which is why I created a 28-day brushing tracker. It gamifies the experience to turn a mundane chore into an adventure they look forward to every day.

What it does

The story is that a sugar monster named Blue Candor steals the secret map to Mulinia, brave molars grab it back from him but it tears it in two and sprint to defend their kingdom. To help them escape, players must complete their daily brushing routines.

Instead of passive timers, an on-device vision model trained on toothbrushes verifies a brush is present before unlocking the session. A secure parental PIN allows manual overrides and protects developer tips powered by RevenueCat.

Paced Quadrant Timer: Visual four-quadrant guidance ensures a clinically thorough two-minute clean, cheered on by an animated tooth mascot.

Daily Quizzes & Rewards: Players learn daily dental facts and earn points through quizzes and consistency streaks.

Candy Crusade Battles: Points upgrade in-game dental weapons to fight off the sugar monster and his bonbon minions in 3D arena encounters.

How we built it

I used: Godot to develop core gameplay and UI alongside Summer Engine. Meshy to create 3D character assets for Candy Crusade. Mediapipe to build the on-device camera pipeline for real-time toothbrush detection without cloud (aka camera data never leaves their device). RevenueCat SDK with Apple Developer to manage developer-support entitlements. Github to deploy iOS binaries directly to TestFlight as I don't have a macbook.

Challenges we ran into

Getting the brush detector to work. Figuring out how to get revenuecat to work. Navigating Apple Developer permissions and store guidelines.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Getting the Brush detector to work. Building a smooth, fully rendered mobile combat arena that makes children eager to brush.

What we learned

Nothing is Impossible lol 3D game dev is really fun and it creates an immediate engagement level and vibe that 2D just can't match.

What's next for The Pearly Whites Challenge

Institutional Partnerships: Teaming up with school governors, local councils, and public health bodies worldwide, to get their youth engaged in tooth brushing. Lore Expansion: Rolling out new unlockable 3D combat levels, cooperative family quests and leaderboards.

Built With

• computer-vision
• gdscript
• github
• godot
• meshy
• revenuecat
• storekit
• summer-engine