Inspiration
The phrase sub rosa - “under the rose” - historically meant something spoken in confidence. I liked the idea of a daily word being quietly shared, revealed a little more each time you fail, until the secret can no longer be kept.
I wanted to build a daily game that felt native to Reddit, not bolted on. Something lightweight, ritualistic, and communal, where discussion happens in the comments instead of through a global leaderboard. The rose became a metaphor: each wrong guess causes it to lose a petal, making the hidden word increasingly visible.
What it does
Verbum Rosa is a daily word guessing game where players start with a single abstract hint. Each incorrect guess reveals another hint, represented visually as fallen petals. After four failed attempts, the secret word is revealed. Guessing correctly preserves your streak.
The game resets every day at 7 AM UTC.
How we built it
The app is built using Reddit’s Devvit platform with a React-based web UI and an Express backend. Game state is persisted using Devvit’s Redis storage, with daily play state stored using TTLs and long-term user stats stored persistently.
Daily word rotation is handled by a scheduled job that advances the word queue and resets active user states. Moderation tools allow trusted users to manage the word queue without redeploying the app.
Accessibility was a first-class concern: the game is fully keyboard navigable, uses ARIA live regions for feedback, and has been tested with screen readers.
Challenges we ran into
One of the main challenges was accurately tracking “time spent” on a mobile Reddit app, where lifecycle events are unreliable. Instead of forcing precision, I treated duration as a cosmetic metric and designed the UX so inaccuracies don’t affect gameplay or fairness.
Another challenge was balancing clarity with mystery. Making the game self-explanatory without over-tutorializing. This led to a design where the mechanics are learned naturally through play.
Overall, the project was an exercise in restraint: choosing what not to build was just as important as what to include.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
Verbum Rosa shipped as a fully playable, production-ready Reddit app with daily rotation, persistent streaks, accessibility support, and a polished mobile-first UI. The game works entirely inside Reddit, resets reliably every day, and encourages community interaction through comments instead of leaderboards. The project was designed, built, deployed, reviewed, and published as a solo effort.
What we learned
Building on Devvit highlighted the importance of designing around platform constraints instead of fighting them. Mobile lifecycle limitations, backgrounding behavior, and visibility events required pragmatic UX decisions rather than perfect technical solutions. The project reinforced the value of restraint: simple mechanics, clear feedback, and intentional omissions often result in a better experience than feature overload.
What's next for Verbum Rosa
The immediate focus is content: expanding the word library and refining hint quality over time. Longer term, Verbum Rosa could support themed days, seasonal word sets, and light community-driven curation, while keeping the core experience minimal and ritualistic. Any future additions would prioritize clarity and accessibility over complexity.
Built With
- devvit
- express.js
- openai
- react
- redis
- tailwind
- typescript
- vite
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