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Inspiration
The idea came from hanging out with friends playing a simple pen-and-paper word game where you add letters and build toward a complete word. At the same time, I kept seeing a lot of TikTok videos of people laughing and having fun playing word duels in real life. It hit me that this dynamic is super simple, tense, and exciting, but there wasn't a clean mobile version out there. So I thought, why not turn it into a real-time mobile game where players race to outsmart each other and land that decisive final letter?
What it does
Word Trap is a fast, fun word duel where you try to outsmart your opponent:
The Rules: Take turns adding one letter to build an evolving word. Play the final valid letter, or leave your opponent with no moves left to win the round! The first player to 5 rounds wins the match.
Three Game Modes:
- Online: Jump into quick matches against random players around the world.
- With Friends: Challenge your friends easily by searching their username.
- Solo vs AI: Practice your moves offline against the computer.
Three Languages: You can play in English, French, or Arabic, with full dictionary checks for each one.
Rewards and Learning: Winning gives you 10 credits and moves you up the leaderboard. You can also check your Game History to see past matches and learn the new words you discovered.
Buying Credits and Removing Ads: Thanks to RevenueCat, players who run out of credits can easily buy more, or pay once to remove all ads forever.
How we built it
- Built native apps for both platforms using Kotlin with Jetpack Compose on Android, and Swift with SwiftUI on iOS.
- Used AI as a coding assistant to speed up development across both codebases, which made porting features between platforms much faster while keeping the code clean, modular, and organized.
- Used Firebase as our backend to power real-time multiplayer matchmaking, synchronize game state between players, and manage user accounts and leaderboards.
- Integrated RevenueCat to easily handle purchases and the ad-free upgrade on both app stores without needing a complicated custom server.
Challenges we ran into
- Making the word checks happen instantly on every tap so players have no delays during their 30-second turns.
- Setting up in-app purchases on both Apple and Google, which can be tricky, but RevenueCat made it much easier to manage.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
I built and shipped Word Trap in under a month, taking the project from an initial concept in early September to a complete, published product in record time. I successfully launched the native Android version on Google Play, and while the native iOS build is currently under review by Apple (which might cause a slight delay for the App Store release) I'm proud to have transformed a casual real-life parlor game into a responsive, real-time multiplayer mobile duel with seamless trilingual support.
What we learned
This project proved that you don't need complicated rules to create intense, addictive gameplay. On the engineering side, building two native apps at once showed me how powerful AI can be for porting features rapidly while maintaining a clean MVI architecture, and I saw firsthand how tools like RevenueCat make it possible for a solo developer to ship a real-time, monetized game in just a few short weeks.
What's next for Word Trap - Dual Word Game
Looking ahead, my biggest focus is on marketing the game and getting it into more players' hands by sharing gameplay clips on TikTok and social media, since that viral content is what inspired the project in the first place. On the product side, I want to expand to a wider global audience by adding more languages like Spanish, German, and Italian. I'm also planning to build competitive ranked tournaments and seasonal events, along with fun customizations like unlockable letter tiles, board themes.
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