Show HN: I built a new word game, Wordtrak (wordtrak.com)

I don't know if it's my adblockers but your page loads an insanely large picture of your face and then people playing scrabble. Like I have to scroll two directions to see the whole picture large...

Wonderful example of using AI thoughtfully as a creativity multiplier, rather than diluting the artistry of the end result. I love the human elements you scattered throughout the game: your children's initials in some of the navigation icons is an especially nice touch!

I love this.

I'm also building a simple game using Claude, so this is quite inspirational. Keep going!

I've built a simple word game with my kids recently. It's fun to add stuff quickly even if they are used only by the family. It has only 5 players now and they have their own group, the family, but open to anyone if interested.

One problem for me, apart from sucking at word games...

I started with a load of vowels in my hand, just two consonants. I found a 3 letter word OK, but got a consonant and vowel back. I traded two vowels and got two more back. Couldn't make a 4 letter word, game over. I suppose the difference in scrabble is that if I had passed, someone else may have put a consonant down that I could use...

406 browser not supported (opera mobile). Come on...

Looks really good, are you in the first photo? How old are you? Good luck for your future projects!

Are opponents autopets-style opponents (e.g. recorded and replayed so you don’t have to wait?)

I’m confused about a lot of things about the game; I guess most particularly the letter draws — do I and my opponents get the exact same sequence of letters when traded in? Do we draw from the same (replaceable? Non-replaceable?) bag?

When I went to sudden death I saw very different words — in my case, I drew a J — was that it, since my foe only used a word with a G, I was basically guaranteed a win. Was that poor word choice on his part, poor or no trading, or a different tile set the foe had?

I think it would be nice to see all the possible letters in the ‘bag’ when we’re looking at trading.

Finally, is there a time component? It would be nice to get some indications about the opponent - maybe showing where they are hovering / clicking, or a clock countdown.

Also - fun!

Are you coding 3 clients: - Swift for iOS - Kotlin for Android - TypeScript/React/etc for web

My phone's browser picked a heckuva place for the line break in the second sentence:

  My mom has been regularly beating me 
  at Scrabble since I could spell.

As with anything word-gamey involving internet, you will probably have to trim down your dictionary. While I'm very glad my "sxxg" beat their "txxt", the first probably shouldn't be allowed (although there are non-rude definitions) and the second definitely shouldn't have!

Still, a very fun game, well made.

Using claude for game design, art design, and coding. I can see you're even using AI to respond to comments in this thread. At that point this is just a game made by AI. It's one thing to lean on AI to cover our blind spots, but if AI is in all stages of the pipeline I just wonder what the point of all this is?

Did you really need to waste money and resources to make a simple word game? Are people really getting to be this lazy already? /rant

This is completely unrelated to your game - but your HN profile description reads: "A short, study creature fond of drink and industry". I'm assuming that's a typo and you intended "sturdy".

Just thought this was kind of amusing given that you're obsessed with word games.

** Feedback for the game **

I highly recommend adjusting the color palette. Aside from the letters themselves, everything tends to blur together particularly the square tiles on the black background. When there was a bit of glare on my screen, I could barely see them at all.

On a more personal note, I don't think that dark-mode style palettes really fit most word-based games. If you look at games like Scrabble, bananagrams, etc. they remind me of the color scheme from the 1981 arcade game Centipede, borrowing from that same palette of lighter pastel tones.

Kotlin Multiplatform is production level at this point. It doesn't really make sense to go with iOS only and then Android maybe later unless you only know iOS development and just plan to make someone else port it.

Keep up the good work!

Harder than I expected. pretty cool.

Firefox browser on Android, tracks don't seem to select. I couldn't figure out how to get letters up there (though they would appear to select if I tapped them)

I suggest a practice mode that allows you to get used to the gameplay without squandering the daily puzzle on that task.

I personally just use incognito mode for this, but not everyone is that savvy.

Impressive idea and fun execution. Graphics are fun and interesting! I don’t play word games, besides when the wife needs crossword help so I’m not much help with actual gameplay feedback.

The UX is a bit wonky in the classic vibe coded way.

1. When clicking send there is no clear indication what’s happened. The trak should visually lock, the send button should animate, etc. 2. After sending a trak, I can select letters - but this is a seemingly pointless state. No trak is selected, so letters don’t go there. Clicking swap resets my tile selection and I need to reselect the letters. 3. Swap phase feels odd - why do I need to confirm my hand? Can’t I just either play, or swap and then play.

Otherwise - I’ve found some of my favorite games have a strong sense of satisfaction in small ways. Like number go up, but visual or audio. IE if I manage to fill a trak with all letters, play a nice animation. And for each longer trak, make that animation even more satisfying. (Or something similar - reward me when I get good at the game with something rare and dank that I will crave)

About how much revenue or how many users do you estimate a game like this will have per month?

I tried it out briefly, and it's really fun! The tutorial is a bit incomplete, though; it's kind of like learning by doing. Looking forward to the Android version!

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Interesting game. I suggest including a simple how-to-play animation in the main page, something that visually shows the rules/mechanics. Otherwise, there's going to be some friction for people to get into it. Claude can easily do this for you. I did it for my math game, which at launch I thought was super self explanatory, but even the most clever of my friends, had questions about the gameplay, which was easily answered with a visual cue! Having said that, happy to see others making thoughtful little games with Claude. Good luck.

Looks pretty interesting even though I am not that much into word games

I love Wordle so I have a feeling this will scratch that itch I have when I'm done with my daily puzzle. Thank you for posting this! <3