🧩Puzzle Arena
Real-Time Multiplayer Puzzles & Board Games with AI Bots
🎮The Experience
Puzzle Arena is a real-time multiplayer board game and competitive puzzle platform. An organizer registers, creates a private room, and players join instantly via a 6-character room code on mobile or desktop — no mandatory app install required.
It features seven complete games: four concurrent puzzles (Sudoku, Killer Sudoku, Nonogram, Word Search) and three turn-based board games (Property Tycoon, Manor Mystery, Scrabble). Every game is playable solo against intelligent automated bots.
🏗️Engineering & Architecture
Separated into strict modules: packages/shared (Zod wire schemas, zero I/O), packages/puzzles (in-house generators with proven-unique solutions), and packages/games (turn-based reducers).
Engine state replays bit-for-bit from an append-only room_events log. Reducers never read the wall clock; all randomness comes from a seeded PRNG carried in state, allowing instant crash recovery.
Dynamic AI integration configurable at runtime from /admin/ai. Supports any OpenAI-compatible endpoint with AES-256-GCM encrypted keys and graceful fallback to bundled offline content.
Sub-50ms WebSocket latency, high-concurrency room dispatch, and instant UI state synchronization backed by Zustand and Tailwind CSS 4.