SparePlay is a mobile trivia game designed for quick, shared play between parents/caregivers and kids. I approached it as a tightly-scoped case study in iterative product design and full-stack implementation. The design process was driven primarily in Figma, where I explored interaction models, visual density, accessibility tradeoffs, and graphic design through rapid iteration. Components were designed with clear state models (selected, locked, disabled, etc.) that mapped cleanly to React Native primitives, allowing design decisions to directly inform implementation rather than being retrofitted later. This tight feedback loop made it easy to test ideas quickly, discard what didn’t work, and refine the overall feel of the app without over-investing in any single direction too early.
On the client side, SparePlay is built with Expo and React Native, using modern Expo tooling (Expo Router, EAS Build, and EAS Update) to streamline development, testing, and deployment. The app is structured around declarative navigation and predictable UI state, with careful attention paid to layout resilience across screen sizes, dynamic type, and system accessibility settings. Local persistence is handled with SQLite, accessed through Drizzle ORM, which provides type-safe queries and migrations while remaining lightweight enough for an offline-first mobile experience. This setup allows trivia packs, play history, and user state to live locally with minimal overhead, while still benefiting from a strongly typed data layer that scales as the schema evolves.
Supporting infrastructure includes a Next.js web presence for marketing and project scaffolding, sharing design language and component thinking with the mobile app even where code is not directly shared. Across the stack, the emphasis was on pragmatic, production-ready choices: tools that reduce friction, encourage iteration, and keep cognitive load low while still supporting future growth. SparePlay reflects how I like to work—designing and building in parallel, validating ideas early, and treating even a relatively small product as a complete system spanning UX, data modeling, and deployment rather than a collection of disconnected parts.
Find it live on the app store now!