Blokus Board Game

Problem

Wanted a lightweight, real-time way to play Blokus online with friends — one where the rules (piece legality, rotation, turn order) are enforced consistently for every player instead of trusted to each client.

Constraints

• Server needs to be the source of truth for move legality, not just the UI
• Real-time sync across clients without noticeable lag
• Piece rotation and flipping needed to feel intuitive on a grid-based board

Decisions

• Built the game server in Node.js with Socket.IO for real-time move broadcasting and turn state.
• Validated every placement server-side before broadcasting, so the client only ever renders legal moves.
• Added rotation, flipping, and placement previews in the React client to make piece manipulation clearer and more accessible.

What I'd do differently

Next step would be reconnect/resume support for dropped players, plus persisting game state so a session survives a server restart.

Stack