Stukalin Academy for Kids

I am not much of a video-game player myself. Ever since childhood, I have preferred making games to playing them. Creating a game that is engaging, attractive, and logical is surprisingly hard.

Fortunately, many complicated tasks can now be automated with AI. I watched the games my daughter plays, what catches her attention, and what she likes doing in real life. I decided to try making a prototype, got completely carried away, and ended up building a full PWA game.

There is no shortage of games for children, but most either cost money, are full of ads, or work only online. I came up with a game built around a simple, familiar mechanic: follow a path toward a goal, completing challenges along the way. Each challenge is a mini-game with a common structure, varying difficulty, and, most importantly, a different theme. The destination of each level is a themed castle. We start with the seasons: summer, fall, winter, and spring. Leia does not have a solid grasp of the seasons yet, so I thought that would be a good place to begin. To draw a child in, I started with easy and very easy challenges, such as sorting shapes and matching colors.

As the levels progress, the games change. Sliding puzzles appear, including castle puzzles that start easy and gradually become harder. There are attention games and themed challenges at every level: dress for the weather, spot the odd one out, trace letters and numbers, count, sort, and complete patterns.

I do not know. Maybe I have taken on something far too ambitious, and perhaps my daughter will get bored of it quickly. But I cannot resist trying. I enjoy making it after work, when I want to forget about digital platforms and government information systems for a while. I sit there making a little game: sketching with a pen, programming in Vibe++, drawing in GPT, and assembling everything in Codex. In short, I am having a blast. I will share it with everyone soon.