Custom UNO

Play with friends, on your rules.

Most online UNO games lock you into a single ruleset. Custom UNO is a browser-based multiplayer game where the host configures house rules before creating a room. Toggle stacking, UNO call penalties, draw behaviour, deal size, scoring mode, and more, then share a 6-letter room code with 2 to 4 friends.

Why I built it

I wanted a friends-only UNO experience that felt fair, flexible, and effortless. No accounts, no matchmaking, just a room code and the rules we actually play by.

The real challenge was not the UI. It was making sure nobody could peek at the deck, reconnecting after a dropped tab did not ruin the game, and, in v2, making the experience feel genuinely native on mobile instead of forcing players onto a desktop.

Features

Host-configurable house rules

• Card stacking

• +2 and +4 chaining

• Draw until playable

• Force play after drawing

• UNO call penalties

• Single-round or target-score games

• Custom starting hand size

Cheat-proof multiplayer

• Server-authoritative game engine

• Player hands and the deck never leave the server

• Every move is validated server-side

Reconnect-friendly

• Rejoin your exact seat after disconnecting

• Turn timer with automatic pass

• Automatic cleanup of abandoned rooms

Built for mobile

• Dedicated portrait game table

• Swipeable hand with momentum

• Mobile-first landing page

• Portrait orientation support

Polished experience

• Hand-drawn groovy card artwork

• Parallax landing page

• Animated card movement

• Redesigned win screen with staged entrance and confetti

• Custom Web Audio sound system

• Mute and reduced-motion support

Under the hood

• Pure TypeScript game engine shared between client and server

• Vitest unit tests for game logic

• Standalone Node.js WebSocket server

• Zod validation for every incoming action

• Next.js 16 + React 19

• Zustand for client state management

• Tailwind CSS v4 with a custom design system using Vodka Sans and Switzer

What's new in v2

• Complete mobile responsiveness with dedicated layouts for gameplay, landing page, and victory screens

• Redesigned win screen featuring the landing artwork, winner reveal animation, and confetti

• Faster cleanup of abandoned rooms

• Multiple reconnect and disconnect edge cases fixed

Scope

Room state lives entirely in server memory. Players can reconnect to ongoing games, but rooms are intentionally temporary.

No accounts. No matchmaking. No chat. No spectators.

Built for quick, private game nights with friends.

Links

Live Demo: http://uno-bay.vercel.app/

Source Code: https://github.com/Crisiswastaken/Uno-Groovy