Back in 2017, I built a physical board game called Cooperation Cube.

The idea started somewhere over the Pacific on a long flight. I had been building software all day for years and felt the urge to make something physical. Something you could actually hold.

The result was a wooden cube with a 5×5 grid of holes on four faces. Players place colored sticks into the cube. Short pegs sit in a single face, while longer beams pass through the cube. Each player has pattern cards they are trying to complete on the face in front of them.

The twist is that the cube rotates 90° every round.

Patterns you were building suddenly become part of someone else’s board. Work you thought was secure becomes someone else’s opportunity.

There are also cooperation cards that require two players to coordinate moves without revealing their individual goals. The game lives in the tension between helping someone and quietly advancing your own position. I took some inspiration from the “shooting the moon” mechanic in Hearts and from social deduction games like Mafia.

The practical problem was the hardware.

Each cube required drilling a 5×5 grid on four faces of a wooden block. That is 100 holes, and they all have to line up perfectly. If even one is slightly off, the sticks will not pass through the cube correctly. For every usable cube I made, I probably ruined five blocks of wood.

I considered making a digital version several times but never got it to the finish line until now.

Try it here: https://cooperationcube.com

More details and pictures of the physical game here: https://www.kevinsdias.com/posts/cooperation-cube.html

Tech details: - Next.js + React frontend - Supabase (Postgres + Realtime) backend - TypeScript throughout - Game state stored as JSONB representing the 5×5×5 cube - Game engine implemented as pure functions for move validation, turn logic, and cube rotation - Supabase Realtime pushes updates so all players see moves instantly - Optional AI players fill empty seats so games can start without four humans

The physical cube is still my favorite way to play, but now the game is not limited to the four or five wooden cubes that exist.