Infinity Hexagonal Tic-Tac-Toe

Small monorepo for a real-time 2-player abstract strategy game inspired by the following YouTube video from webgoatguy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ob6QINTMIOA

Official website: https://hexo.did.science/

Game

Infinity Hexagonal Tic-Tac-Toe is played on an infinite hexagonal grid with an asymmetric opening:

• Player 1 starts the game with a single move on any empty hex.
• Player 2 replies with two consecutive moves.
• Every turn after that also contains two moves.
• The board is infinite, so the game can expand in any direction.
• The first player to connect six of their own hexagons in a straight line on one axis wins.

Preview

Software Stack

• pnpm & TypeScript
• Node.js + Express + Socket.io + MongoDB
• React + Zustand + React-Router

Development

Local development

Install dependencies and start the frontend and backend in separate terminals:

pnpm install
pnpm dev:backend
pnpm dev:frontend

Frontend: http://localhost:5173
Backend: http://localhost:3001

Create packages/backend/.env before starting the backend. The backend requires:

• MONGODB_URI
• AUTH_SECRET
• AUTH_DISCORD_ID or DISCORD_CLIENT_ID
• AUTH_DISCORD_SECRET or DISCORD_CLIENT_SECRET

Common local values in packages/backend/.env look like this:

PORT=3001
MONGODB_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017
MONGODB_DB_NAME=ih3t
AUTH_SECRET=replace-me
DISCORD_CLIENT_ID=replace-me
DISCORD_CLIENT_SECRET=replace-me

Optional backend environment variables:

• ALLOWED_ORIGINS
• FRONTEND_DIST_PATH
• LOG_LEVEL
• LOG_PRETTY
• REMATCH_TTL_MS
• MONGODB_METRICS_COLLECTION
• MONGODB_GAME_HISTORY_COLLECTION
• MONGODB_AUTH_USERS_COLLECTION
• MONGODB_AUTH_ACCOUNTS_COLLECTION
• MONGODB_AUTH_SESSIONS_COLLECTION
• MONGODB_AUTH_VERIFICATION_TOKENS_COLLECTION

Discord OAuth must be configured with the backend callback URL:

http://localhost:3001/auth/callback/discord

In production, use your deployed backend origin for the same /auth/callback/discord path.

Server logs are printed to the console and also written to logs/server.log, rotating in 50 MB segments with a 500 MB total cap.

While the backend is running, type shutdown into the backend terminal and press Enter to schedule a graceful shutdown. This immediately blocks new games, gives existing sessions up to 10 minutes to finish, and then closes any remaining sessions before the server exits. Sending SIGINT or SIGTERM follows the same graceful path on the first and second signal; the process exits immediately only after the third signal.

Docker Deployment

The included multi-stage Dockerfile builds the frontend, builds the backend, and serves the compiled frontend through the backend on port 3001.

Build the image:

pnpm docker:build

Run it with your backend environment file:

docker run --rm \
  -p 3001:3001 \
  --env-file packages/backend/.env \
  --name ih3t \
  ih3t:latest

The container exposes only port 3001. In production, the frontend is served by the backend from the same origin, so users only need to reach the backend URL.

For a long-running deployment, remove --rm, run the container detached, and consider mounting a volume for persistent logs:

docker run -d \
  -p 3001:3001 \
  --env-file packages/backend/.env \
  -v ih3t-logs:/app/logs \
  --name ih3t \
  ih3t:latest

The Docker build context excludes .env files, so runtime configuration must be provided with --env-file or -e flags when the container starts.

AI Use

This project was built mostly with AI-assisted "vibe coding" techniques.

Why?
I wanted to experiment with AI coding systems, especially GPT-based ones, and this project felt like a good fit. I already have a strong background in web development and in this tech stack, but using AI to build the initial prototype helped speed things up considerably.

Contributing note on AI

AI-assisted pull requests are welcome, but responsibility for the final change always stays with the author of the PR. If you use AI, you are still expected to understand every change, test them properly, and make any necessary adjustments before requesting review.