Gamers Forem: Adam

We Built a Free Drawing Game for Long Distance Couples - Just in Time for Valentine's Day ❤️

Adam — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 11:23:59 +0000

Valentine's Day is hard when you're miles apart from your partner. Watching movies over video call gets old. Sending virtual cards feels impersonal. We wanted something better.

So we built Paint Your Partner - a free online game where couples draw portraits of each other in real-time, then reveal the results together.

The Concept

The rules are simple:

You and your partner join the same room
You each draw a portrait of the other person
You can see each other's canvas updating live
When the timer ends, both portraits are revealed side by side

The results are always hilarious. Most people aren't artists, and that's the point. The worse the drawings, the funnier the reveal.

Why We Built It

My co-founder and I were both in long distance relationships at different points. The options for virtual dates were limited:

Watch a movie together (passive, not interactive)
Play video games (requires skill matching)
Just video call (eventually runs out of things to say)

We wanted something that was:

Interactive - both people actively doing something
Creative - makes you think and laugh
Quick - 10-15 minutes, not a whole evening commitment
Shareable - creates a memory you can keep

Drawing each other checked all the boxes.

The TikTok Moment

We launched quietly, shared it with friends, and forgot about it for a few weeks.

Then someone posted their Paint Your Partner session on TikTok with the hashtag #PaintYourPartner. It got 2 million views.

Suddenly we had thousands of couples drawing each other every day. The hashtag #PaintYourDate started trending. People were posting their terrible portraits and tagging their partners.

The best part? The worse the drawing, the more engagement it got. Nobody wants to see a perfect portrait. They want to see their partner's genuine attempt at capturing their likeness with limited artistic ability.

How It Works (Non-Technical Version)

When you visit paintyourdate.io, you create a room and get a shareable link. Send that link to your partner - they can be anywhere in the world.

Once you're both in the room:

You each see your own canvas and your partner's canvas
A timer counts down (you can customize the duration)
You draw each other simultaneously
When time runs out, both drawings are displayed together

There's no account required. No app to download. It works on phones, tablets, and computers. Just open the link and start drawing.

Perfect for Valentine's Day

Here's how couples are using Paint Your Partner for Valentine's Day:

The Classic Date Night
Set up a video call, open Paint Your Partner in another tab, and draw each other while chatting. Reveal the portraits, laugh at the results, screenshot for memories.

The Long Distance Surprise
Send your partner the room link with a message: "I have a Valentine's surprise for you." When they join, they'll see you've already started drawing them.

The Group Activity
Some couples do this with other couple friends - everyone draws their partner at the same time, then reveals together. Competitive portrait drawing.

The TikTok Challenge
Record your screen during the drawing session, capture the reveal reaction, post with #PaintYourPartner. Bonus points if the drawings are terrible.

What We've Learned About Couples

Building this game taught us a few things:

Time pressure creates better content. When we gave unlimited time, people overthought their drawings. A 5-minute timer forces quick decisions and genuine attempts.

Imperfection is the feature. Early feedback asked for undo buttons and layers. We kept it simple on purpose. The constraints make it fun.

The reveal is everything. We spent more time on the reveal animation than any other feature. That moment of seeing both portraits appear simultaneously is the entire experience.

People want to share. We added a one-tap share button that creates an image with both portraits. It's the most-used feature after the drawing canvas itself.

Valentine's Day Stats (From Last Year)

Last Valentine's Day, Paint Your Partner saw:

47,000 drawing sessions
Average session length: 12 minutes
Most common drawing time: 5 minutes
Peak hours: 7-10 PM across all time zones
Most shared result: A couple where both drawings looked nothing like either person

It's Free

Paint Your Partner is completely free. No premium tier. No ads. No data collection beyond basic analytics.

We built it because we wanted it to exist, and we keep it running because people use it.

Try It Before Valentine's Day

Don't wait until February 14th to figure out how it works. Do a practice round this week.

Play now: paintyourdate.io

Learn more about the challenge: artbitrator.com/paint-your-partner

Full guide to the TikTok trend: Paint Your Partner Challenge Guide

The Sister Project

Paint Your Partner is actually a spinoff from our main project, Artbitrator - a multiplayer drawing game where AI judges your artwork with voice commentary.

If you enjoy Paint Your Partner, check out Artbitrator for competitive drawing games with friends. Same drawing mechanics, different experience.

Share Your Results

If you try Paint Your Partner for Valentine's Day, I'd love to see the results. Post them in the comments or tag us on social media.

The worse the drawing, the better. That's the whole point.

Links:

Play Paint Your Partner: paintyourdate.io
Paint Your Partner info page: artbitrator.com/paint-your-partner
TikTok challenge guide: artbitrator.com/blog/paint-your-partner-tiktok-challenge-guide
Virtual date ideas for LDR couples: artbitrator.com/blog/paint-your-partner-virtual-date-ldr
Main game (Artbitrator): artbitrator.com

From Side Project to Viral TikTok Challenge - Building Paint Your Partner

Adam — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 11:21:19 +0000

The Idea

Long distance couples have limited options for virtual dates. Watching movies together gets old. We built Paint Your Partner as a simple premise: draw portraits of each other in real-time, then reveal the results.

It went viral on TikTok as the Paint Your Partner challenge.

The MVP

The first version took two weeks to build:

Two canvases, synchronized via WebSockets
A timer
A reveal button

No accounts. No persistence. No features. Just the core experience.

// The entire reveal logic in v1
function reveal() {
  socket.emit('reveal');
  document.getElementById('partner-canvas').style.display = 'block';
  document.getElementById('your-canvas').style.display = 'block';
}

Why It Worked

The Paint Your Partner challenge succeeded because:

Simple to explain - Draw your partner, reveal at the same time
Guaranteed funny results - Most people can't draw well
Shareable outcome - Two portraits side by side is perfect for TikTok
No skill required - Bad drawings are part of the fun

Technical Decisions That Mattered

No accounts required: Couples don't want to create accounts for a 10-minute activity. We use room codes instead.

Mobile-first canvas: Most TikTok users are on phones. The drawing canvas needed to work with touch, handle palm rejection, and fit portrait orientation.

Instant sharing: After reveal, one tap generates a shareable image with both portraits. This drove organic growth.

The TikTok Effect

The first viral video came from a couple we'd never heard of. Their Paint Your Partner video got 2 million views. Traffic spiked 50x overnight.

What we learned:

TikTok traffic is mobile traffic (optimize accordingly)
Viral spikes are temporary (have a retention strategy)
User-generated content is your best marketing

Scaling Challenges

The viral spike exposed problems:

WebSocket connections maxed out - Upgraded server capacity
Room code collisions - Moved from 4-digit to 6-character codes
Canvas rendering on low-end phones - Optimized stroke rendering

Current State

Paint Your Partner now handles thousands of daily sessions. The average couple spends 12 minutes drawing each other.

We've added:

Optional voice chat during drawing
Multiple brush sizes and colors
Save and share functionality
Timer customization

Try It

Play Paint Your Partner free at paintyourdate.io or learn more about the challenge at artbitrator.com/paint-your-partner.

For virtual date ideas and how the challenge works, see our complete Paint Your Partner guide.

Comparing Drawing Game Architectures - Skribbl, Gartic Phone, and Artbitrator

Adam — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 11:19:12 +0000

Three Approaches to Online Drawing Games

The drawing game genre has three dominant architectures:

Turn-based guessing (Skribbl, Drawasaurus)
Telephone chain (Gartic Phone)
Simultaneous competition (Artbitrator)

Each solves the "multiplayer drawing" problem differently. Here's a technical comparison.

Skribbl Architecture: Turn-Based Simplicity

Skribbl's approach is straightforward:

One player draws
Others type guesses
Server validates guesses against the secret word
Points awarded, next player's turn

[Drawer] --> Canvas Data --> [Server] --> [Viewers]
[Viewers] --> Guesses --> [Server] --> Validate --> Points

Advantages:

Simple server logic
Low bandwidth (only one canvas to sync)
Easy to scale

Disadvantages:

Players wait during others' turns
No simultaneous interaction
Engagement drops during waiting periods

Gartic Phone Architecture: Async Chain

Gartic Phone uses asynchronous rounds:

Everyone writes a prompt
Everyone draws someone else's prompt
Everyone guesses someone else's drawing
Chain revealed at the end

Round 1: [All Players] --> Write Prompts --> [Server stores]
Round 2: [All Players] --> Draw (assigned prompt) --> [Server stores]
Round 3: [All Players] --> Guess (assigned drawing) --> [Server stores]
Reveal: [Server] --> Compile chains --> [All Players]

Advantages:

Everyone active simultaneously
No waiting between turns
Hilarious results from miscommunication chains

Disadvantages:

Complex state management
Long total game time
No real-time interaction between players

Artbitrator Architecture: Real-Time Competition

Artbitrator takes a different approach:

All players draw the same prompt simultaneously
AI evaluates all canvases in real-time
First correct AI guess wins

[All Players] --> Canvas Data --> [Server] --> Broadcast to all
                                     |
                                     v
                              [AI Evaluation]
                                     |
                                     v
                              [Commentary + Winner Detection]

Advantages:

Constant engagement (always drawing or watching)
Real-time feedback from AI
Competitive tension throughout

Disadvantages:

Higher server load (multiple canvases + AI)
More complex synchronization
AI accuracy affects gameplay fairness

Bandwidth Comparison

For a 12-player game:

Game	Data per second	Notes
Skribbl	~5 KB	One canvas, text guesses
Gartic Phone	~2 KB	Async, no real-time sync
Artbitrator	~60 KB	12 canvases, real-time sync

Artbitrator's bandwidth is higher but manageable with stroke batching and delta compression.

Server Complexity

Game	State to Track	Real-time Requirements
Skribbl	Current drawer, word, scores	Low
Gartic Phone	All prompts, drawings, guesses	None (async)
Artbitrator	All canvases, AI state, timing	High

Which Architecture Wins?

It depends on the experience you want:

Casual party game: Gartic Phone's telephone mechanic creates laughs
Classic Pictionary feel: Skribbl's turn-based format is familiar
Competitive drawing: Artbitrator's simultaneous format adds tension

Play and Compare

Try each approach yourself:

Skribbl: skribbl.io
Gartic Phone: garticphone.com
Artbitrator: artbitrator.com

For a detailed feature comparison, see our complete guide to drawing games in 2026.

How to Fix Azure Application Gateway Stuck in "Failed" Provisioning State (Without Downtime)

Adam — Sun, 18 Jan 2026 15:40:12 +0000

How to Fix Azure Application Gateway Stuck in "Failed" Provisioning State (Without Downtime)

If you're using Azure Application Gateway with AKS and AGIC, you might encounter the dreaded "Failed" provisioning state. Here's a quick fix that saved my Sunday.

The Problem

After deploying a new container image, my Application Gateway got stuck:

az network application-gateway show \
  --name ingress-appgateway \
  --resource-group MC_my-aks-cluster_uksouth \
  --query "provisioningState" -o tsv

# Output: Failed

The gateway was still running (operational), but any configuration updates would fail with:

"Last configuration update operation on this Application Gateway failed."

This meant:

AGIC couldn't sync new pod IPs to backend pools → 502 errors
SSL certificate renewals couldn't complete
Any ingress changes were blocked

The Nuclear Option (What I Almost Did)

Stop and start the gateway:

az network application-gateway stop --name ingress-appgateway --resource-group MC_...
az network application-gateway start --name ingress-appgateway --resource-group MC_...

This works, but causes ~2 minutes of downtime for all services behind the gateway.

The Better Fix (Zero Downtime)

Force a re-commit of the configuration by making a trivial change:

az network application-gateway update \
  --name ingress-appgateway \
  --resource-group MC_my-aks-cluster_uksouth \
  --set tags.reset="reset-$(date +%s)"

This triggers Azure to re-process the entire configuration, which resets the provisioning state back to "Succeeded" - without any downtime.

Verify It Worked

az network application-gateway show \
  --name ingress-appgateway \
  --resource-group MC_my-aks-cluster_uksouth \
  --query "provisioningState" -o tsv

# Output: Succeeded 🎉

Why Does This Happen?

The "Failed" state usually occurs when:

Azure has a transient issue during a config update
AGIC tries to sync while Azure is having problems
SSL certificate operations fail mid-way

The gateway keeps running with its last good config, but gets stuck unable to accept new changes.

TL;DR

# Check state
az network application-gateway show --name YOUR_APPGW --resource-group YOUR_RG --query "provisioningState" -o tsv

# Fix it (no downtime)
az network application-gateway update --name YOUR_APPGW --resource-group YOUR_RG --set tags.reset="reset-$(date +%s)"

Credit to this Microsoft Q&A thread for the PowerShell equivalent that pointed me in the right direction.

[Boost]

Adam — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 22:30:55 +0000

How I Built a Stroke Capture System for an AI Drawing Game

Adam ・ Dec 22

#gamedev #webdev #ai #showdev

How I Built a Stroke Capture System for an AI Drawing Game

Adam — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 21:31:42 +0000

Most drawing apps save the final image. I wanted to capture the whole journey.

For Paint Your Partner, I built a system that records every single brush stroke. Position, timing, pressure, colour, order. Everything.

Why? Because an AI is watching. And it needs to see the drawing happen, not just the end result.

The Problem

I was building a couples drawing game. You draw your partner, they draw you, an AI commentates live.

But if the AI only sees the finished image, the commentary is boring. "Nice portrait." Cool. Thanks.

I wanted it to react as you draw. Spot the eyes appearing. Notice you're spending ages on the hair. Catch the moment you give up on the nose and scribble something abstract.

For that, I needed stroke data.

What Gets Captured

Every stroke is an object. It contains:

Path data (array of x/y coordinates)
Colour
Brush size
Timestamp (when the stroke started)
Duration (how long it took)
Order (which stroke number this was)

Nothing clever here. Just capture everything and store it.

I've got over 1,000 drawings in the database now, each with complete stroke history.

Replay

With full stroke data, I can replay any drawing as a video. Speed it up, slow it down, export as GIF or MP4.

This is useful for:

Shareable content (watch someone draw their partner in 10 seconds)
AI training data (if I ever want to fine-tune)
Debugging (see exactly what a user drew and when)

Real-Time AI Commentary

The AI watches strokes arrive in real-time. It doesn't wait for you to finish.

As features appear on the canvas (eyes, hair, smile), it fires off short commentary. One or two sentences. Cheeky, not critical.

"Ooh those eyes are looking dreamy!"

"Someone's really capturing that smile!"

The stroke data tells the AI what's being drawn and how. Hesitation, confidence, chaos. It's all in the timing.

The Engine

Paint Your Partner runs on the same engine as Artbitrator (my multiplayer drawing game, like Quick Draw but with AI judging). Same stroke capture. Same replay system. Different game modes.

Building the core engine once and spinning up different products on top has been worth the upfront effort.

What's Next

Camera capture. Sync the players' webcam feeds with the stroke replay and export the whole thing as one video. TikTok-ready couples content.

Not built yet. But the stroke system makes it possible.

Try It

paintyourdate.io

Draw your partner. Let the AI commentate. See how bad you really are at noses.

[Boost]

Adam — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 22:51:45 +0000

Major Update v1.2

Adam ・ Dec 8

#webdev #ai #programming #javascript

Artbitrator - Major Update v1.2

Adam — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 22:49:32 +0000

Welcome to Artbitrator’s New Playground of Creativity

Play here for free

Love doodling? Obsessed with Quick Draw-style games? Looking for a Gartic Phone alternative with AI judges? We’ve got you covered. With this significant update, Artbitrator - the multiplayer drawing game that’s like Google Quick Draw meets Gartic Phone but better - is rolling out four new modes designed to bring out the artist in you, whether you’re here to compete or have fun.

Weekly Challenge: Channel Your Inner Quick Draw Pro
Our brand-spanking-new Weekly Challenge mode has been designed for competitive doodlers. Better than Gartic Phone’s chaotic gameplay and more competitive than Google Quick Draw, you’ll tackle tricky prompts in this quickdraw drawing competition and race to get the AI to recognise your doodle, climbing the leaderboard each week to earn bragging rights.
Draw All The Things: A Doodler’s Collection Journey
If you love variety, the Draw All The Things mode is your new best mate. Inspired by Google Quick Draw and the best doodle challenges we have hand-picked, you’ll work through categories like animals, characters, and fantasy themes. Each completed set earns you stars and a satisfying sense of progress, giving you a rewarding creative gaming experience as you improve your skills and build your collection of drawings.
Story Mode: Transform Your Doodles into Epic Tales!
Your excellent drawings turn into colourful illustrated stories when you use Story Mode. Unlike the crazy pass-the-pictures game of Gartic Phone, where you quickly draw and pass your drawings, this way lets you spend time carefully creating your drawings by drawing them based on an idea that you received from another player (this is called receiving prompts). This is a great way to have fun while expressing yourself by creating stories with your doodles!
Free Draw: Doodle Away With No Pressure
Free draw mode offers an opportunity for creativity without any stress. If you intend to prepare for multiplayer games in the style of Gartic Phone or wish to improve your drawing skills on Google Quick Draw, this will provide you with a prompt to do so. You get to select the prompt, then doodle as much as you want, with no competition or time constraints. You will receive feedback from the AI to help you improve your doodling.

With these new modes, Artbitrator combines the best of drawing games online like Gartic Phone, Google Quick Draw, and more, offering you the best Gartic Phone alternative with AI judges that actually talk to you! Draw it your way and show us what you can create—see you in the game!

Whether you loved Google Quick Draw or you’re looking for something beyond Gartic Phone, Artbitrator’s new modes bring the best of both worlds—competitive fun, creative expression, and AI judges with personality!

New updates, come check it out!

Adam — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 16:05:37 +0000

I Built an AI That Roasts Your Drawings

Adam ・ Sep 5

Play testers are wanted, free, and no signup is required. Give any feedback on x @artbitratorgame

Adam — Tue, 28 Oct 2025 14:22:55 +0000

Artbitrator Launches!

Adam ・ Oct 28

#ai #gamedev #showdev

Play tested wanted, play for free, no sign up required. let me know any feedback on X @arbitratorgame

Adam — Tue, 28 Oct 2025 14:21:27 +0000

Artbitrator Launches!

Adam ・ Oct 28

#ai #gamedev #showdev

Artbitrator Launches!

Adam — Tue, 28 Oct 2025 13:15:07 +0000

Artbitrator Launches - Draw for AI Art Legends!

PLAY HERE FOR FREE NO SIGNUP

The wait is over! Artbitrator is officially LIVE and ready to judge your artistic skills!

What is Artbitrator?

Ever wondered what Bob Ross would think of your drawing? Or how brutally honest Picasso would be? Now you can find out! Artbitrator is a fast-paced multiplayer drawing game where you create art for AI judges based on legendary artists.

Play the online drawing game! Multiplayer drawing game with an AI judge!

PLAY HERE FOR FREE NO SIGNUP

Find me on x (twitter)

LOOKING FOR PLAYTESTERS!

Game Modes

1-12 Multiplayer - Real-time drawing duels (LIVE NOW!)
Gallery - Showcase your masterpieces
Campaign Mode - 50 levels of progressive challenges (Coming soon)
Daily Challenges - Compete on global leaderboards (Coming soon)
Free Draw - Practice your skills (Coming soon)

Quick & Addictive

Get instant AI feedback

Earn XP and unlock ranks

Climb the leaderboards

Play Now!

PLAY HERE FOR FREE NO SIGNUP

Built with React Native + Expo

Join our community and share your best (or worst!) drawings!