A magical board game café, with a library that tells you what to play.
Twist of Fate is a board game café opening in Mount Dora, Central Florida, built around “encouraging analog connection in a digital world.” I designed and built its website and the system behind it: guests browse more than 450 games, open a page for any title, or let a six-question wizard pick the right one for their table.
Behind the public site, staff run the library from an admin panel: every stock change is logged, game data is enriched from BoardGameGeek and YouTube, and retail stock stays in sync with the café’s Shopify store. It began as a Vite prototype and was rebuilt in Next.js 16 on Vercel and Firebase.
Design System
Color
Typography
Tech Stack
Key Features
Game Library
More than 450 titles with instant search, filters for players, playtime, genre, mechanics and library vs. retail, and six sort orders, all without page reloads.
“What Should We Play?”
A six-question wizard: the first two answers filter strictly, the other four score the shelf, and ties are shuffled so every table gets fresh picks.
Game Pages
Every title gets a pre-rendered page with complexity, mechanics, a how-to-play video, an image carousel and rulebook PDFs with branded QR codes.
Staff Admin & Inventory
Server-checked Google sign-in for staff, game editing with BoardGameGeek enrichment, and inventory changes that always write an audit entry.
Shopify Retail Sync
A signed inventory webhook keeps retail stock in step with the café’s Shopify store, while library copies stay managed in-house.
Community Touchpoints
Rive hero animations for desktop and mobile, “Join the Quest” email capture, a blog with moderated comments, Taste Test ordering and a QR link page.
