I wanted to test if it's possible to build a full game using only Rive, no external code, just state machines, data bindings, and nested artboards. Spoiler: It works. As a Motion Designer specializing in interactive Rive UI/UX, this was a fun way to push the tool's limits and show what it can do for code-free interactions.

Whack-A-Mole is simple: moles pop up randomly, you hit them for points, and time runs out. The tricky part was handling everything without code, game states, scoring, and screen switches all had to happen inside Rive. I started in Figma, designing the UI: blue sky, grassy field, mole holes, and bold text. Then imported into Rive to add motion and logic.

I set up nested artboards for modularity: the main "MainAppUI" container holds the start screen, game screen, and end screen. Each exposes values like startPressed, score, and gameOver.

Start screen: Triggers a boolean to begin the game.

Game screen: Moles appear via timed states, taps update score through bindings.

End screen: Shows the final score and a restart option.

Moles as Artboard List The Moles are a single Artboard loaded into the game screen using Rive's Artboard List feature, this helps keeping the size small modular and scalable, if I need the game to have say 100 moles on screen I just need to add new instances to the list and set their positions via data binding. Data bindings connect it all, score passes between screens, states change without external inputs. For switches, I animated Y positions and opacity with step keyframes, binding child artboard positions for clean transitions. The Music created by Davo Gámez added the finishing touch.

I hit play, and it all came together: smooth transitions, accurate scoring, fully contained in Rive. Not ideal for big games, but perfect for prototypes, UI demos, or app mini-games. The Game is fully playable and proved how modular setups in Rive speed up design and animation.

This project showed Rive's strength for quick, scalable interactive design, no-code bloat for smaller projects, easy tweaks. If you're working on SaaS UIs, onboarding flows, or engaging elements, my Rive expertise can help bring your ideas to life with or without coding.

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