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Building a Sudoku Game with Amazon Q and AWS

Building a Sudoku Game with Amazon Q and AWS

In this AWS Game Builder Challenge, I set out to create a Sudoku game that emphasizes puzzle logic, interactivity, and a seamless user experience. Like many developers, I often find myself spending more time than I'd like on repetitive coding tasks—setting up data structures, scaffolding logic, and handling boilerplate code. This time, I decided to streamline my workflow by leveraging Amazon Q, a generative AI coding assistant, to handle the groundwork and let me focus on the fun aspects: puzzle mechanics.

game-challenge
Srujana
Published Dec 21, 2024

Introduction

For the AWS Game Builder Challenge, I decided to create a Sudoku game that showcases puzzle logic and user interactivity. Like many developers, I often start projects with a vision—only to get bogged down by the routine of setting up data structures, scaffolding code, or writing repetitive logic. This time, I turned to Amazon Q to handle much of the boilerplate and let me focus on the fun parts: puzzle rules and user experience.

Why Sudoku?

Sudoku is a classic logic puzzle that tasks you with placing digits 1–9 so each row, column, and 3×3 subgrid contains no repeats. It’s straightforward to understand, yet challenging enough to keep players engaged.

Using Amazon Q to Speed Up Development

Amazon Q is a generative AI coding assistant that can:
  • Generate initial data structures
  • Refactor repeated logic
  • Suggest design patterns and code improvements
For this Sudoku project, Amazon Q helped me quickly set up:
  1. A 9×9 board structure
  2. A validation function to check rows, columns, and subgrids
  3. React states to track filled vs. empty cells and game time
By relying on Amazon Q’s suggestions, I avoided manually typing all nine rows and columns or rewriting common Sudoku validation logic. This freed me to focus on user feedback and puzzle flow instead of code grunt work.

The Core Code Structure

  1. Board Setup
    I maintain an initial puzzle in a 2D array. Cells with a number represent pre-filled hints; cells marked as empty strings ('') are open for user input.
  2. Validation
    A validation function checks three things:
    • Row uniqueness: digits 1–9 appear only once in each row.
    • Column uniqueness: digits 1–9 appear only once in each column.
    • 3×3 subgrid uniqueness: each smaller box (3×3) has no repeated digits.
      If all conditions pass and all cells are filled, the puzzle is solved.
  3. Stateful Timer
    A simple timer increments each second to measure how long the puzzle takes. With a quick snippet from Amazon Q, I set up a React effect that updates time until the user finishes or pauses the game.
  4. Rendering the UI
    • The 9×9 grid is rendered using a nested .map() structure. Each cell is clickable for the user to fill.
    • A side panel shows the elapsed time and remaining numbers count.
By keeping these parts modular—board logic, validation, timer, UI layout—I can readily expand or modify pieces without affecting the entire codebase.

Wrap-Up

Thanks to Amazon Q, I was able to:
  • Launch my Sudoku game more quickly by automating repetitive code blocks.
  • Structure the core puzzle logic and user interface in a clean, modular way.
  • Deploy my final build on AWS without fussing over extensive boilerplate.
Try it out: https://sudoku-game-ten.vercel.app/
 

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