Mobile App Developer Needed — Interactive Kids Virtual Pet / Adventure App

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: TYPE OF WORK

Full Time

: SALARY

N/A

: HOURS PER WEEK

TBD

: DATE UPDATED

Sep 18, 2026

JOB OVERVIEW

PROJECT OVERVIEW:

I am looking for an experienced mobile app developer or small development team to build a highly interactive children's mobile app for iOS and Android.

The app combines:

• A virtual pet companion
• Interactive daily activities
• Voice interaction
• Mini-games
• Rewards and collectible items
• Pet care
• Character progression/evolution
• Fantasy challenges
• Multiple unlockable environments
• Bedtime stories
• Parent dashboard
• AI-powered features

This is NOT a simple educational app with static screens.

The goal is to create something that feels like a polished children's game where the character reacts constantly to what the child does.

The child should be tapping, dragging, speaking, choosing, helping, collecting, exploring and interacting with their character throughout the experience.

I already have extensive concept art, UI references, character ideas, gameplay concepts and screen flows.

The selected developer will receive the deeper product specification after selection and NDA.

--------------------------------------------------

CORE FEATURES

1. CHILD ONBOARDING

The app begins with a polished onboarding experience where the child:

• Enters/selects their name
• Chooses a character/pet
• Meets their companion
• Completes a short interactive introduction
• Enters the main game environment

The onboarding should feel animated and magical rather than like filling out forms.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . VIRTUAL PET SYSTEM

The child has their own interactive pet/companion.

The pet should:

• Blink
• Move
• Celebrate
• Sleep
• Eat
• Drink
• Play
• React emotionally
• Respond to activities
• Grow/evolve over time

The pet should feel alive.

Static character images alone will not be enough.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . MAIN INTERACTIVE HUB

Instead of a standard menu, children enter a fantasy environment containing different interactive locations.

Examples:

• Pet home
• Activity areas
• Games
• Story area
• Drawing area
• Challenges
• Collectibles
• Locked areas
• Future environments

The child taps different parts of the environment to enter activities.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . DAILY ACTIVITIES

The app will include rotating daily tasks and interactive missions.

Tasks can include:

• Helping someone
• Sharing
• Cleaning
• Listening
• Completing a simple challenge
• Speaking certain phrases
• Drawing
• Taking care of their pet

The app should react differently depending on the child's response.

Example:

The character asks the child a question.

The child answers YES or NOT YET.

If NOT YET, the character may encourage them to complete the activity and come back.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . VOICE INTERACTION

Several parts of the app require the child to speak.

Eventually the app should support speech recognition so certain words or phrases can be detected.

As words are spoken correctly, they may visually:

• Light up
• Become underlined
• Glow
• Trigger animations
• Advance progress

Experience integrating speech recognition is a major plus.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . REWARD SYSTEM

Completing activities earns rewards.

Possible rewards:

• Toys
• Badges
• Stars
• Character XP
• Decorations
• Collectibles
• New animations
• New areas
• Character upgrades

After certain tasks, the child may choose between several rewards.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . TOY COLLECTION

The child's pet can collect toys.

The child can:

• Choose toys
• Give toys to the pet
• View the collection
• Watch the pet interact with toys
• Unlock rarer items

Different toys should trigger different animations.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . PET HOME

The pet has its own home.

The child can enter it and interact with the pet.

Activities may include:

• Feeding
• Giving water
• Playing
• Cleaning
• Bathing
• Bedtime
• Organizing the room
• Toy collection

This area should feel like a virtual-pet game.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . DRAG-AND-DROP MINI-GAMES

Several activities involve direct touch interaction.

Examples:

• Dragging toys to different characters
• Cleaning a room
• Sorting objects
• Moving items to correct locations
• Giving an object to the pet
• Completing simple touch-based puzzles

Strong drag-and-drop UX is important.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . CHARACTER CHALLENGES / BATTLES

The app will include fantasy challenge sequences.

These should feel cinematic and game-like.

The child's pet may face larger fantasy characters/creatures.

The child completes voice or interaction challenges to reduce the opponent's power and complete the encounter.

The system should be reusable so many different challenges can be created using one engine.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . CHARACTER PROGRESSION

The pet grows and changes visually as the child progresses.

Eventually there may be multiple evolution stages.

Progression can unlock:

• New appearance
• New effects
• New abilities
• New animations
• New areas
• Stronger challenge abilities

------------------------------------------ ---------- . MULTIPLE ENVIRONMENTS

The app architecture should support multiple fantasy environments/worlds over time.

Each environment may contain:

• Different artwork
• Activities
• Challenges
• Characters
• Rewards
• Collectibles
• Final challenge
• Unlock progression

Do NOT hard-code every world separately.

The system should be scalable and data-driven.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . DRAWING ACTIVITY

The child can participate in creative drawing activities.

Eventually this may support:

• Built-in drawing
• Parent-assisted camera capture
• AI-assisted image recognition
• Positive character feedback

The experience should always be encouraging.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . BEDTIME MODE

The app will contain a calmer nighttime experience.

The child can:

• Help put the pet to bed
• Select a story
• Listen to narrated content
• Complete simple breathing exercises
• Watch calming animations

The app will launch with multiple bedtime stories and should allow new stories to be added later without rebuilding the app.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . GUIDED CALMING ACTIVITIES

There may be short audio/visual activities such as:

• Breathing exercises
• Relaxation activities
• Simple guided listening experiences

These should feel integrated into the game rather than like a clinical health app.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . AI CHARACTER CONVERSATION

A future/premium feature may allow the child to talk to their pet using AI.

The character should:

• Understand simple child speech
• Respond briefly
• Remain age appropriate
• Maintain personality
• Follow strict child-safety rules

This feature will require significant safety and parental-control architecture.

Experience with OpenAI/LLM APIs, moderation and child-safe AI systems is a major plus.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . CAMERA-BASED MINI-GAMES

Future versions may include optional camera interaction with parental permission.

For example:

• Smile-based challenges
• Simple facial movement games
• AR-style interactions

This should NOT be designed as medical or psychological emotion detection.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . PARENT DASHBOARD

There will be a completely separate parent-only section.

Parents may eventually see:

• Activities completed
• Rewards earned
• Character progress
• Stories listened to
• Badges
• Usage summary
• Child profiles
• Privacy settings
• Camera permissions
• Microphone permissions
• AI settings
• Content settings

The parent area must be protected by a parental gate.

------------------------------------------ ---------- . CHILD PRIVACY AND SAFETY

This app is intended for young children.

Child safety and privacy are extremely important.

The developer should understand or be willing to carefully implement:

• COPPA requirements
• Apple Kids Category requirements
• Google Play Families requirements
• Parental consent
• Child-data minimization
• Secure storage
• Camera/microphone permissions
• Safe analytics
• Appropriate parental gates

There will be:

• No public child profiles
• No stranger messaging
• No unrestricted child-to-child chat
• No public ranking of identifiable children

--------------------------------------------------

TECHNICAL DIRECTION

I am open to technical recommendations.

My current preferred direction is:

• React Native
• Expo
• TypeScript
• iOS + Android from one codebase

Potential backend:

• Supabase
or
• Firebase

Future integrations may include:

• Speech recognition
• Text-to-speech
• AI APIs
• Camera/vision
• Audio
• Subscriptions
• Analytics
• Push notifications

Animation experience with any of the following is a major plus:

• Rive
• Lottie
• React Native Reanimated
• Spine
• Similar game-animation technology

--------------------------------------------------

IMPORTANT DEVELOPMENT REQUIREMENT

I do NOT want someone to simply create 100+ completely separate hard-coded screens.

The application needs reusable systems.

For example:

One activity engine should support many activities.

One challenge/battle system should support many different characters.

One story player should support many stories.

One reward system should support many reward types.

One pet-care system should support multiple actions.

The application needs to be scalable because much more content will be added after launch.

--------------------------------------------------

DESIGN STYLE

I already have visual concepts.

The final product should feel:

• Premium
• Magical
• Highly animated
• Colorful
• Warm
• Child friendly
• Game-like
• Modern
• Polished

This should NOT look like a generic business application or basic educational app.

Character animation and visual feedback are extremely important.

--------------------------------------------------

WHO I AM LOOKING FOR

Ideally you have experience with several of the following:

• React Native / Expo
• iOS + Android apps
• Mobile games
• Children's apps
• Interactive animation
• Rive / Lottie
• Drag-and-drop interactions
• Speech recognition
• Audio
• AI APIs
• Camera features
• Backend development
• App Store / Google Play deployment

Experience with virtual pets, children's games or highly interactive mobile products is a major advantage.

--------------------------------------------------

HOW TO APPLY

Please answer ALL of the following:

1. Show me the most interactive mobile app or game you have built.

2. What part of it did YOU personally develop?

3. Have you built anything involving:
- Virtual pets?
- Mobile games?
- Character animation?
- Speech recognition?
- AI?
- Children's apps?

4. What technology stack would you recommend for this project?

5. Can you build both iOS and Android?

6. Are you an individual developer or a team?

7. Can you handle frontend AND backend?

8. What animation technology would you use?

9. How would you structure the app so hundreds of future activities can be added without rebuilding everything?

10. Approximately how long would you expect a strong first playable version to take?

11. What is your expected pricing structure?

12. Are you willing to sign an NDA before receiving the complete product concept and detailed feature documentation?

Please do NOT send only generic websites, WordPress sites or basic admin dashboards.

I am specifically looking for somebody capable of building a polished, interactive mobile experience.

If the initial build goes well, this can become a substantial long-term project with many future features, characters, environments and content updates. - This is one of 8 projects we will be working on.

SKILL REQUIREMENT

Mobile Development Game Development iOS Development

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Mobile App Developer Needed — Interactive Kids Virtual Pet / Adventure App

Please login or register as jobseeker to apply for this job.

TYPE OF WORK

SALARY

HOURS PER WEEK

DATE UPDATED

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