Father-son team in Port Huron release 'Synonym Swap' for mobile devices

PORT HURON — Avery Kovatch first started to come up with the idea for a new word-based game in December 2022.

For the next 18 months Avery and his 15-year-old son, Rhys Kovatch, would use their spare time trying to think of rhyming phrases. Avery grabbed a pen and pencil whenever he had a break at his job as a mattress salesman. "Strong Song," "Nice Ice," and "Large Barge," were just a few that he came up with.

All that hard work allowed the father-son team to release their own game for Android and IOS devices: Synonym Swap, a word-based game in which the player is given two words and must come up with synonyms for each that rhyme.

As an example, a prompt of "Sugary Warmth" might be answered with "Sweet Heat." The game has more than 2,000 such pairings.

The two checked the app stores on both IOS and Android to make sure no one had already used their idea.

"Most games are just a remake of something that's older," Rhys said. "We wanted to make a game that's original."

Avery said he he discussed the idea for the game with his son, drawing inspiration from games such as Worldle which have seen great success in recent years, and the two decided to try to make it a reality.

Avery came up with most of the rhyme pairs and the core game idea, while Rhys managed marketing for the game. They designed the game and company logo together, with Avery coming up with the design and Rhys picking the colors.

Then the really hard part began: saving the money to work on the project and officially starting a company.

"It was a lot harder to start a company than you'd think," Avery said. It took over six months before the two could officially start their business, also called Synonym Swap.

One particular barrier was coding the game into a functional app, which would require them to hire outside help, as neither Avery nor Rhys had coding skills to bring the game to life. This prompted Avery to take his core idea to several banks to see if any of them would help fund the idea.

"The first four banks I talked to said no," Avery said. "I realized I had to explain it better: they had assumed I wanted to buy an app someone else made, when in reality we were trying to make our own."

With the funding from the bank, however, Avery was able to hire a web-design company, Hierographx in Saginaw, which developed the game.

"We met regularly to discuss how it should look," Avery said. The employees at Hierographx would draw up multiple versions of screenshots and allow them to pick how they wanted the game to look. The company also designed a sloth mascot for the game and animated it so the sloth would clap for successful answers and cry at failed attempts.

Synonym Swap was released for IOS devices in June, and Android in July. The game allows each player to make five incorrect guesses a day, at which point players can watch an advertisement to continue playing, or pay for more chances.

About 130 players have downloaded the game since it launched. There's a leaderboard for who completes the most puzzles, which Avery said is currently lead by his own father who helped him secure the loan.

Work has already begun to update the game to include a hint button. Rhys and Avery are hoping the game will grow through word of mouth in time and hopefully cover their initial investment of $20,000 into the project.

Avery said every dollar beyond overhead will go to pay for his son's college. Rhys just finished his freshman year at Port Huron Northern High School. Rhys said he wants to study film directing and writing.

"I had to go to the military to go to college," said Avery, who served in the U.S. Marine Corp and did a tour in Iraq. "I'd like for him to be able to go without having to do that."

The game can be found in your app store .

Contact Johnathan Hogan at jhogan@gannett.com .

This article originally appeared on Port Huron Times Herald: Father-son team in Port Huron release 'Synonym Swap' for mobile devices