Tag Archives: Space Invaders

Playing real-world Space Invaders with real-world lasers

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Warning: Do not try this at home.

When it comes to old-school arcade gaming, Space Invaders undoubtedly joins the ranks of Pac-Man as one of, if not, the most influential 8-bit pioneers. Originally released in 1978, the laser cannon shooting game led the way for the industry in migrating from just Pong-inspired sports games towards action-packed ones involving fantastical scenarios. However, the pixelated blocky graphic graphics always seemed a little unrealistic. That’s why one engineer has made a real-world version with real-world lasers.

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In anticipation of Arduino Day 2015, Martin Raynsford — who happens to be one of the owners of UK-based laser cutter manufacturer Just Add Sharks — decided to brought the idea to life using the hardware of a modified Whitetooth A1 laser cutter along with a laptop keyboard to serve as its gamepad. An Arduino Nano (ATmega328) was also mounted to a custom 80W laser controller to enable side-to-side movement to help shoot the paper invaders, each clipped to a plate and driven by stepper motors.

“X,Y and Z; step, direction and limits make the first 9 I/O, laser on/off and laser PWM make the last two outputs. The USB connection provides serial input for the board and the communication link with the PC,” Raynsford explains.

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How it works is relatively simple. A player watches the game via an overhead webcam while a PC controller sends simple left/right/fire commands. The PC controller was written with VB.net, and the images were captured using OpenCV.

Given the genuine risk of fire, Raynsford advised that he completed a test burn before the actually playing the game. During those tests, the Maker discovered that the paper invaders were too close together. In other words, fire would spread across a row quite easily should a player hit the intended target. After a few minor alterations, “The game played well and resulted in flamey death for the Space Invaders and not the laser cutter, [so] I consider that to be a win condition.”

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Intrigued? You can read more about the project on its official page here, or watch it in action below.

Video: Mega + Uno drives this 8X8X8 cube invader



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Anred Zynch recently debuted a massively slick 8x8x8 LED cube — configured as a Space Invaders style game with a Playstation 1 controller.

According to Hackaday’s James Hobson, the cube is powered by an Arduino Mega (ATmega2560) which is tasked with driving the 512-LED array. 

Meanwhile, an Arduino Uno (ATmega328) is responsible for generating sound effects during gameplay.

Aside from the two Atmel based Arduino boards, key cube components include:

  • 512x LEDs
  • 10x Silver plated wire 0.8mm for sinkers and LED grid
  • 2x Breadboard 160×100 H25PR160 (sinkers)
  • 1x 100 Ohm resistor
  • 1x Speaker 8 Ohm
  • 2x resistor between 1,5 K and 47 K
  • 1x switch 2 or 3-positions
  • 1x or 2x 10K ohm resistor

Zynch’s cube — recently surfaced on Instructables — was reportedly inspired by a number of cube projects, including Chr’s and yes, the Borg cube by Das-Labour.

Interested in learning more? You can find additional information, along with a full parts breakdown on the project’s official page here.