For my midterm project, I have decided to recreate a toy which I enjoyed playing as a child. The toy is in the shape of a crocodile with a mouth open at default. The players alternate and click the teeth and the mouth closes when one specific tooth is clicked.  The tooth is randomly selected for each round and the person who gets ‘bitten’ loses the game.

Inspired by this, I chose to create a game similar to this concept but instead of the multiple teeth, I have one button and the closing of the mouth is not determined by the number of teeth, but rather an analog input, the total duration of the time of the button being clicked. The players can choose to click the button for how long as they want, just as long as the mouth does not close when it is their turn. 

The steps:

Here are the functions you could expect from the game:

1. When the middle button is clicked, the 8 LEDS (that look like teeth on the lower part of the mouth) light up to indicate to the player that the button is being clicked. 
2. When the button is pressed, the counter, which is initially defined as 0, starts counting up. When the player finishes their turn, they un-press the button and this stops the counter at the position left. The value of the counter is stored.
3. The next player presses the button for the duration that they want. The counter increases from the last value stored.
4. Step 2 – 3 repeats until one of the players press until the pre-defined max counter value. 
5. When the counter value reaches the max value, a game over melody is activated along with the servo (connected to the crocodile mouth) closing on to the player’s hand. The mouth opens up for the next game.
6. The players must click the second button which resets the counter, making it ready for the players to restart the game.

Video

Input Sensors

• Two buttons (one for the reset, and one for the game)

Output Sensors used

• Speaker (for sound effects)
• servos (for the movement of the mouth)
• leds (for indicating the press of the buttons)

Schematic Diagram

Code:

The arduino program can be accessed through my github.

https://github.com/yk1932/Intro-to-IM-Midterm

Evaluation of the project:

The most challenging part of the project was the idea selection. The initial ideas that I had were very ambitious and time consuming for the time and resources we were given. I think the ideation process took the longest time. This was not surprising however, as this is normally the case with projects such as these. This made me realize that I have to allocate more time towards coming up with ideas as I underestimated the time it would take. 

I think another aspect which I found challenging was my tendency to care more about the looks / aesthetics of my product. As a visual person, I think about the designs of a product first prior to the function. After the perfect design is established, I work on perfecting the function. It is never purely about the functionality for me as I give a lot of importance on the experience of using the product. This also inspires me to me more efficient with my time management for my final product to allow myself the time to perfect my design and be satisfied with the visuals of my end product.