Cases, Emulation, Games, Making, Raspberry Pi Zero, Retro

Raspberry Pi Zero used to bring new life to GameBoy Advance

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Over on Imgur, user  has documented the process of turning a GameBoy Advance into a Pi-powered retro gaming console. Chosen primarily because of the shoulder buttons, the GBA has had its guts ripped out and replaced by a couple of custom circuit boards. Bizarrely, he is using both battery power and mains power rather than going for an integrated solution, but it’s still a pretty neat job, especially the main circuit board which is a work of art in itself. Take a look at the gallery and walk-through here.

Games, GPIO boards, Magazines, Programming, Tutorials

Catch those eggs in this cute Raspberry Pi / SenseHAT game

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Dan Aldred wrote an article for MagPi issue 47 in which he creates a simple game using the SenseHAT and the Raspberry Pi. In the game, you play a red “basket” at the bottom of the screen which moves according to the SenseHAT’s accelerometer. You use the basket to catch yellow “eggs” which drop from the top of the screen. Read how to do it and get access to the code here. See it in action in the video above.

Arduino, Games, Making, Programming

Using wireless modules with a Raspberry Pi to create a (very) active button game

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Albert Hickey wanted to create a game for kids which would get them running around. So, he conceived a button-pressing game where buttons, mounted on tubes, would light up and need to be pressed to score points. This was similar to other reactions games (such as the giant Raspberry game featured at the Big Birthday Weekend):

So, Albert got some NRF24L01 wireless transceivers and hooked them up to mini Arduinos. Battery powered, they were then placed inside Pringle tubes and staked to the ground using screws. The Raspberry Pi was then used to receive and send signals, run the game and keep score. You can see it in action below, a run of the game after the initial prototyping stage:

And here is the game fully mounted on the Pringles cans:

Spaced apart, and at the level of the Pringles cans, this will create an excellent challenge for active children! You can read more about the build and see the code over on Albert’s blog.

Magazines, Raspberry Pi Foundation, Research

Raspberry Pi runs a poll to find the top 20 Pi projects

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14107866_10153686049262343_3805114523289133689_oMy 40th birthday today, so being a bit quiet and doing real-life things (although hacking will be part of that, got to finish off the Music Box properly!). On Saturday, at Potton Pi & Pints, my wife and my good friend Tim Richardson organised a surprise party! I think it’s fair to say that I was speechless when I arrived at the top of the stairs to find the upper room of The Rising Sun decorated and ready for a buffet with lots of my Pi friends, family, church friends and friends I hadn’t seen for ages in attendance! Thanks to everyone who came and made it so special – I felt honoured and blessed 🙂

Issue 50 of Raspberry Pi magazine The MagPi is coming up soon. To celebrate, part of the issue will feature the top 50 projects so far and the community has been asked to vote on the top 20. There are many of my favourites in there (I won’t mention which ones as I’d hate to deny you the privilege of seeing the list for yourself). I reckon I’ve seen 8 or 9 of them in person, and they are worthy contenders! So, it’s time to get involved – browse the list, read up on the many projects and pick your favourite!

GPIO boards, Robotics, Shopping

4tronix release new ZeroPoint Analog board – use for Raspberry Pi gauges!

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zeropoint

Featuring a small stepper motor and an orange pointer, the new ZeroPoint board from 4tronix allows you to add a gauge to the Raspberry Pi. It has a Zero-sized form-factor and the motor is driven by an H-bridge motor controller. There are numerous pins broken out and there’s a small prototyping area for you to use in your projects. It comes fully assembled and is available for £9.75 (+VAT) from the 4tronix website. A Python library and test scripts are available to download and you can read more about that here. Gareth’s done a great job on this, as usual.

Arduino, Geeky Techiness, Industry, Making

Plasma CNC machine uses a Raspberry Pi as its brains

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Will Baden from Nebraska has developed a plasma CNC machine (which is similar to a regular CNC router but uses plasma) to help him to build and make BIG things. The table controller is a GRBL shield attached to an Arduino and this is sent gcode commands from a Raspberry Pi 3 which is used as the visual interface. He’s entered it into the Hackaday prize competition. You can read a lot more about the project over on Hackaday.io and you can see the machine in action, including the Pi interface, above.