Penny Arcade Machine

In my Mechatronics I class, we were given an assignment with a few simple guidelines and no creative limitations — create a game machine that was coin-activated, fully functional, and incorporating an electro-mechanical system. My partner and I disregarded the standard “single-player, high-score” concept and designed a two-player, head-to-head whack-a-mole game. Our classmates loved it; our machine was voted #1 in the class design competition. 

At the start of our whack-a-mole concept, we first designed a discrete logic circuit. Mechatronics I focuses on designing and debugging analog/discrete circuits. We challenged ourselves to offboard as much game logic as possible into a discrete logic circuit for the game controls. The machine was comprised of three Arduino’s communicating via serial in real-time, and the embedded system was programmed in C/C++. We placed our carefully constructed logic circuts into a clear acryllic laser-cut box, robust enough to withstand overly enthusiastic graduate students.