Real-World Pong Created by Amateur Builders (geeky-gadgets.com) 39
sproketboy shares this article about a computer graphic designer who spent two years building a real-world version of the classic videogame Pong, played on a full-sized coffee table using only mechanical parts. The project's team apparently used a hard drive platter for the real-world scroll wheels controlling the paddles, aided by some large Arduinos and other homemade electronics (along with rainbow LED lights to create the pixels for the score).
"We don't have any electronics, product design, or manufacturing background," Daniel Perdomo told one technology site. "All we knew for this was thanks to the Internet (Google, YouTube, forums). Today you can grab all the knowledge you want just a few clicks away!" He's now looking for a hardware incubator to transform his "Atari Pong Project" into a real consumer product. (Interestingly, another group of hobbyists built a similar electromechanical version of Pong back In 2004.)
"We don't have any electronics, product design, or manufacturing background," Daniel Perdomo told one technology site. "All we knew for this was thanks to the Internet (Google, YouTube, forums). Today you can grab all the knowledge you want just a few clicks away!" He's now looking for a hardware incubator to transform his "Atari Pong Project" into a real consumer product. (Interestingly, another group of hobbyists built a similar electromechanical version of Pong back In 2004.)
Re: (Score:2)
ahh! Suzanne Vega Reference there!
Old idea (Score:3, Funny)
Been there
https://youtu.be/vGOGOxtN2lM
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Doesn't anyone remember pongmechanik?
http://www.cyberniklas.de/pong... [cyberniklas.de]
Pong implemented entirely mechanically, down to the "brain" controlling it being all relays.
All mechanical you say? (Score:3)
played on a full-sized coffee table using only mechanical parts.
Sounds super neat.
aided by some large Arduinos and other homemade electronics (along with rainbow LED lights to create the pixels for the score).
Oh... well... so much for that.
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Yeah, I noticed that discrepancy too. I think what the summary writers was (somewhat clumsily) trying to get at is that the gameplay elements are mechanical rather than electronic displays.
Re:All mechanical you say? (Score:5, Informative)
I wasn't much impressed, either. Plus I remembered a much better attempt from more than a decade ago, slashdot coverage here [slashdot.org].
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Well, I think they were trying for the most authentic look rather than a full-on electromechanical streampunk score.
Still, I get you - a mechanical flip display would have been cool; something like this
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Signal... [ebay.com]
"Pac-Man es victorioso!" (Score:2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Plotter... (Score:2)
Reminds me of a flat-bed plotter. A little faster, perhaps.
PacMan already did it (Score:1)
http://www.likecool.com/Gear/P... [likecool.com]
Ya knooow (Score:1)
I have some large Arduinos, too, if I do say so myself.
Fucking awful video (Score:1)
Fucking awful video.
Cool idea though.
And by real life Pong... (Score:5, Funny)
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So I wasn't the only one wondering how making a real world version of a game that was modeled after a real world game is news?
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Have you ever WATCHED a professional ping-pong player? These guys can do all that and then some!
Air hockey (Score:2)
Air hockey is much funnier.
Keep it coming! (Score:2)
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I'm waiting for the electro-mechanical simulation of the computer simulation of the real world pong simulation of the computer game.
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I'm waiting for the electro-mechanical simulation of the computer simulation of the real world pong simulation of the computer game.
I'm waiting for the officially-licensed juice drink of the electro-mechanical simulation of the computer simulation of the real world pong simulation of the computer game.
It contains real fruit juice!(*)
(*) Ingredients: Water, sugar, artificial sweetener, artificial colours, flavouring, preservatives, acidity regulator, plutonium 238, real fruit juice (1.5%).
Next step: Mechanical Space Invaders! (Score:2)
A bigger Blip? (Score:2)
Still got mine, I think.
Nice but not the first - Marx TV Tennis from 1974 (Score:2)
There was a toy marketed in 1974 for poor kids who couldn't afford the computerized game. "T.V. Tennis" had a fully mechanical 2-dimensional playing field and would keep score, ringing a bell with each paddle hit.
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link, stripped by slashdot. Grr. http://www.museumofplay.org/online-collections/1/6/112.5948 [museumofplay.org]
Real World Pong (Score:1)
"Real World Pong created using a ping pong table, two paddles and a ball!"