micro:bit Simon
The BBC micro:bit is a computerised project board that’s being given to every year 7 (11-12yr old) kid in the UK. It’s supposed to encourage experimentation and learning to program in the same way that the BBC Micro (and associated BBC programmes) did back in the 80s. I’ve been pretty excited about it since the announcement, though I feared that I’d have to wait until my daughter received hers before I got my hands on one. Luckily a friendly local teacher brought me one to play with, and with a long flight on my hands I decided to have a go at coding Simon (a perennial favourite of mine for trying out new platforms).
There are various different ways to program the micro:bit, but I went with Python (as it’s familiar) and the Mu editor (as plane WiFi isn’t a great way to use online code editors). I used the accelerometer for input, and simple arrows to show the game sequence (up, down, left, right).
Here’s the code, which is also on github (it should work fine in the online Python editor as well as Mu, and yes I know I should probably not be using global variables, but I haven’t refactored much from earlier BASIC and C implementations):
from microbit import * # standard Micro:Bit libraries from array import * # to use an array import random # generate random numbers count = 0 # initialise counter to 0 wait = 500 # initialise wait to half a sec sequence = array('B',[]) # array to hold sequence display.show("-") # start out showing a dash def squark(dir): # function to show arrows global wait if dir==0: # Right display.show(Image.ARROW_E) elif dir==1: # Left display.show(Image.ARROW_W) elif dir==2: # Down display.show(Image.ARROW_S) elif dir==3: # Up display.show(Image.ARROW_N) else: display.show("-") sleep(wait) display.show("-") sleep(wait) def play_sequence(): global count # use the count global variable global sequence # use the sequence global variable global wait # use the wait global variable sequence.append(random.randint(0, 3)) # add a new value to sequence for i in range(0, count): # loop for sequence length squark(sequence[i]) # display the arrow wait = 500 - (count * 15) # vary delay to speed things up count = count+1 # increment sequence length def get_tilt(): x = accelerometer.get_x() # read left-right tilt y = accelerometer.get_y() # read up-down tilt if x > 100: return 0 # Right elif x < -100: return 1 # Left elif y > 100: return 2 # Down elif y < -100: return 3 # Up else: return 4 # Flat def reset_game(): global count global sequence count=0 sequence=[] def read_sequence(): global count global sequence display.show("*") # Show that we're waiting for i in range(0, count-1): while get_tilt()==4: # Wait for a tilt sleep(50) input=get_tilt() if input == sequence[i]: # If it's right then show it squark(input) if i==9: # We have a winner display.show(Image.SMILE) sleep(1000) display.show("WINNER") reset_game() else: display.show("X") # Wrong tilt - game over sleep(1000) display.show("TRY AGAIN") reset_game() break while True: play_sequence() # play the sequence to be remembered read_sequence() # read the sequence from the player sleep(1000) # wait a sec
Filed under: code, micro:bit | 2 Comments
Tags: accelerometer, game, micro:bit, python
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