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Hey folks... I actually PMed someone about this but they didn't know enough to point me in a specific direction. I've already been to HackADay, they weren't too helpful to me either.
I want to build a game of Reversi (aka Othello if it's the trademarked model) with a handheld electronic controller (or two) that outputs composite video + simple sounds to a TV. I would prefer to have a three-color display (blue background, yellow and green 'sprites' for game pieces, and yellow text indicating score and who's turn it is). "Sound" would be limited to a beep when a move is complete. The turns will not be timed, although I'm thinking of going with a more "Othello" style ruleset (the players' first pieces automatically placed in the center of the play field). Screen resolution would be QuarterVGA -- 320x240.
As an aside, I *might* be persuaded to go in the direction of a serial graphic LCD for this, but those are mondo expensive compared to an R-2R ladder DAC and a couple chips, so I'd like to avoid that.
Player controls (consisting of four directional buttons and a 'select' button, per player) can be handled one of four ways. One controller (and the players swap it between turns) or two. Shift registers or no shift registers. Here's how that lays out...
(1) Two controllers w/o shift registers. Needs 10 GPIOs, one for each button.
(2) One controller w/o shift register. Needs 5 GPIOs, one for each button.
(3) Two controllers with shift registers. Needs 5 GPIOs (2x chip enable, 2x serout, 1x clk [shared]).
(4) One controller with a shift register. Needs 3 GPIOs (chip enable, serout, clk).
Video would be handled with a separate PWM output for each color (R/G/B) plus a conversion IC (something that's a socketable DIP would be nice!) to make it composite.
I've been informed on the relevant forum that PICAXE chips are far, far too weak for this... so that's why I'm asking what /would/ work.
I want to build a game of Reversi (aka Othello if it's the trademarked model) with a handheld electronic controller (or two) that outputs composite video + simple sounds to a TV. I would prefer to have a three-color display (blue background, yellow and green 'sprites' for game pieces, and yellow text indicating score and who's turn it is). "Sound" would be limited to a beep when a move is complete. The turns will not be timed, although I'm thinking of going with a more "Othello" style ruleset (the players' first pieces automatically placed in the center of the play field). Screen resolution would be QuarterVGA -- 320x240.
As an aside, I *might* be persuaded to go in the direction of a serial graphic LCD for this, but those are mondo expensive compared to an R-2R ladder DAC and a couple chips, so I'd like to avoid that.
Player controls (consisting of four directional buttons and a 'select' button, per player) can be handled one of four ways. One controller (and the players swap it between turns) or two. Shift registers or no shift registers. Here's how that lays out...
(1) Two controllers w/o shift registers. Needs 10 GPIOs, one for each button.
(2) One controller w/o shift register. Needs 5 GPIOs, one for each button.
(3) Two controllers with shift registers. Needs 5 GPIOs (2x chip enable, 2x serout, 1x clk [shared]).
(4) One controller with a shift register. Needs 3 GPIOs (chip enable, serout, clk).
Video would be handled with a separate PWM output for each color (R/G/B) plus a conversion IC (something that's a socketable DIP would be nice!) to make it composite.
I've been informed on the relevant forum that PICAXE chips are far, far too weak for this... so that's why I'm asking what /would/ work.
