Micro:bit Bluetooth Challenge

Can you build Scissor-Paper-Rock game using micro:bit and Bluetooth?

• The Challenge
• The Building Blocks
• Extra

This post is the challenge for the Race Condition badge at Arctic IoT Challenge. The description for the badge is as follows:

At random, the jury will present a challenge. Timeboxed to one hour, the first team with a working solution gets all the points.

This time I am designing the challenge, so here it comes:

The Challenge

We want you to simulate a popular Scissor-Paper-Rock game using micro:bits. Each team gets two devices.

• On shake the micro:bit should pick a random shape (scissors, paper, or rock) and show it using LED array on the device
• The two devices should connect and send the data over to each other
• The opposite device compares then its shape to the one received and decides whether it won or lost
• Each of the two micro:bits shows then “Won” or “Lost” on the LED array.

The Building Blocks

Connecting to a micro:bit

Connect the micro:bit to your computer using a micro USB cable. It should appear as a USB disk on your machine.

Editor and Language

Yan can use Python and the editor here: http://python.microbit.org/editor.html.

After you are done writing the code, click Download, and you will get a binary file you will be using in the next step. Check out the help section for more information.

Python documentation for the API can be found here.

Deploying to a micro:bit

Copy the binary *.hex file from the previous step on to the micro:bit, just like you would copy to any USB drive.

Sending Data Between micro:bits

Now, over to connecting micro:bits and sending data over. Take a look at the example below. Make sure to change group=1 to a number between 0 and 255. Both chips should belong to the same group to connect with each other. You will be assigned a number.

from microbit import *
from radio import *
from random import*

#turn radio on and configure group
on()
config(group=1, length=251)

while True:
    if button_a.was_pressed():
        #send the images
        send("Hello, World!")
     
    #receive data    
    data = receive()
    
    #check that we have received any data
    if data != None:
        
        #split the data into different pictures by the marker
        display.scroll(data)

        #clear the screen
        display.clear()

The Scissor-Paper-Rock Game

Have a look at the simple implementation of the game. You will need to translate it to MicroPython and extend.

Extra

[Spoiler alert!] The winning team gets to submit their code to this GitHub repo.

Rustam Mehmandarov

Passionate Computer Scientist

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