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Hex Game 03: Hex Game Review - Advice from Avid Technology -- Episode 327

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element14's The Ben Heck Show

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James Ray, the engineering department manager at AVID Technologies, joins Ben to discuss the Hex Game Prototype the team has been working on. AVID Technologies is a design services company that takes concepts into full production, utilizing sister companies throughout Avnet.

 

 

James Ray gives his initial observations of the Hex Game.  The switches give it a nice tactile feel, the buzzer gives good feedback, and the simple design looks really good.  It was also fun to play with.  His suggestions include improvement on the ergonomic design, so that it feels better in your hands.  He also suggests adding radio communication so it can link up to up to your cell phone for added game play options.  This would have minimal impact on the certification as long as you pick a certified radio and didn’t adjust anything in the RF path.

If you were to follow his suggestion, you could add a radio addition using a BBC:microbit, for example.  That would give you more flexibility and additional game modes.  Making the board a carrier for the BBC:Microbit could improve marketability and expand the target audience.    They’ll need to contemplate the tradeoffs between incorporating a radio module into their design versus making it a carrier for the Microbit.  They also need to settle on function.  Is it part of a kit for kids to put together or could it be incorporated in tech classes to practice soldering, learn hex or binary, and programming.

Following up on James Ray’s advice, they prototype a BBC:Microbit module. James recommends using something that is already made to plug into their hex game. He goes over considerations for placement of the antenna. Any metal in proximity to the antenna will detune the antenna and make it resonate less optimally. Anything that has capacitance, including mounting screws, will introduce a shift in the resonant frequency.  Felix locates the datasheet for the card edge connector, which Ben uses to find the dimensions, and goes to work designing a 3D model to see how it might fit into their kit. Ben and James go over the pros and cons of incorporating the BBC: Microbit.  The pros are that it’s well-documented, fairly powerful, it’s certified wireless, it’s got a lot of software, there’s name recognition, an LED matrix, and switches.  A big con would be the form factor.  They’re trying to find an orientation for placement but are running into trouble because the coplanar version of connector is through-hole.  There is a surface mount vertical version but they don’t want it to be vertical. The microbit solves a lot of problems but it creates physical layout problems.

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  • in reply to beacon_dave

    If going down the controller route, then may want to take a look at this game controller product which is about ready to make it to market:

    https://www.kitronik.co.uk/5626-game-zip-64-for-the-bbc-microbit.html

  • in reply to beacon_dave

    Perhaps interesting to look at some of the page viewing figures compared to the number joining in the discussion.

     

    At the time of writing:

    ShowElement14YouTube11,90621,88021,91819,349386113,083giveaway47,61311,587

     

    I think the standalone Hex Game as it is works well enough to market however that might be a rather specialist market.

     

    Even if available as a ready-built educational toy, then on its own it would probably hold interest for a relatively short space of time for the majority of people.

     

    For those really interested in wanting to improve on their hex skills (which was part of the motivation for Ben to build it) and self-disciplined enough, then I think it will hold interest (up until the point where they have become fluent at least image).

     

    For it to be educational then I think perhaps it has to be bundled with some sort of didactic material which refers to the game to try various things out, with the free play mode available on top.

     

    To incorporate it into a school curriculum for teaching hex, then perhaps it becomes too specific a device. This is where using it as a more generic controller to the likes of a BBC micro:bit might work better as alternative programs can be developed and loaded to follow along with the teaching syllabus and altered as it changes.

     

    As an electronics club kit then it looks like it gives a good bit of soldering practice and then ends up with something functional at the end of it. However, in comparison, I recall back around 1981, local colleges were offering night classes where you learned to solder by building a Sinclair ZX81 microcomputer kit (circa £50 which included a printed user manual/programming reference) and then once built, then went on to learn to program it.

     

    If going down the add-ons route then I suspect you need some interesting add-ons available before you attempt to go to market ("it's a hex game but you can expand it with these available add-ons..."). Another thing to consider is what impact the add-ons will have on the power consumption if connecting wirelessly an running on battery.