Planet Arduino

Before succumbing to the Whos’ Christmas cheer, the Grinch’s heart was two sizes too small (or three in the text) and that sounds like a medical condition that warrants immediate surgery. What better way to celebrate Christmas this year than by performing that surgery yourself after building this Grinch-themed Operation game.

This project from Hanzlica puts a grumpy green spin on the classic Operation game. The gameplay is the same and there are six maladies to remedy, including a broken heart, butterflies in the stomach, and the ol’ nail in the arm. As in the standard Hasbro game, the goal is to pull those pieces from the patient’s body without touching the sides of the cavities. But this version is enlarged to the point where players don’t need to use special tweezers and can instead pull the pieces using their hands. The cavities have aluminum foil lining and act as capacitive touch sensors to detect contact.

The Instructables tutorial provides detailed instructions on how to build the board using plywood and glue. The removable pieces are 3D-printable and a laser cutter is ideal for the complex board outlines. An Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect board handles logic. It detects contact through an Adafruit 12-key capacitive touch sensor breakout board. That knows which cavity the player touches, which allows for the use of different sound effects that play through a small speaker connected directly to the Arduino.

Both kids and adults should get a kick out of this game, which will make it perfect for holiday family gatherings.

The post Make your own Grinch-themed Operation game this Christmas appeared first on Arduino Blog.

As a kid you may have played Operation, but certainly never anything like this nine-foot board from SPOT Technology. This device is not only impressively large, but assists doctors in their surgical pursuits with a CNC gantry setup to pull out obstructions.

In the game, amateur surgeons control the system using a small arcade cabinet next to the patient (Sergio), moving a magnetic gripper with a joystick and buttons. A camera rides along and transmits images to the cabinet, hopefully leading to a clean extraction. If the gripper isn’t aligned correctly, a button on the plunger reports the doctors error, and Sergio’s nose lights up red to indicate a failed surgery. Two Arduino Megas are implemented, one on the CNC playfield itself, another in the cabinet.

The project will be on display at the Philadelphia Mini Maker Faire on October 6^th if you’d like to see it in person.

Usually, when you think of doing “surgery” on electronics, it’s to replace a component, or maybe modifying an appliance into something different. In this case, an Arduino Nano powers Hurry, Doctor!, an updated version of the board game classic Operation meant as a middle school STEM exercise.

This game, of which creator “TrevorB23” gives an extensive explanation in his Instructables write-up, features a LEGO minifigure with cutouts inside that house obstructions such as a “mental block” and “funny bone.” As with the original, the objective is to remove these foreign bodies without touching the sides, constructed here with conductive aluminum foil tape in order to signal the Nano.

With its enhanced electronics, TrevorB23’s version adds a timing element to encourage “surgeons” to complete tasks faster, as well as doctor names and melodies that can be altered if so desired. Want to make your own game? You can follow along with his 31-step tutorial.