Reaction Game

I was inspired by an installation at a local science museum that tested peoples’ reaction speed based on both visual and audio cues. I designed a miniature version where after a randomized duration of time, a buzzer rings and a stopwatch begins displaying the elapsed time. Players rush to press the stop button as fast as possible to stop the clock and see their reaction speed in milliseconds. The toggle switch changes the game mode so that an additional LED also turns on along with the buzzer and stopwatch.

This was a quick three day project where I experimented with ChatGPT to assist with programming, which worked best when I provided specific libraries to use and some baseline code. I also used ChatGPT for troubleshooting and debugging, which led me to add a debounce function for the arcade buttons, and resisters to tune the display.

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Photography by Anna Bodney