PING
May 26, 2022 9:33 AM Subscribe
PONG This is a simulation of the 1972 Atari game Pong at a circuit level. The original Pong did not have any code or even a microprocessor. It was a circuit, implemented mostly using digital logic chips, with a few timers and other analog components.
Seriously? Cool.
"Make pong" would be one hell of a whole-class, collaborative final project. . . though, I guess I'd need to change it up somehow so they don't just literally build this.
posted by eotvos at 11:04 AM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
"Make pong" would be one hell of a whole-class, collaborative final project. . . though, I guess I'd need to change it up somehow so they don't just literally build this.
posted by eotvos at 11:04 AM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
This is amazing.
posted by timdiggerm at 11:18 AM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by timdiggerm at 11:18 AM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
Check out Nand to Tetris, a course about building a computer from the circuits up! I never did it but I knew several people who went through most or all of it on their own and built a game virtually out of nand gates.
posted by little onion at 12:02 PM on May 26, 2022 [7 favorites]
posted by little onion at 12:02 PM on May 26, 2022 [7 favorites]
A friend of mine wrote this, which is pong, but implemented entirely as cellular automata. Briefly, each pixel on the screen has a state and is only aware of the states of neighboring pixels. Each pixel transitions to a new state based on the state of its neighbors. There is no global state that says "The score is 2 to 5" or "the ball is here, moving in this direction". Each pixel has a state and the state is continuously updated and certain pixels will change to a different state if the pixels to the left of them have another certain state and we see that as the ball bouncing off a paddle.
"Make pong" would be one hell of a whole-class, collaborative final project. . . though, I guess I'd need to change it up somehow so they don't just literally build this.
"Make pong" was almost literally a final project in a hardware class that I took many years ago and it was a complete disaster. A few people managed to complete it. I did not. Those who picked the alternative final project found it much easier.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 12:07 PM on May 26, 2022 [6 favorites]
"Make pong" would be one hell of a whole-class, collaborative final project. . . though, I guess I'd need to change it up somehow so they don't just literally build this.
"Make pong" was almost literally a final project in a hardware class that I took many years ago and it was a complete disaster. A few people managed to complete it. I did not. Those who picked the alternative final project found it much easier.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 12:07 PM on May 26, 2022 [6 favorites]
I'm now remembering an episode of "That '70s Show" about Red Forman and Kelso cracking open PONG to figure out how to make the paddles smaller, and the triumph of them actually making that work all through messing with the hardware.
posted by Navelgazer at 12:30 PM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Navelgazer at 12:30 PM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
building a computer from the circuits up
That was my final semester in college. I hated every minute of it up until the point where it actually ran real code and I got the CRT timing right and the prompt started flashing on the screen. I AM GREAT GOLDEN NERD!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 4:43 PM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
That was my final semester in college. I hated every minute of it up until the point where it actually ran real code and I got the CRT timing right and the prompt started flashing on the screen. I AM GREAT GOLDEN NERD!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 4:43 PM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]
In the early 90s you could get (analog) pong on a chip. A single chip that just needed a power supply and maybe some external capacitors and resistors, and you could hook it up to a TV and play pong. Let me see if that still exists.
haha I was off by like 2 decades
posted by RustyBrooks at 5:34 PM on May 26, 2022 [4 favorites]
haha I was off by like 2 decades
posted by RustyBrooks at 5:34 PM on May 26, 2022 [4 favorites]
The pinout diagram on that is how all computer chips should be.
posted by grahamparks at 3:31 AM on May 27, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by grahamparks at 3:31 AM on May 27, 2022 [1 favorite]
Pretty amazing that we went from "I bet we can make animations on a CRT using digital counters" to "yeah I got a TFLOPS GPU in my pocket, what of it" in my lifetime.
posted by credulous at 7:52 AM on May 27, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by credulous at 7:52 AM on May 27, 2022 [3 favorites]
Pretty amazing that we went from "I bet we can make animations on a CRT using digital counters" to "yeah I got a TFLOPS GPU in my pocket, what of it" in my lifetime.
There's precedent:
Wright Bros. @ Kitty Hawk, NC: December 17, 1903.
to
Apollo 11 @ Tranquility Base, The Moon: July 20, 1969.
in only 63 years. And Apollo was a heck of a lot more on the Pong side of things than the iPhone side.
posted by mikelieman at 8:30 AM on May 27, 2022 [1 favorite]
There's precedent:
Wright Bros. @ Kitty Hawk, NC: December 17, 1903.
to
Apollo 11 @ Tranquility Base, The Moon: July 20, 1969.
in only 63 years. And Apollo was a heck of a lot more on the Pong side of things than the iPhone side.
posted by mikelieman at 8:30 AM on May 27, 2022 [1 favorite]
The pinout diagram on that is how all computer chips should be.
What, they should all have "ball angle" inputs?
Reading how the output worked is pretty interesting. There were separate outputs for player 1, player 2, and score and field output. You'd sum them together to get a single output which let you use resistors to control the color of each individual output. Neat.
TI made a bunch of game chips and they were designed to each do an individual small part of making a game, like maybe one would be able to draw characters at set spots on the screen and maybe another could process inputs and produce some kind of output etc. You'd connect them together with some additional logic to make a game. They pre-made some "kits" like buy all this stuff and hook it up and you have game X.
posted by RustyBrooks at 10:10 AM on May 27, 2022
What, they should all have "ball angle" inputs?
Reading how the output worked is pretty interesting. There were separate outputs for player 1, player 2, and score and field output. You'd sum them together to get a single output which let you use resistors to control the color of each individual output. Neat.
TI made a bunch of game chips and they were designed to each do an individual small part of making a game, like maybe one would be able to draw characters at set spots on the screen and maybe another could process inputs and produce some kind of output etc. You'd connect them together with some additional logic to make a game. They pre-made some "kits" like buy all this stuff and hook it up and you have game X.
posted by RustyBrooks at 10:10 AM on May 27, 2022
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posted by selenized at 10:29 AM on May 26, 2022 [1 favorite]