MAKE: Blog: Audio ping pong

Audio ping pong

Audio Pingpong Headset

Mike made an audio-only version of pong - looks like a lot of potential fun!

When you put on the headphones, you hear a sound that is cycling through a sequence indicating its approach. The sound is somewhere on the left-right axis in the headphones. If the sound is to your left, you have to tilt your head to the left until the sound is centered. If you tilt your head (the paddle) to the right position in time, you hit the ball an continue, the ball’s approach speeding up each time. If you fail to hit the ball a buzzer and light go off to punish you and the game is over.

I am interested in using senses differently and getting people to focus on their senses in novel, interesting and engaging ways.
My first implementation is very rudimentary. My sound generation capabilities are limited to square waves at full volume so there isn’t true panning - just left, right and centered. In addition to real panning, I would like volume control to indicate the ball’s approach rather than the tone sequence I have now. I need to figure out what kind of RC circuit would smooth the PWM output to act like volume control, or use a digital potentiometer.

Warning: playing audio ping pong in public while using a bluetooth headset will most likely make you appear quite insane - awesome. Audio Ping Pong

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