Zero Ball - a game using Raspberry Pi, GPIO Zero some LDRs and very little building skills

Update: 3rd March 2017.  I resurrected ZeroBall today in preparation for Guildford Innovate on Saturday and did a video.

Trivia: Previously ZeroBall ran from a Raspberry Pi A+.  With the new PiZero W I thought it would be perfect to pair with the NexDock.  The NexDock has Bluetooth keyboard and trackpad and the PiZero W now has Bluetooth, so can be paired to the keyboard easily.  Making a nice compact solution.

On with the actual blog post.

For the recent Egham Raspberry Jam that I organised the theme was Gamification.
I already posted about sensecave a Raspberry Pi Sense Hat game  but I wanted to do something a bit more physical and real world.

That got me thinking about Fairgrounds and the kinds of games you play there.
The final decision was a ball throwing game.  Get the ball in the cups and you get points.  For those who watch US teen movies the principle is similar to beer pong, but without the beer and with points and scores....

Next exercise was to figure out how to detect a ping pong ball going into a cup.
I spent a lovely afternoon trying out PIR (Passive Infrared Sensor) sensors at  HackWimbledon. If you're near Wimbledon in the UK check them out. Great bunch of people and the events are every 2 weeks on a Saturday.

After an enjoyable day I figured out the PIR sensors are great for detecting movement of animals including people, but no use for my requirement as they even  tripped if the ball passed over the cup since the amount of infra-red light changed.  Tweeted when it failed. Luckily there was still a month to the Jam.

Plan B needed for project. Testing at @HackWimbledon revealed plan A wont work. Productive. Also had a great time.

— Albert Hickey (@winkleink) December 19, 2015

I now have six PIR that I can use for a different project. ;-)

With PIR out of the question the alternatives I considered were a switch or an LDR (Light Dependent Resistor) .  Both had their advantages and disadvantages.
Switch digital and easy to read and wire up, but most switches would need more force than a ping pong ball would provide.
LDR would give a great reading but is an analogue device which the Raspberry Pi cannot handled without additional circuitry

In the end despite needing extra circuitry I went with the LDR.
To get a reading from an LDR you have to create a voltage divider circuit so you can get a different voltage depending on the relative resistance values of the 2 resistors used.

Here's a great guide on voltage dividers and using an LDR

The next thing was to get the analogue reading from the voltage divider into a the Raspberry Pi in a format that it could use.  My initial thoughts were to use the analog inputs on an Arduino and then send the data over serial to the Raspberry Pi.  Considered Arduino as I have used them a bunch and knew what to do, but in the end I decided this would be over kill.  Why use a microcontroller to read analogue when there is a nice little chip that can do the same and people way smarter than me have already got it working with the Raspberry Pi.

May I introduce you to the MCP3008. An 8 channel, 10 bit analog to digital converter which communicates with the host over SPI.

Since SPI and the MCP3008 were all new to me I did the Google and found an great article by Raspberry Pi Spy. This guide explains exactly how to wire up the MCP3008/Pi and also RPI.GPIO code.
Using this I tested the LDR and it worked perfectly.  Looks like all systems are go on the project.

Then I saw that gpiozero has built in support for the MCP3008 and decided for the final project to take advantage of the ease of use brought by gpiozero.
A little test and it all worked again.  :-)

So, electronically everything works.  I can use voltage dividers with an LDR and resistor along with an MCP3008 to read the sensors and then using gpiozero read the values over SPI.

So, I began construction.

Firstly, soldering the Raspberry side headers from the MCP3008 on a strip board.

When I did this I made a mistake.  I should have left more room on the Pi wiring side of the MCP3008.  There is no need for the chip to be this close to the edge, with only one hole for the wire to be attached.  This will come back and cause me problems later...

Once this was done I moved on to creating the voltage dividers.  Since there are 6 cups, 6 resistors and LDRs are needed.

In the picture above the left side is VCC (3V3 from the Raspberry Pi), right side is GND.  Each 10k Ohm resistor is soldered to VCC on the left and then to one of the MCP3008 input pins.  The LDRs will then be connected from the MCP3008 input pin to GND to create the divider.

I did a quick test using one LDR to make sure I did this right. Image below shows it wired to the Raspberry Pi.  I used a model A+ as there isn't a requirement for network or more power. Yes, I wired it all up to power and stuff for testing.

After this the need was to add the wiring for the LDRs.  That's 6 connections with 2 wires for each.

This is already starting to look a bit more complicated than the small breadboard projects I've done before.  Looking at the image above you will see 6 black wires from the top edge (GND) and 6 orange wires tied to each MCP3008 input line.

All that was missing for the voltage dividers to be complete was to add the LDR for each line.

Since this is a physical build the LDRs need to be embedded in a plastic cup.  I also needed the LDRs to be flat against the cup to make it register a passing ball without obstructing the path of the ball.

This is the first time the sensor is actually in a cup so I can check if the ping pong ball passing is detected  correctly for the purpose. More testing of a single cup.

It worked and it worked amazing well.  That's 1 cup wired up.  Now just the other 5.

All wired up.  A bit fiddly  keeping the other cups out of the way while soldering and working with all wires the same colours to make sure I wired the correct ones for each LDR.

I had great fun at this time setting the cups up and throwing balls into them.  My kids loved it too. The fact they wanted to keep doing it even when all that happened was the number on a terminal screen updated when it happened made me think the build would actually result in a compelling game.

With the electronics sorted it was onto the bit that was new to me. The physical build.  I heard foam board was easy to work with and sturdy so went with that. Another new thing for me.

I cut holes in the foam board and inserted the cups. Using tape to hold them in place.

top, pretty side

bottom, business side.

As I mentioned the physical build is not something I do regularly, so I didn't have a lot of tools to hand to finesse the build.  My main tools were a sharp knife, glue and tape.

Once built I again did some testing and it all worked.

The top is sloped, so the balls roll back to the player. A layer is underneath, again to have the balls roll back to the player.

In the picture below you can I see a piece on the top to direct the ping pong balls to the bottom right so the returned balls will always be in the same place.  For the layer underneath the same happens. Balls return to the bottom right.

Last requirement of course was the software. I mentioned it used gpiozero for the MCP3008.  For SPI to work you have to run your code as root using sudo.

I wanted the game to feel like a fairground, so music and sound effects were essential as well as a score board.   All coded in Python.  To make this easy (for me) I used Pygame for the display, keyboard input to start a new game and also to play the background music and sound effects when a ball goes in a cup.  If you haven't used Pygame on the Raspberry Pi before then check out their recently released Make Games with Python Essentials book that is available in print, PDF, iOS and Android app.

Electronics sorted, physical build done, programming all completed.  Ready for the Egham Raspberry Jam on the 17th of January. 

As I was packing the night before I thought it best to test my projects as usually for me something goes wrong on the day and since I had the time (rare for me) doing some testing seemed like a good idea.  Ahhhh!!!!.  It didn't work.  I was checking the code and the terminal output.  No readings from any of the sensors. 

On looking at the circuit board a couple of the wires had broken off.  Remember I mentioned my thing about not leaving enough space on the Raspberry Pi side of the stripboard.  

I again went to Twitter an got some some great advise from Alan O'Donohoe and Pete Lomas

Doh, so that's why it's not working today. Joint snapped. A bit delicate. Soldering to do today. pic.twitter.com/HsKrLvpRcq

— Albert Hickey (@winkleink) January 16, 2016

@winkleink Literally drawn on the back of an envelope, drill sizes from memory pic.twitter.com/IZ31NzjrUz

— Alan O'Donohoe (@teknoteacher) January 16, 2016

@ukscone @winkleink @teknoteacher @biglesp My staple machine - Good idea but not the neatest assembly job :) pic.twitter.com/KvBgkZF9wQ

— Pete Lomas (@PeteLomasPi) January 16, 2016

You have to love the Raspberry Pi Community. Within a few hours I had exactly the advise I needed to get my project fixed perfectly.  But I had 1 day left and didn't leave enough room to do what they advised so I ignore their advice this time. Soldered the wires back on and crossed my fingers that it would all hold together.

On the day of the Jam the game was very popular.  Great write up from Richard Savill who is well worth following as he does some great Raspberry Pi projects and Kickstarters. With lots of kids and adults playing with it.  When a few kids gathered around the game they would just drop the ball straight in the cups to get the points and hear the sound effects.

Overall, I'm very happy with the final game.  The build is a bit rough around the edges but works great.  The code held up and the kids played it all afternoon which was the desired outcome.   I also had a number of conversations with adults and kids about the code and the electronics involved, so hopefully helped a few of them to learn something new and consider their own Raspberry Pi projects.

You can download the Game Code for Zero Ball from GitHub

Codebug - Flashing LED tree made with conductive paint

Last year I made some conductive paint using this Instructable.  For me 50:25 by weight, paint to graphite powder works great. Make sure to stir in slowly otherwise the graphite powder will fly.
With this mix the paint is easy to apply yet has good conductivity.
It worked great and I used it at a Raspberry Jam to make flashing LED eyes for Halloween.

Since then the paint has been abandoned until my eldest daughter mentioned she was making circuits in school yesterday and I said I'd try to make them flashing LED Christmas Tree pictures.
This got a thumbs up from my daughters so the pressure was on.

Using Inkscape I drew a simple Christmas Tree with a place to put 7 LEDs.
Nice and simple and easy to print on A4 card.  I made the baubles the shape of a physical LED so you can see which way to place the LEDs on the sheet. All the negative (ground, cathode) sides in the middle making it easier to connect all to GND later.

PNG Version.

Links to PDF and SVG 

With the drawing done I added the LEDs.  6 to the green tips and a yellow one in the star.  I had 2mm LEDs to hand so that's what I used.  For the real thing I plan to use 5mm as the effect should be better.

I found pre-bending the LED leads at right angles so they are pointing down when in places made it easier to  get the LED to stand up at the front.  I also made small holes using a pin to push the LED leads through.  It's hard to push LEDs through 300gsm card as the leads don't have a point.

Once this was done I turned over the card.  Left the ground side for each LED pointing down and turned the positive side (anode) out at right angles pointing to the edge.  Once done I used a small piece of tape to keep the LEDs in place.
Tip.  Push the leads down to they push against the card. It's means the leads lie flat making them easier to hold on with just paint.

Back of the card

As I mentioned the conductive paint had spent the last year drying so was a bit sticky meaning the paint job is less than smooth.  I have since revived the paint with a little bit of water so for the kids it should be much easier to paint.

The bar down the middle is the ground tied to all the LEDs.  The other lines are for the positive side of each LED.
If you want all wires to be at the bottom then you may have to adjust the SVG in Inkscape to only print one Tree per A4 landscape card.

To test I thought I'd use a Codebug I got in the Kickstarter and hardly used it since. They are no on sale at CPC Farnell
With the help of Twitter people (I didn't declare the legs as outputs at the top of my code) I put together the following program. Link to CodeBug site for project

CodeBug code

Once all this was done the LEDs flashed. Yeah!.

For this project I wired up the LEDs so the top and bottom on one side are paired with the middle one on the other side and vice versa and the star LED on a leg of it's own.
This only uses three  (3) legs on the CodeBug,s o the 4th one (3) in the code is redundant.  I just left it in there in case I can figure out a more exciting way to use 4 outputs to flash 7 LEDs.

Very Short video of the final tree.

Next I want to wire up to a Raspberry Pi to enable interactive input and independent control of all the LEDs and maybe play a Christmas tune as well.

Sidenote; Some might be asking where the current limiting resistor is.  It's the paint.  The conductive paint has a higher resistance than wire and so it is acting like the current limiting resistor.

Flappy Brain - Cambridge Jam Raspberry Pi project

At the last Egham Raspberry Jam I showed the Mindflex game EEG Brainwave reader (CNET article from when it was launched : http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/moving-objects-with-mattels-brainwave-reading-mindflex/) displaying bar graphs for the different brainwave signals.  It was interesting but served no real purpose other than to show the EEG was doing something. Even got a mention on the Linux Luddites Podcast (https://linuxluddites.com/shows/episode-41/)

So, for the Cambridge Raspberry Jam I wanted to get the EEG reader to be used for something.  I decided it had to be a single signal and immediately Flappy Birds came to mind.
Nice simple one button game.
Decision made I went about coding the game in Python on the Raspberry Pi.  I had already done the work to get the EEG

To hack the Mindflex and get it working with an Arduino I used this great guide and the code from the following article: http://frontiernerds.com/brain-hack.
This articles gives a lot of detailed background on the Mindflex and how it as well as lovely clear pictures showing where the TX and GND wires need to be attached.
For strain relief the article uses hot glue.  I wrapped the wires around the already in place knot so the wires could not be pulled no matter what.

The Processing code provided didn't work for me on the Raspberry Pi and that's the main reason I had to code up my own visualisation program.

The example I used to send the data is BrainSerialTest with one small modification. I commented out the following line as it caused the import and breaking out of the variable in Python to fail.  (Limit of my coding ability showing):
        Serial.println(brain.readErrors());

To read this from Python I had to install pyserial as it wasn't installed by default using the following commands.

apt-get update
apt-get install python-serial

You will have to use sudo for this. I left it out from the commands so that  you have to make the decision to run the commands

With the Mindflex hacked, and hooked to the Arduino and then sending it's data over serial I did the code to visualise the data.  Here is the Python code  I used on the Raspberry Pi for the last Egham Raspberry Jam

import serial
import pygame
# initialise pygame
pygame.init()

# Define the colors we will use in RGB format
black = [ 0, 0, 0]
white = [255,255,255]
red = [255, 0, 0]
blue = [0,0,255]
darkBlue = [0,0,128]
pink = [255,200,255]
green = [0,255,0]
orange = [255,102,0]
brown = [153,102,0]
yellow = [255,255,0]
purple = [128,0,128]

# Set the font for the text. Windows computer so usd Ariel

myfont = pygame.font.SysFont("OpenDyslexic", 18)


# Set the height and width of the screen
size=[800,600]
screen=pygame.display.set_mode(size)
# Fill the screen White
screen.fill(white)
# Put something in the application Bar
pygame.display.set_caption("Serial Mind reader")
pygame.display.update()

done = False
div = 2000
fatt = 20
fmed = 20
fdelta = 20
ftheta = 20
flalpha = 20
fhalpha = 20
flbeta = 20
fhbeta = 20
flgamma = 20
fhgamma = 20

ser = serial.Serial('/dev/ttyUSB0',9600)

# Clear the serial input buffer
ser.flushInput()

pygame.draw.rect(screen, white, (0,0,800,600), 0)
pygame.display.update()


while done == False:
    for event in pygame.event.get():
        if event.type == pygame.QUIT:
            done=True

    data = ser.readline()

    signal,att,med,delta,theta,lalpha,halpha,lbeta,hbeta,lgamma,hgamma = data.split(",")

    print signal
    print att
    print data


#  clear screen before putting new square on it 
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, white, (0,0,800,600), 0)
    pygame.display.update()


    fatt = int(att)
    fmed = int(med)
    fdelta = int(delta)
    ftheta = int(theta)
    flalpha = int(lalpha)
    fhalpha = int(halpha)
    flbeta = int(lbeta)
    fhbeta = int(hbeta)
    flgamma = int(lgamma)
    fhgamma = int(hgamma)

    pygame.draw.rect(screen, red, (1,600-(fatt*4),75,fatt*4), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, blue, (76,600-(fmed*4),75,fmed*4), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, pink, (152,600-(fdelta/div/2),75,(fdelta/div/2)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, green, (227,600-(ftheta/div),75,(ftheta/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, orange, (303,600-(flalpha/div),75,(flalpha/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, darkBlue, (379,600-(fhalpha/div),75,(fhalpha/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, brown, (455,600-(flbeta/div),75,(flbeta/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, black, (531,600-(fhbeta/div),75,(fhbeta/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, yellow, (607,600-(flgamma/div),75,(flgamma/div)), 0)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, purple, (683,600-(fhgamma/div),75,(fhgamma/div)), 0)

    screen.blit(myfont.render("Attention",1,black), (4, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Mediation",1,black), (79, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Delta",1,black), (155, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Theta",1,black), (230, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Low Alpha",1,black), (306, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("High Alpha",1,black), (382, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Low Beta",1,black), (458, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("High Beta",1,black), (534, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("Low Gamma",1,black), (610, 1))
    screen.blit(myfont.render("High Gamma",1,black), (686, 1))
# show the whole thing
    pygame.display.update()

pygame.quit ()

As a side note. I did a D&T day at my kids school where I used this code for a Year 1 demonstration. All the kids got to see their brainwaves bouncing around as they moves, did maths and recited poems.  It even went really flat when the kids closed their eyes and calmed down.   Some of the kids had to wait so long that they missed their morning break for the opportunity to see their brains waves bouncing around,

Next onto getting the Flappy Birds inspired game (for the purest you could say helicopter inspired) game working.
I thought myself to code in the 80's on a Commodore 64 and to be honest I haven't updated my skills since, so doing the same in Python was a new challenge for me.
Fortunately, I read an article in Linux Format Issue 112 from December 2008 that made a top down racer using Python and Pygame in 100 lines of code. http://www.linuxformat.com/includes/download.php?PDF=LXF112.tut_code.pdf
Yes, using a tutorial from over 7 years ago.  I may not be great at coding but I do hoard useful bits of knowledge.  I bought the Mindflex from eBay in September 2014 and did nothing with it until January.  Another bit of my electronics stash.

The Racer game if you think about it is the same but more complex than the Flappy Brain game with a few differences.
Racer scrolls vertically, Flappy  Brain scrolls horizontally.  That's just changing the value of the X variable instead of the Y variable
Then it's just change some of the graphics.

Once I figured out the Racer code I worked out the bits I could throw away and then bits I had to keep as well as worked out how to modify the code to do what I needed.

This took me a while to work through again due to a lack of knowledge or practice.

In the end I created the final game that was shown at the Cambridge Raspberry Jam.

Code Below:

from pygame import *
import random
import time
import serial

# set up the serial port
ser = serial.Serial('/dev/ttyUSB0',9600)

# Clear the serial input buffer
ser.flushInput()

# variables for colours 
black = [ 0, 0, 0]
white = [255,255,255]
red = [255, 0, 0]
blue = [0,0,255]
darkBlue = [0,0,128]
pink = [255,200,255]
green = [0,255,0]
orange = [255,102,0]
brown = [153,102,0]
yellow = [255,255,0]
purple = [128,0,128]

# gap in wall
gap  = 200

# width and height of screen 
width = 1000
height = 600
count_gap = int(height/gap)

# 0 = hard, 1 = easier, 2 is easiest
difficulty = 2

# class to create sprites and render them
class Sprite:
    def __init__(self,xpos,ypos,filename):
        self.x = xpos
        self.y = ypos
        self.bitmap = image.load(filename)
    def render(self):
        screen.blit(self.bitmap,(self.x,self.y))

# screen size
size=[width,height]
# initialise pygame
init()

# create the screen (window)
screen = display.set_mode(size)

# Caption to go at the top of the window
display.set_caption("Flappy EEG 2")

# set the music, its volume and start to play. -1 means infinite loop
mixer.music.load("Pinky_and_the_Brain.ogg")
mixer.music.set_volume(0.5)
mixer.music.play(-1)

# crreate sound for crash
crasheffect = mixer.Sound("ouch.ogg")


# fill the screen with blue, update the screen
# not really required but I like it
screen.fill(blue)
display.update()
#time.sleep(1)

# create the sprites for the brain, columns and the background image

playerbrain = Sprite(20,200,"brain_75.png")
column1 = Sprite(1200,100,"column1.png")
column2 = Sprite(1200,100,"column2.png")
background = Sprite(0,0,"background.png")

# set fonts for different purposes
scorefont = font.Font(None,60)
datafont = font.Font(None,20)
overfont = font.Font(None,100)

# set default values for some variables
score = 0
maxscore = 0
quit = 0
gameover = 0

# master loop for the program. If quit == 0 then exit program
while quit == 0:
# flush the serial port of all data to begin fresh
    ser.flushInput()

    gameover = 0

# set the height of top column
    column1.y = (random.randrange(0,(count_gap))*gap)-800

# set the height of the bottom column
    column2.y = column1.y + 800 + gap

# start of loop (using while) to move the columns

# start off screen to the right
    x = width +50

# x>-100 means still valid (yes there is a minus in there)
# gameover when collision
# quit selected. either pressed q or click x on window
    while x >-100 and gameover == 0 and quit == 0:

# increment the score and if higher than maxscore make maxscore = score
        score = score + 1
        if score > maxscore:
            maxscore = score

# update columns location and set x positions
        x = x - 50
        column1.x = x
        column2.x =x  

        data = ser.readline()
#        print data

        signal,att,med,delta,theta,lalpha,halpha,lbeta,hbeta,lgamma,hgamma = data.split(",")

        print "signal: " + signal
        print "attention: " + att
        print "data: " + data
        intatt = int(att)
        if intatt > 90:
            intatt = 90   
        brainpos = intatt * 6
# set brain location based att (attention)

# is intatt near the gap above 
        if brainpos < column1.y +800 and brainpos > column1.y + 800 - (difficulty * 10):
            playerbrain.y = column1.y +800 +70
            print "brain near top and moved down!"
# is intatt near gap bottom
        elif brainpos > column2.y-75 and brainpos < column2.y + (difficulty * 10):
            playerbrain.y = column1.y +800 +70
            print "brain near bottom and moved up!"

        else:
            playerbrain.y = brainpos
            print "brain where is should be"


#        print playerbrain.y
        background.render()
        playerbrain.render()
        column1.render()
        column2.render() 

# display some information on screen
        screen.blit(scorefont.render("Score: "+ str(score),1,white), (100, 5))
        screen.blit(scorefont.render("High Score: "+ str(maxscore),1,white), (400, 5))

        screen.blit(datafont.render("signal: "+ signal,1,white), (5, 570))
        screen.blit(datafont.render("attention: "+ att,1,white), (150, 570))

        screen.blit(datafont.render("playerbrain.y: "+ str(brainpos),1,white), (250, 570))
        screen.blit(datafont.render("column1.y: "+ str(column1.y+800),1,white), (500, 570))
        screen.blit(datafont.render("difficulty: "+ str(difficulty),1,white), (650, 570))

        display.update()

#        print playerbrain.y

# collision dection
        if ((playerbrain.y < column1.y+801 or playerbrain.y > column2.y-74) and (x <150 and x > 20)):
            mixer.music.stop()
            mixer.Sound.play(crasheffect)
            print "BUMP"
            gameover = 1

# check if clicked x on window to exit 
        for ourevent in event.get():
            if ourevent.type == QUIT:
                quit = 1

# has key been pressed. K_q is to quit 
            if ourevent.type == KEYDOWN:
                if ourevent.key == K_DOWN:
                    playerbrain.y = playerbrain.y+10

                if ourevent.key == K_UP:
                    playerbrain.y = playerbrain.y-10

                if ourevent.key == K_q:
                    quit = 1 

# if game over show message
    while gameover == 1 and quit == 0:
        screen.blit(overfont.render("GAME OVER",1,yellow), (380, 260))
        display.update()

# then wait for a key to pressed  before starting again
        for ourevent in event.get():
            if ourevent.type == KEYDOWN:
                if ourevent.key == K_0:
                    difficulty = 0
                    score = 0
                    gameover = 0
                    mixer.music.play(-1)

                if ourevent.key == K_1:
                    difficulty = 1
                    score = 0
                    gameover = 0
                    mixer.music.play(-1)

                if ourevent.key == K_2:
                    difficulty = 2
                    score = 0
                    gameover = 0
                    mixer.music.play(-1)

                if ourevent.key == K_SPACE:
                    score = 0
                    gameover = 0
                    mixer.music.play(-1)

                if ourevent.key == K_q:
                    quit = 1 
                    score = 0
                    gameover = 0


The sharp eyed amongst you will recognise the bits taken from the Racer game and the bits taken from the original visualisation code I create.

I added the ability to Quit the game by pressing 'q' and also 3 difficulty levels. On the Game Over screen press 1, 2, or 3 with the higher number being easier.
It does this by widening the readings that will get you through the gap.

At the Cambridge Raspberry Jam I had the pleasure of meeting Alex Eames who brought us to HDMIPi and also the RasPi IO Duino which was another successful Kickstarter and is now for general sale.  Alex did a great video which you can see below.

Following this the project was picked up by the Raspberry Pi Foundation and featured on their Blog (https://www.raspberrypi.org/flappy-brain/) and most recently was featured as The MagPi Magazine Issue 35 in their Amazing Pi Projects List (https://www.raspberrypi.org/magpi/)
The MagPi magazine is a a resource for everybody with a Raspberry Pi. It includes articles, project details and tutorials in everything from Scratch, to Python and C++ and has software and hardware projects.  Also, they announced recently that it is going to become a physical magazine soon and be available to buy in shops as well as the current PDF download and acces through the Apple App Store and Google Play stores.

It's been a fun few months and to me is an example of what can be done if you take advantage of the resources out there if you have idea.  For this project I used some great code and guide to hack the Mindflex.  Code from a 2008 Linux Format article and some previous work I did to figure out how to read serial data on the Raspberry Pi.

I will be bringing Flappy Brain to the next Egham Raspberry Jam. It is on the 12th of July 2015 and as always is free to attend.  All that's required is to register beforehand on the Eventbrite page.
http://eghamjam8.eventbrite.com

Maybe I'll see you there.