I need help on what Sparkfun products would be best to work with.

Community Projects
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I am working on a game that needs an electronic push button (similar to something like the Staples Easy Button) but with custom sounds and a custom functionality for the button. This for a board game idea I am working on. I don’t need wifi or bluetooth or any other connectivity other than to load the sounds and programming.

Here’s what I am trying to do:

I want the device to be battery-powered with a power on and off button (power on/off toggle switch). When I turn it on, nothing should happen other than maybe an LED light or something. No functionality should happen until the first input from the button press activates it.

When the button is first pressed, Sound 1 (15 seconds long) would immediately start playing. If the button is pressed during this 15 second period, the Sound 1 would reset back to the beginning and immediately start playing again. This would happen often and ideally all the way until the real-time game ends over the course of 5-10 mins.

However, if the button wasn’t pressed before it ends, I would want Sound 2 (5 seconds long) to play and not be able to accept any input during that time regardless of pressing the button or not.

Then Sound 3 (10 seconds long) would immediately start playing. If players hit the button during Sound 3, then it would reset back to the beginning of Sound 1. If they did not, then Sound 4 would play for 3 seconds without any input and the process loop would stop until the next game starts back at the beginning with a new button press.

I would like to Long Press the button to “stop” the process at any time.

It would be nice to have a slider switch that would allow users to select from “easy” to “hard” (slider toggle switch?) which in essence would just change the time duration of Sound 1 from 15 seconds to 30 seconds (loop the sound file twice or play a different file twice as long) but that’s not totally necessary.

I want it to be cheap as it’s just a prototype. If it works, I would need to make 5 or 6 of these for playtesting purposes. I have 3d printers and lots of knowledge of 3d design. However, I am not that into programming and electronics though I work in IT and most of it should be relatively easy for me to pick up… but for now, treat me as a newbie when it comes to that.

I want the smallest board I can find where I can hook a sound output to a small speaker but I need the speaker to be relatively loud as people will be talking, possibly loudly, during the game session. (Maybe a volume dial underneath?)

This instructable would be ideal but they reference proprietary hardware that is no longer made.

https://www.instructables.com/Make-a-Cu … wn-Sounds/

Also, this is basically what I would buy to work with initially for the physical form factor.

https://www.amazon.com/CRTEPST-Button-D … B09N2R831W

Any feedback would be awesome on where to start. I would like to turn this project around in the next week or so and make a functional prototype as soon as possible.

Thanks again!

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A week is ambitious but you seem motivated.

I’d start by sketching a visualization like a flow chart. It can help organize your thoughts and, as in this case, better share sequence, logic decisions and process details with a collaborator.

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Thanks for the response!

A week is ambitious for sure, but a bit impractical. When I say a week, what I want is to have a path in a week. I am trying to get a parts list together and have the stuff on the way to me that makes the most sense so I can jump on it as soon as it all arrives.

I have a flowchart that is ready to be moved into whatever syntax is supported. I also have 3d printers to make the necessary mounts for whatever PCBs and wires if needed though I would like for it to be as clean as possible without having to make my own mounts and supports.

The logic is not hard. In fact, I have pretty much stated it up above. It’s just play 3 different sounds in a playlist. During sound 1, the input restarts playback. During Sound 2, no input can be accepted. During Sound 3, the input restarts playback of Sound 1. Else, playlist ends.

At this point, I am just looking for the smallest board that can hold 3 sound files under a total of 10 megs probably? Maybe even as small as 2 megs… I want to be able to easily modify the time variables within the logic as I evolve the gameplay. There’s some options I would like to explore for the final product but they’re not necessary for this initial prototype. These would be for things like a volume control potentiometer. Then there is the idea of a triple select switch for “easy/medium/hard” which would basically just call on a config file that would then call on three different logic values based on the switch setting and then playback different config files that use different time variables and matching media files. And for the prototype only, I would like an external USB port to make changing code easy.

My biggest problem is where to start with the exact components to build this whole thing from scratch. I saw a couple of large arcade buttons on here or over at Adafruit. There was a 100mm diameter button and a 60mm diameter button. I am not sure what size is appropriate without seeing them in person but that’s a $5 item so it’s worth buying both. The real issue is not buying more than what I need for the circuit board. I also need a loud speaker but not overdo it without a volume control.

My biggest problem is the insane levels of projects and controllers that exist and I don’t need 95% of the offerings. I am trying to find the best thing just to work with for simple logic, a single tactile physical button input, and a single audio speaker output. That’s it. I just can’t believe there isn’t a simple solution.

Thanks for the help!

Jason