Snake

Snake game on a display, controlled by buttons.

info

Author: Nicolae Dragu
GitHub Project Link: https://github.com/UPB-PMRust-Students/proiect-nicolaedragu

Description

Players control a growing snake to consume food, displayed on a screen. The game signals its conclusion with a dedicated red LED illuminating upon the snake's death, when he collides with itself.

Motivation

I was inspired to create this classic game because of its nostalgic value to me, as I used to play it on my old Nokia phone. I wanted to recreate that experience in this project, as it is an engaging way to learn more about the technologies I am using.

Architecture

• The Raspberry Pi Pico serves as the main controller, running the game logic and handling all input/output operations.
• OLED Display 0.96": Renders the Snake game in real time, showing the snake and the fruits.
• Directional Buttons (GPIO): Allow the player to control the snake's movement (UP / DOWN / LEFT / RIGHT).
• Red LED (GPIO): Lights up when the player loses (collision with itself or wall).
• Buzzer (PWM/GPIO): Emits a short sound whenever the snake eats a fruit.

Game Flow:

• Startup: The OLED shows the welcome screen and waits for a button press to start the game.
• Gameplay: The snake moves continuously; button presses update its direction.
• Fruit Collected: The buzzer plays a sound and the snake grows.
• Game Over: Collision triggers the red LED and halts the game until reset.
• Restart: A button press resets the game state and restarts the loop.

Here is the block scheme and how the components are all conected:

Log

Week 5 - 11 May

Week 12 - 18 May

Week 19 - 25 May

Hardware

1. 1x Raspberry Pi Pico 2W: acts as the primary processing unit.
2. 1x OLED Display, 0.96 inch: Continuously displays the game.
3. 5x Buttons: Provide real-time directional control of the snake and the restart game function.
4. 1x LED: Indicates game-over condition.
5. 1x Buzzer: Adds auditory feedback on successful fruit collection.

Schematics

Bill of Materials

Device	Usage	Price
[Rapspberry Pi Pico W]	The microcontroller	[35 RON x 2]
[LED]	The LED	[0.2 RON]
[Buzzer]	The Buzzer	[4 RON]
[OLED Display]	The OLED Display	[40 RON]
[Buttons]	The Buttons	[0.5 RON x 5]

Software

Library	Description	Usage
embassy	Embassy	An asynchronous executor and Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) designed for constructing embedded applications in Rust.
embassy-executor	Embassy Executor	Used for task scheduling and asynchronous programming
embassy-rp	Embassy RP	Used for initializing and interacting with peripherals
gpio	GPIO	Used for interacting with GPIO pins
embedded-hal	Embedded HAL	A set of traits for embedded hardware abstraction
defmt	Defmt	A logging framework for embedded systems

Links

1. Science Buddies
2. Pico-series Microcontrollers Documentation
3. Free Code Camp - Rust tutorials