An ARM mbed LPC1768 microcontroller have been used to develop a handheld arcade game in the style of an old-school platformer. This project is entirely my own independent work in all stages of the development; including design, defining project specifications, breadboard prototyping, schematic and PCB layout using CAD, assembly, testing and software development. Due to this being part of the ELEC2645 Embedded System Project module at University of Leeds, spring 2015, limitations were given on the available hardware components. Credit is due to the authors of the dependent libraries (N5110, Pin Detect, PowerControl and mbed). I would also like to thank the author of Game Programming Patterns as well as the authors of SFML Game Development for providing me with useful sources for programming design patterns.

Project aims¶

• Implement simple gameplay:
  • A single, fixed (no scrolling) level.
  • Player can move left to right, jump and shoot.
  • Enemies will drop from the top of the screen.
  • The player gets points for shooting enemies.
  • The player dies when it gets hits by an enemy.
• Implement a simple menu system.
• Enable the user to adjust the brightness of the display.
• Output sound to enhance the user experience.

Software¶

The program flow is controlled by a finite state machine. The implemented design was inspired by the State design pattern from the books Game Programming Patterns and SFML Game Development. The StateManager class is responsible for updating and rendering the current selected state. It also changes the state based on request from the current state. The framework built for the state machine used in this project makes it easy to add new screens.