Arcade reaction game is a genre of play designed to test a player's physical response time and hand-eye coordination against increasingly difficult visual or auditory cues. These games are usually dead simple (a single button, a joystick, or a touch screen), and anyone can play immediately, but mastering the timing is the real challenge.

 This time I will present you with a way to make such a game using an Arduino microcontroller and a WS2812B type LED Strip. This game is designed for two players and the basic goal is to press a button as quickly as possible immediately after a certain color appears on the LED strips. It is the simplicity and speed of play that make this game very addictive. In fact, I used the complete hardware from one of my previous projects , adapting the code for this purpose.

Detailed video description at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsBzSfjQNW0

   The device is really simple to make and consists of only a few components:

- Arduino Nano microcontroller Board

- Two LED strips with 50 LEDs each of the WS2812B type

- Three Buttons (Player 1, Player 2 and Start)

- Speaker

- and Two Potentiometers

  The entire device is mounted in PVC housings, and the two buttons for the players are large, robust ones that I made specifically for these kinds of arcade games.

  The code uses the Adafruit_NeoPixel library and is designed in a way that allows you to change all settings and options very easily. Specifically, in this case I used Arduino IDE ver. 1.8.16 and the latest version of the Adafruit_NeoPixel library.

 First, let me describe the method and rules of the game. At the beginning, when starting both strips, a simple animation appears accompanied by appropriate sounds. The left bar and button represent player 1, and the right side represents player 2. By pressing the Start button, the first three LEDs on both strips begin to alternately light up with green and blue, which is a sign that the game has started.

 After this, from the third to the eighth second, at some point all the LEDs will light up with red. This is the moment when the players should press the button. The first to press the button is the winner of the individual game. If any of the players presses the button before the red LEDs appear, they automatically lose the game. The next game begins by pressing the start button again. A complete game ends when one player is the first to win five individual games. The result is displayed by the top five LEDs with the appropriate color, player 1 yellow, and player 2 magenta. The winner of the complete game is indicated by flashing all the LEDs with the winning color and the corresponding winning sound sequence.

Since the game is based on reaction speed, it is desirable that the reaction time can also be displayed somehow on the strips. For this purpose, I used the Select potentiometer. In the extreme left position, the active scale (45 LEDs) represents a time of 10 milliseconds (4 LEDs approximately indicate 1 millisecond), and in the extreme right position, the scale displays a time of 1 second (one LED indicates 22 milliseconds). At the end of any individual game, we can "Zoom" the time. So we can very precisely determine the reaction time of the two players (theoretically with an accuracy of 0.25mS !!!). This will become clearer to you during the specific demonstration game that you will watch below.

We set the left potentiometer approximately in the middle, where the entire scale represents a time of half a second. The right potentiometer changes the intensity of the LEDs from 0 to maximum.

  Finally a short conclusion. This project transforms basic components like LED strips and an Arduino into a professional-grade arcade experience that tests the limits of human reaction time. It is the perfect blend of simple mechanics and high-precision engineering, making it a great addition to any DIY game collection.