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Video Game Shield

**Replacement: **None. We are no longer stocking this shield. This page is for reference only.

The Video Game Shield is an Arduino add-on shield to make your own video games, including graphics, text, sound effects, and music! Using the power of open source, this shield includes everything you need to make awesome black-and-white video games on your TV. It supports up to two Nintendo Wii Nunchuck controllers for an easy and familiar interface.

The Video Game Shield works great on many Arduino boards, including the Uno and Duemilanovae, and on Arduino-compatible boards like the Freeduino. However, it requires a few minor changes to work on the Arduino Mega.

Check out the examples below. All you need is an Arduino, a Wii Nunchuck, and you can start playing classic games! You can also use it for your own custom games or take advantage of the libraries to use it for your own application where you need audio and video from an Arduino.

Comments

Looking for answers to technical questions?

We welcome your comments and suggestions below. However, if you are looking for solutions to technical questions please see our Technical Assistance page.

  • jago lee / about 13 years ago * / 3

    chiel its a add on to Arduino, you add it to what ever one you have like a arduino uno. trust me this kit works!

    • trodoss / about 13 years ago * / 2

      I agree, it definitely works!
      I have used it on a few projects, see: http://code.google.com/p/trodoss-arduino/

      • jago lee / about 13 years ago / 2

        WOW! Thanks for sharing your ingenuity with me. That's a great video too! Looking forward to seeing more.

        • trodoss / about 13 years ago * / 1

          Glad you like the projects! For those who haven't seen it, video for Elventure is here: YouTube Video of Elventure

          The video is from the Hackvision version, but both the Video Game Shield and Hackvision versions are functionally the same.

          • trodoss / about 12 years ago * / 1

            Another really cool example that is a little hard to find on the Wayne and Layne site is a Raycaster engine that they wrote: Forum Post

            Thought I would pass that along.

    • joeyxl / about 13 years ago / 1

      yes spark fun would never give out somthing that does not work its is tested by the the top people in sparkfujn the best from all over the world and evean if they did put it out the would take it back and give you a full refund.

  • ChadWV / about 13 years ago / 1

    I just built the game shield, but none of the code works for me. I tried the sample stuff from Wayne and layne nothing but errors can someone help ?

    • jago lee / about 13 years ago / 1

      Ok, theres many things that could be wrong with your board. Firstly the arduino will tell you if your code is wrong. If so use a diferent code. Secondly check for cold joints, solder bridges, ETC. Thirdly, if your multimeter has a continuity setting on it check for breaks in the circuit. I hope this works :) if not email me at jagolee@hotmail.co.uk.

  • A.G. / about 14 years ago * / 1

    I was wondering if there a way/hack available where I can convert the composite video to VGA so that I can view the shield's output on a monitor? This would be helpful to demo a game I am working on.
    Thanks!

  • Ivan747 / about 14 years ago / 1

    A supporting NTSC and two Wii nunchucks makes me wonder how much can you do on an AtMega328 running a bootloader.

  • Mr. Person / about 14 years ago / 1

    Is there any chance of a .NET Micro Library coming out for this shield?

    • wayne_and_layne / about 14 years ago / 1

      We're working to get a Netduino and set up the windows environment to start working on it. I'll let you know when we have it working with the Netduino. Might take a few weeks to get it working.

  • Mr. Person / about 14 years ago / 1

    I am wondering, can the colors be changed besides black and white? I mean, there would still only be two different colors, but the two would be different from black and white.<br />
    <br />
    Also, how does this compare to the Tellymate Shield? Is it better? Is it worse? Is it about the same?

    • wayne_and_layne / about 14 years ago / 1

      I don't think that changing the colors, even staying with only two colors, would be possible with the current hardware. If you change the values of the resistors for video and sync, you might be able to have black and gray, or gray and white, or something like that, but color would be trickier, I think.
      The tellymate shield doesn't include the nice connectors for the Wii accessories (Nunchuck, Classic Controller, etc), but it only uses the two serial pins for the arduino to talk to the tellymate chip. The tellymate chip handles all the tricky business of generating the video signal, which is all done by the arduino with the video game shield. The tellymate looks like it's all text-based, although they can deal with individual pixels by using a special font, where each character is some combination of lit/unlit pixels. Also, the tellymate is a little more expensive than the video game shield.

      • MoriFi / about 14 years ago / 1

        color runs at a higher frequency to. I forget what it is though.

      • Mr. Person / about 14 years ago / 1

        Thanks for the help.

        • Mr. Person / about 14 years ago / 1

          Wait, would color be possible using a more powerful board, like the Netduino or FEZ Panda?

  • Ted M / about 14 years ago / 1

    The cool thing about this is that it puts together audio, video, and two wii controllers on one shield. (Two wii nunchucks are tricky because they all use the same address, so you need a circuit to switch between the wii's) It also looks like it has two connectors for the wii's, so you can just plug them in. Very Cool!

    • wayne_and_layne / about 14 years ago / 1

      Thanks! Glad you like the Video Game Shield. We've just added support for the Wii Classic Controller, in addition to the Nunchucks, and are planning to release a new library that supports the Wii Motion Plus rotation sensor module.<br />
      <br />
      You're very right about the Wii accessories sharing the same address: Most of the hardware on the Video Game Shield is involved in supporting the two controllers at once, doing the switching and level-conversion between 5v and 3.3v.<br />
      <br />
      You can indeed just plug in the controllers, as we have some specially designed cutouts on the circuit board.

  • EvilTwin / about 14 years ago / 1

    I would love to see a you tube clip of this in action.

    • BricoGeek / about 14 years ago / 1

      here is:<br />
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9ff2oioew

  • Chiel / about 14 years ago / 1

    i did not know you could that with some resistors,transistors and a 4066 ic.<br />
    <br />
    is there a schematic for the circuit? i wouldn't mind trying this out on a breadboard.<br />
    <br />
    also the tvout examples seem broken. to fix it you just change TV.begin(PAL) to TV.begin(_PAL)(same with the NTSC).

    • wayne_and_layne / about 14 years ago / 2

      Hello Chiel,<br />
      <br />
      We have schematics posted on the Download page, located here: http://www.wayneandlayne.com/projects/video-game-shield/download/#hwdes<br />
      <br />
      We initially developed the circuits on a breadboard, so you should have no trouble making it yourself. The transistors and 4066 IC are used for interfacing with the Nunchucks, so you shouldn't need them unless you are using Nunchucks. The TV-out part is just the four resistors near the top of the board.

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