T3S - Tic Tac Toe Robot

T3S – Tic Tac Toe Solver

MODEL INFO:

454 parts

26 x 26 x 26 cm

811 grams (without batteries)

Interactive robot playing Tic Tac Toe

You'll get:

• PDF with detailed instructions
• ZIP file with NXC (source code) and resource files
• TXT and XML file to buy parts

You'll need some basic skill to use BrickxCC to compile and download the program to the robot.

You can cut down the cost if you don't buy letter tiles.

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WARNING: THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS OR ANYONE DISTRIBUTING THE SOFTWARE BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

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THE STORY

I was asked to build an interactive robot for a science fair, themed to AI.

First problem: what kind of game?

They needed a robot playing with public, especially kids, so I needed a game "simple to learn but hard to master". Thinking what kind of games I played when I was young, I choosed Tic Tac Toe.

First, a Google search fo a Tic Tac Toe robot: I found that a friend of mine, Daniele Benedettelli, sold the instructions for his solver, so I buyed them for a kickstart.

His robot is very smart but... ugly! Ugly like an assembly line machine.

So I tried to give an attractive shape to the robot, and I think "Tic Tac Toe, TTT ,T3, Terminator 3".

Most mechanic solutions went from Benedettelli's instructions, reshaped to stay on topic.

The head was created by my son Sabran: perhaps the teeth need a whitening...

On software side, every robot needs his own, especially with a big hardware change like in this case.

So finally I wrote software, using some Benedettelli's ideas.

First idea was a self-learning software, but I realized that none of the visitors would have noticed how much him was learning, so I reverted on a regular match, leaving the first move to human.

To complete the work, I got sounds from the film (start: "It's your destiny". victory: "Hasta la vista, baby", draw: "No problemo", lose: "I'll be back") and the shotgun sound from Doom.

On the screen there are a map of board on the left and the evaluation for his move on the right.

Actually, I dismantle the robot after 6 years of matches (more than 2000 matches to exhibition) and I have built a newer version.

Have fun!