ACME Bomb #1
Physical Computing · Aarhus University
A real-life Counter-Strike bomb for paintball, built from scratch at Aarhus University — custom PCBs, surface-soldered components, and embedded C.
Overview
The first of two iterations of the same idea: a real-life Counter-Strike bomb for paintball. Built from scratch in a physical computing class at Aarhus University, the focus was the hardware — getting the circuit design right and making it actually work in the field.
The Build
Everything was custom. I designed the PCBs, surface-soldered the components, and wrote the embedded C that ran the device. The bomb integrated vibration motors, speakers, buttons, and radio transmitters and receivers with a custom noise-filtering protocol so the units could talk to each other reliably during a game.
The Interaction
Six wires, six holes, and a countdown timer. Any wire could go in any hole — to disarm the bomb, you had to cut the wires in the correct sequence before the clock ran out. Simple to grasp, tense to play, and entirely dependent on hardware that had to behave perfectly under pressure.
Why It Matters
This is deep hardware from the ground up — PCB design, soldering, embedded systems — paired with interaction and game design. It set the foundation for the thesis project that followed.