Tron Lightcycles, in Real Life

Digital_Quartz writes "This is a clever hack, using a laptop and GPS to play the classic Lightcycles game from Tron, using bicycles and a city. The page is a little light on details, but does give the essentials, including screen shots."

No thank you

[nokilli]

As I recall, the point to the Tron lightcycle game was to make your opponent crash.

Which means my opponent is trying to make me crash.

I don't need any help in that regard. I can get into accidents all by myself.

Re:No thank you

[Coneasfast]

the challenge of tron is you are moving at a fast speed, what do you do in this bike situation?

maybe there should be a minimum speed limit? (which means you lose if you get too tired)

maybe a motorbike could be used, although you would need a closed course for safety,

this all seems too much for the real world :/

Re:No thank you

[Hungus]

According to TFA the server says you are cheating if you do not move for 60 seconds.

Re:No thank you

[interiot]

I've seen variants of Tron that add a Go [wikipedia.org]-like rule... if the other person completely encircles you, you lose. That would encourage the contestants to try to pedal faster than the other guy, which could be pretty entertaining. (this could make teammates and tunnels more interesting as well)

Re:No thank you

[xenocide2]

how do we determine that someone has been encircled? If I recall correctly, you are not immune to your own walls, so there's always the mathematical possibility that someone can escape, barring the fuzziness of GPS.

And if you say, once the person has been "wrapped around" once, doesn't that imply a rectangular grid? Last I checked we live on a sphere-like planet, which means I could drive in a small circle and claim to have enveloped the opponent!

Re:No thank you

[xenocide2]

Right, but I thought better of bringing up non-Euclidian geometry. Perhaps I erred in refusing the topic of that which had eluded the best mathematical minds of bountiful generations.

RTFA.

[edunbar93]

While your post was cute, it's obvious that you didn't read the article.

Cross the other person's path, and you lose. The path is defined by the GPS. In the movie (and the game) it was a tad more dramatic when a player lost. :)

Maybe not

[MyLongNickName]

But you could have the equivilant of a dog's "bark collar". Hit the GPS line and get a couple hundred volts.

Betcha that would make you take it seriously ;)

Re:JESUS was a baby but I don't think he was fucki

[kurzweilfreak]

Then you lose. :)

exercise is good

[humankind]

Any game that promotes physical activity is a great idea. This is a very clever adaptation that involves exercise, freedom and creativity.

Be thankful they didn't do a real life version of Joust.

Re:exercise is good

[Anonymous Coward]

Be thankful they didn't do a real life version of Joust.

That was our initial aim but PETA terrorists stole our ostriches. Bastards.

Re:exercise is good

[RompeRatones]

Comming up, Real Life Counter Strike

Re:exercise is good

[Dorsai42]

And right after that, Global Thermonuclear War

Re:exercise is good

[MyLongNickName]

Real life "Leisure Suit Larry"?

Nope. This is Slashdot! ;)

Re:exercise is good

[KDR_11k]

No, he [wikipedia.org] prevented it.

Re:exercise is good

[Surt]

They may not have, but i've started a game where I play the blue jouster using my car. I'm sure if they hit me just right with their bikes, i'll lose.

Re:exercise is good

[nycbicyclist]

"Be thankful they didn't do a real life version of Joust."

Perhaps because it's been done already:

http://dclxvi.org/chunk/operations/chunk/image/hir es/joust150.jpg [dclxvi.org]

Re:exercise is good

[nycbicyclist]

I have to add that I was a spectator at one of these jousting events last year in NYC. One match-up left the two participants flat on the ground, both unconscious.

A few minutes later I overheard the following conversation between one of the event organizers and an ambulance medic:

Medic: OK, what happened here?

Organizer: Well, they were jousting and....

Medic: Jousting? Did you say jousting?

Re:exercise is good

[identity0]

Did he end the conversation with, I'm wearing boots of escaping! I'm wearing boots of escaping! [comedycentral.com]??

Re:exercise is good

[tonsofpcs]

I believe the grandparent was referring to the Arcade and Nintendo Entertainment System game: JOUST [klov.com].

There are more than just two jousters....

Play Joust online [tripletsandus.com]

Re:exercise is good

[Andrewkov]

The arcade game Joust actually used flying ostridge-looking birds, not bycicles.

Yeah, I'm old.

Re:exercise is good

[strider44]

I think a real life version of Frogger would be interesting...and easy to set up!

how about

[zephc]

you paint one of these little bikes [dodgetomahawk.com] red or blue, and ride around somewhere roomy [saltflats.com].

Hummunah.

I'd forgotten how cool the Dodge Tomahawk was...

[NeoBeans]

...until your post. Granted, I've always wondered if they ever found someone with the kahunas to ride that thing flat-out!

Re:how about

[Locke2005]

Umm... it be a little difficult to play Tron with these, since there is only one of them... and by the way, anything over about 750cc is overpowered, since you are limited by the traction of a very narrow strip of your rear tire, not by power/weight ratio. The Tomohawk would need about a 3 foot wide rear tire to deliver that torque to the road, not the 2 skinny motorcycle tires it has. Also, can a vehicle using 4 motorcycle tires really be considered a motorcyle? They claim an "estimated top speed of 300+ m

Re:how about

[TinyManCan]

Ummm, traction is a function of the size of the contact patch and the amount of weight (or pressure) applied to each square inch of the contact patch. Simply widening the tire isn't going to buy you much if any additional traction. What you need to do is increase the pressure per sq/in of contact patch, using something like downforce generated by a wing or something similar. Plus I doubt that they couldn't find anyone to ride it flat out. The lawyers probably won't let them, or the execs don't want to see

Re:how about

[Locke2005]

Right, size of the contact patch has nothing to do with traction... so all those drag racers running those superwide tires must be complete morons, eh?

Re:how about

[cloudmaster]

The coefficient of friction for a tire is based on the size of the contact patch, though, and therefore the force due to friction (aka, "traction") is indeed related to the size of the contact patch. Mu is not a constant.

Find some sticky motorcycle tires and put them on the back of my 412 HP car, and tell me that they hook up better than (or as well as) the 11" wide tires that are on it now. Well, after the motorcycle tires go up in a cloud of smoke after one hard launch, that is.

Re:how about

[jericho4.0]

Static friction, espcially for gummy tires. But the real driver for tire size in HP tires is heat dissapation.

Re:how about (BM?)

[WillAffleckUW]

you paint one of these little bikes [dodgetomohawk.com] red or blue, and ride around somewhere roomy [www.saltflats.com].

Back in my day, we used to call that:
Going to Burning Man [burningman.com]

Re:how about

[Barryke]

(..)
Mummunah

I thought you meant one of these [pensfans.com]

Re:Typical Dodge Stupidity

[erlenic]

Don't you know anything? The bigger the engine, the bigger the dick. So yes, the bigger engine is essential.

Re:Typical Dodge Stupidity

[BVis]

I find the opposite is true. Whenever I see an SUV I'm reminded of http://cartalk.cars.com/ [cars.com]Click and Clack calling an SUV a "Chevy Compensator".

SUVs are wicked stupid. This is one case where I'm glad to see the price of gas going up. How long do you think the soccer moms will keep them once it costs $100 twice a week to fill the thing with gas?

Re:Typical Dodge Stupidity

[silicon not in the v]

SUVs are wicked stupid. This is one case where I'm glad to see the price of gas going up. How long do you think the soccer moms will keep them once it costs $100 twice a week to fill the thing with gas?

I think they might perceive the problem when their fuel costs get higher than their payments on the beast. Until then, probably not.

Re:Typical Dodge Stupidity

[kurzweilfreak]

Dodge = Linux zealots

Tomahawk = some special purpose computing device not designed for general purpose computing

Big engine = Linux

New use for the phrase?

[PornMaster]

I'm sorry, but I don't know how one could squish the phrase "clever hack" enough to make it fit this activity.

Re:New use for the phrase?

[NoData]

When you take the groundbreaking physics of a novel force field projector, and jam it up yer ass just to get a trailing wall of impenetrable light shooting out yer anus, you better believe it's a hack!

That is what they did, right?

Maybe I should read TFA...

Re:New use for the phrase?

[tktk]

How about:

The firemen will have to use a clever hack to pull you from the wreckage.

Link to a mirror

[kdark1701]

Slashdotted already. http://www.mirrordot.org/stories/5dcc252f0f43fc6f2 52db1df395c93a7/index.html [mirrordot.org]

Get Greasmonkey for Firefox

[/dev/trash]

And install the Mirrordot and CoralCache extensions. Automatic linkage.

+++
My last.fm page [www.last.fm]

awesome*2

[834r9394557r011]

Totally cool. I mean if i was so inclined to get hit by a bus looking at a blue line.

Re:awesome*2

[kfg]

All the buses I know are too busy looking at auto erotica, although that might make them more inclined to hit on you.

KFG

Hmmm...

[TWX]

I'm usually all in favor of life imitating art, but I don't see how this could get accurate enough to be truly entertaining.

By contrast, some 20 friends of mine were playing Laser Tag in a park after dark, and someone living in the area called the cops and said that there was a gang war going on, and something like 40 units descended on the park. They were ultimately let go that evening from the scene, but that had to be fun...

Re:Hmmm...

[comzen]

Don't try this (or anything that get 40 police units swooping on you)! It only takes one "oops" on the part of a cop to put a 38 slug in your skull.

Re:Hmmm...

[Spy der Mann]

and someone living in the area called the cops and said that there was a gang war going on

Funny, that's exactly what the neighbor said last time we played Dungeons n Dragons in my appartment.

Re:Hmmm...

[DaCool42]

What kind of idiot confuses laser tag with a gang war? Don't real guns have a tendancy to go "bang"?!!

Re:Hmmm...

[T-Ranger]

True, but high quality real guns have laser sights and go "swoosh". At least, if Bruce Willis is to believed.

Re:Hmmm...

[HyPeR_aCtIvE]

Same thing happened to me back when I was a kid. We'd regularly get a dozen or so of us together to play lazer tag around an elementary school/public playground that was next to a friend's house.

One night the cops were called. Granted this was a small town, and the number of cops was 2 ... and they weren't really believing the old lady about 'people shooting each other'.

So when they arrived, we got the 'So, what's going on here' discussion. We explained, they chuckled a bit, and asked us to call it a

OT:Hmmm...

[RangerRick98]

That reminds me of the time the local LUG I belong to decided to see how far we could stretch a wireless mesh network in the business complex. Someone working in one of the warehouses saw a bunch of people walking around with laptops at night and got nervous.

Two cop cars showed up about halfway into it. You could see it in their faces when they pulled up. "Oh, this is just some geek meeting, nothing to worry about here." :)

Darwin Natural Selection?

[Anonymous Coward]

Gee, talking on a cell phone while driving is safe, so using a keyboard and mouse while staring at a display while riding a bicycle in city traffic must be really safe, eh?

Re:Darwin Natural Selection?

[w98]

Not to mention the loss of equipment from wipe-outs and smashing your kit all over the sidewalk.

The second outdoor video game

[technoextreme]

I noticed that this is the second video game that has been retrofitted for outdoors. Pac man was the first one that I know of. I wonder how many of these games can actually be made for the outdoors.http://www.pacmanhattan.com/about.php [pacmanhattan.com]

Re:The second outdoor video game

[kurzweilfreak]

I always thought it would be cool to turn Super Dodgeball into an actual sport, similar to the way the original NES game was, with an actual court, people along the 3 sidewalls of each half of the court. I remember drawing out all the court layout, writing out all the rules I could think of for it to make it interesting, etc...

Only problem was I couldn't figure out how to make all the players have superpowers, like the lightning ball...

Re:The second outdoor video game

[Trejkaz]

I'm sure some LARP fanatic can help you out with lightning balls.

Re:The second outdoor video game

[barkingcorndog]

I've always enjoyed going over to I-5 to play Frogger. It gets the adrenaline going, it is impossible to cheat, and you find out very quickly when you lose.

Re:The second outdoor video game

[c0bw3b]

Hey! How about Grand Theft.. oh nevermind.

I'd like to see...

[kurbchekt]

One of these fools pull one of those ninety-degree turns like in the movie... End of line.

Other interesting (but failed) video game hacks

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried doing real-life pac-man with a yellow highlighter and some altoids. Didn't go so well.

I tried Donkey Kong with a fake moustache, a mallet, and my local zoo. Didn't go so well either.

I tried yelling "hadouken" after throwing a bowling ball wrapped in a lit kerosene-doused rag. The neighbor kid thought it was pretty cool.

I pulled on the passenger door of a cop car, and as he tried to go after me, I went to the drivers' side to try to floor it. I yelled "It's CJ, foo!" I forget, I was either busted or wasted...and nobody thought it was cool.

I think next I'm going to re-create Hitman: Contracts by shaving my head, and getting good with a shotgun.

Re:Other interesting (but failed) video game hacks

[MS-06FZ]

I tried yelling "hadouken" after throwing a bowling ball wrapped in a lit kerosene-doused rag. The neighbor kid thought it was pretty cool.

Oh, right, like the neighbor kids these days even know what a hadouken is...

Pfft...

[Spy der Mann]

I pulled on the passenger door of a cop car... and nobody thought it was cool.

Gee, and I thought I was crazy trying to climb skyscrapers a-la Prince of Persia...

Check out the green line player

[XXIstCenturyBoy]

The green line player is just too scary for me. He can hack a live Tron device AND go all the way around town on a bicycle? That guy went around his 2 other friends, and the long way round at that.

/Welcome my new super intelligent, super fit overlord! I hope he is not the next nerd evolution.

GPS games

[centauri]

My GPS (Garmin eTrex C) came loaded with several GPS-based games. One is a single-player lightcycles-esque game in which you run to spots to collect points whilst trying not to cross your own trail.

The other games feature a maze, a pair-matching game a la Concentration, a Whack-a-mole type game, and an asteroids clone. I've been a little leery of trying them, lest I be arrested for wacky behavior in a public area.

Re:GPS games

[xNoLaNx]

The first game you described sounds more like nibbles than tron.

Re:GPS games

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Never heard of "nibbles" but it sounded like Snake to me.

Re:GPS games

[Luke-Jr]

Nibbles is one of the two demo games that came with QuickBasic. (the other being Gorilla)

Re:GPS games

[centauri]

Yeah, maybe later versions can have bot cycles that you have to avoid. Or maybe Garmin had planned on that but just wanted to avoid lawsuits.

20lbs of stuff!

[EvilStein]

My god, with all that crap strapped to you, you'd be lucky to get the bike moving at all. It'd be like bumper cars for senior citizens. How.. uh, not exciting. :)

Re:20lbs of stuff!

[flithm]

Yeah I was thinking the same thing.

I thought maybe a better, and more fun way would be to use a GPS and wifi equipped PDA. Just tape the sucker to the handle bars. Of course you'd limit yourself to the largest wifi area around, but if you pick say the university campus, you'd have more than enough room to play a sweet game.

Also much cheaper. Could even use any old school bluetooth enabled PDA and bluetooth GPS adapter.

Re:20lbs of stuff!

[imsabbel]

Because moving around 200 pounds bike+driver+crap is SOOOOOOO much more difficult than moving 180 pounts bike+driver without crap...
wait, its only 12% or so...
that means that if you cannot get it moving with 20pounds extra load, you are obviously to weak to move you body at all, armchair hero.

1 thing missing..

[demonic-halo]

Need a image projector to project an augmented reality light wall for you to see so you can avoid crashing into them.

It wouldn't be a fast game if they players have to keep peeking inside their backpacks to avoid crashing.

Critical flaw in game!!!

[RootsLINUX]

It relies on human-powered vehicles. We all know that anyone who is cool/stupid (pick one) enough to play this game is not going to have the stamina it requires. They'll all pedal about 30 feet before they fall off their bikes and pass out on the sidewalk.

Re:Critical flaw in game!!!

[adamjaskie]

Not to mention that bikes aren't fast enough to make it interesting. You could pull off onto the sidewalk and walk your bike while staring at the screen, and you wouldn't need to worry about hitting a line.

Bah! :)

[Samurai Cat!]

I'm a geek and I snowboard, bike (road and mountain), run, and did a couple of adventure races. So there nyah. :D

Maybe this thing could become like DDR - nerdy combined with physical exercise. Depends on how accurate the GPS is - you could in theory do this in a large parking lot or field, instead of a whole town...

you have to wear the suits.

[intro]

They are missing a VERY important part of Tron. You HAVE to wear the suits! [tronguy.net]

Just so long...

[segfault7375]

Just so long as I don't have to wear one of these suits [tronguy.net]

*shudder*

Re:Just so long...

[sphix42]

Yea, but what about these:

http://images.burningman.com/index.cgi?image=16757 [burningman.com]

Re:Just so long...

[Jay Maynard]

Indeed. I was wondering if the group would make up its collective mind.

FWIW, I wouldn't wear the costume on a bicycle...too easy to damage it, and I've only got the one, still.

Cellphone version

[Rufus211]

A far more elegant version is available for cell phones, so you don't have to have a whole laptop setup.

http://datenmafia.org/gpstron/index-english.php [datenmafia.org]

Re:Cellphone version

[blonde rser]

What the? How is this only modded (Score:3, Informative). Come on moderators... this link is more interesting than the original story itself and it is directly related. Is the little bit of german throwing people off?

But then what about the virtual me?

[jockm]

If I can play light cycles in real life, then what is my virtual self doing? Sitting on the couch eating BBQ potato chips? This is all so confusing, won't the MCP set all of this straight?

Re:But then what about the virtual me?

[c0bw3b]

Isn't that kind of how the Sims works? I never understood that game.

Meanwhile, in the computer world...

[Luke-Jr]

The computer game [sf.net] prepares for version 0.2.8 [sytes.net], featuring support for non-square arenas [utopios.org].

Re:Meanwhile, in the computer world...

[Luke-Jr]

BTW, here's a link to CVS snapshots ("betas") [dashjr.org].
Not many servers making use of the new features, but "HexaTRON Server" is the one in the screenshot.

For those who want to run a server, here is an index of maps [armagetronad.net]-- if you have any to add, email me to add them [mailto].

More realistic

[StonedRat]

If it could be combined with something like this http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4607449.stm [bbc.co.uk] then it would be much more like the real thing.

Yet more realistic - Add the right bike

[Digital_Quartz]

Add in this new concept motorcycle by Dodge (which, incidently, not only looks a lot like a lightcycle, but has a 8.3L V10 engine, so would probably go about as fast);

http://www.dodge.com/tomahawk/flash.html [dodge.com]

If you crash...

[mendaliv]

...where's the explosives to give that neat blowing-up effect like in the movie?

At the very least, if you hit the wall does it punch a hole in whatever wall you hit and then remove your own from the playing field?

90 degree turns?

[way2trivial]

on a bicycle?

The only individual that could do that kinda thing was AUTOMAN!

And laugh as they call the bomb squad.

[Picass0]

Cop #1: "Hey, did you see that guy on a bike rushing towards that crowd with wires hanging out of his backpack?"

*POP*

Cop #2: "Got 'im"

Ad-free mirror

[xbmodder]

We need better mirrors http://xbmodder.us/mnt.is-a-geek.org/tron/ [xbmodder.us]

maps.google.com

[KidSock]

I wonder if one could improve on this using maps.google.com for the mapping part.

Ha, I want to see Frogger!

[Wacky_Wookie]

Thats right, Frogger in real life. I'd love to see the look on people's faces that come across a real life game of frogger.

With Cosstumes.

Quake III

[ross.w]

Ingredients:

1.Abandoned warehouse or industrial complex
2.Guns...Lots of guns
3.A few "friends"

The advantage with this method is you can only be fragged once - or is that a disadvantage?

Re:Ha, I want to see Frogger!

[ross.w]

You mean like this?

JERRY: Well, come on George, I'll help you push it across.

GEORGE: Wait a minute. This looks familiar. This reminds me of something. I can do this.

JERRY: By yourself?

GEORGE: Jerry, I've been preparing for this moment my entire life.

George pushes the machine onto the street. From a view in the sky, we see him dodging cars, hopping back and forth into lanes of traffic. Frogger music and sound effects play.

SHLOMO: He looks like a Frog.

SLIPPERY PETE: So do you.

George makes it across j

You see, officer...

[stinky wizzleteats]

The best part of this is to imagine the conversation that might take place with a cop after you completely annihilate some 80 year old bat in a crosswalk.

Re:You see, officer...

[macshit]

"For Luigi's sake officer, she was 80 years old! Not long for this world, soon to be an ex-citizen! Surely it's better to die quickly from massive trauma inflicted by an insane geek committing unspeakable perversions to the grand old sport of bicycling than to choke on her own phlegm in some decrepit bingo parlor? ... Officer...?"

If you've seen the movie:

[sker]

Sark to conscripts: "You will each receive.. an identity disk! .. and a keyboard
and an LCD screen
and a mobile phone
GPS
err and a RS232 cable
Oh fuck and a backpack to carry it all in

Where was I? Oh yeah...

Every thing you do, or learn will be imprinted on this disk!"

It's cool because...

[BonoLeBonobo]

... police motorbikes are gonna play Tron with you !

I can see my house from here!

[d99-sbr]

Hey, that's Karlsruhe on the map! What a coincidence. I'm writing my master's thesis here, and I actually live in a building clearly visible on the map they're using.

By the way, one of my favorite scenes from Family Guy is when it turns out that Peter Griffin used to be the red guy. Hilarious.

Starving?

[hiryuu]

What's the nutritional value of a Latitude? :P

Re:Syour sig.

[amcdiarmid]

Girls only like guys with bad karma.
Or guys in bad brains.