Waiting on PCBs, I Built a Flying Roadster Game: Meet RoadsterGO™

Every hardware project has the same awkward stretch. The design is finished, the Gerbers are sent off, and then there’s nothing to do but wait while the PCBs get made. That’s where I am right now with ncBrain, vBotTech’s CNC motion controller. The boards are at the fab and I wanted to take a little break.

Then I watched the Tesla Roadster event. On Thursday night, October 15, Tesla livestreamed the next-gen Roadster reveal from a SpaceX test site in McGregor, Texas. The moment that got me was the Roadster coming down for a landing on thrusters. A car hovering on jets felt like something straight out of a video game. So I figured, why not make that game?

RoadsterGO is a 3D browser game set in a neon arena. You fly a white Roadster with booster thrusters, and your goal is simple: stick a soft landing. It’s harder than it sounds. There are four modes: Ramp, Suction, Jump (clear a row of Teslas from Cybercab to Semi) and Flip. You score points for a clean landing and for any fuel you have left. There’s a live Top 10 leaderboard, and the crowd cheers when you nail it and ducks when you don’t.

Building a game turned out to be a nice break from routing traces. Thrust, gravity and timing a landing aren’t that far from motion control. Once the ncBrain boards arrive I’ll be back to bring-up and testing, and I’ll post an update here.

Play RoadsterGO for free at roadstergo.web.app. If you make the Top 10, grab a screenshot and share it with me.

Tesla and Roadster are trademarks of Tesla, Inc. RoadsterGO is a fan-made game, not affiliated with or endorsed by Tesla.