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Today we’re going to be building a Tic Tac Toe or Noughts and Crosses shield for an Arduino. The game board is made up of a 3×3 grid of RGB LEDs that light up green or blue to indicate the naughts or crosses. A keypad at the bottom of the shield, that corresponds to the game board positions allows you to input each move. A status LED underneath the gameboard shows you which player’s turn it is and allows you to select one of the three game modes using the start button alongside it.

The game has 3 selectable game modes, the first is a turn-by-turn two-player mode that allows you to play against another person, the second is an easy level AI opponent and the third is an expert level AI opponent that is impossible to beat.

How The AI Algorithm Works
The AI works on a minimax algorithm, which is a recursive algorithm aimed at minimising the possible loss for a worst-case scenario. The algorithm calculates the value of each state of the game by looking at all of the possible outcomes following each move.

For example, the top game board below represents the current state of the game, with the green player to play next. The second line indicates the three possible moves that the green player can make. Two of these states result in the green player winning, these are awarded a score of 10. The third state allows the game to continue, with blue taking their turn. There are two possible spots for blue to play, the first does nothing (nothing in this move, although we can see that in the next move green would win) and then second results in blue winning. So, a score of -10 is given as this is against the green player who is currently playing. A state which results in an eventual draw is given 0. The algorithm would therefore favour one of the first two game moves, and work against playing the third move which allowed the opportunity for the blue player to win.

With the AI running the minimax algorithm on the Arduino, it’ll always play the best possible move, so regardless of who starts, you won’t be able to beat it.

To make the game a bit more fun, as it’s not much fun losing or drawing games all the time, I’ve added a second mode that plays random moves for the first two plays before allowing the AI algorithm to finish off the game. This drastically reduces the AI’s ability to win and you’re left with the possibility of winning most games that you start and a fair number of games that the AI starts.

What You Need To Make Your Own Tic Tac Toe Shield
Arduino Mega
10 x Tactile Pushbuttons
10 x 5mm RGB LEDs (Common Cathode)
10 x 15K Resistors
11 x 390Ω Resistors
10 x 470Ω Resistors
Male Header Strips”

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