In a nutshell, Christmas decorations can range from being extremely simple to completely outlandish, but I’m willing to wager that you’ve never seen anything quite like this before. Sprite tm, a user on YouTube, has lately displayed a little Christmas tree ornament that is modelled by the original IBM personal computer. The item was manufactured using a 3D printer and then hand-painted, which, in the opinion of some people, is sufficient to merit a spot on a tree. However, the maker went above and beyond by installing software and hardware that is able to run Doom.
That’s correct, this ornament for the Christmas tree can actually play the game Doom.
A customised version of Doom for the Game Boy Advance was included with the Sprite tm kit along with an ESP32-C3 microcontroller. The chip in particular is compatible with both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. The latter of these allows you to wirelessly connect a controller that is compatible with the game, allowing you to play it on a tiny 0.96-inch rectangular TFT screen. Wi-Fi is also supported by the chip. Audio playback is controlled through a little speaker that is attached to the GPIO on the ESP32-C3.
As for the software, Sprite tm mainly relied on GBADoom; nonetheless, it was necessary to alter the manner in which it handled music and restructure the input subsystem in order to ensure that the Bluetooth controllers functioned appropriately. Sprite updated an already existing model that he found on Thingiverse and then printed it in 3D using his JLC printer because his SLA printer had just lately stopped working. The natural colour of the resin was preserved while the grey and black accents were sprayed on with model spray paint. The white portions of the model were left unaltered.
As can be seen, everything has a nice and snug fit inside of the case. The display is somewhat larger than it should be; nevertheless, only a small portion of it is visible through the screen cutout; the remainder of it remains concealed inside.
On the website for Sprite, you can access comprehensive details regarding the construction, and on GitHub, you can get hold of all the files you need to construct them on your own.
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