Tongari Shot is a shooting device that actually launches cone-shaped corn snacks worn on a fingertip using compressed air. The results are recorded as a score, turning the snack launcher into a game.
The firing system uses an air compressor and air valves, with an M5Stack Core2 and servo motors among the control hardware. RacoonFactory created it from the idea that the fingertip snack looked as if it could really be fired.
Most people put the snack on a finger and pretend it could shoot. This team added compressed air and completed the thought all the way to a working launcher.
Newson's Electronics' Self Catching Projectile Machine launches a ball bearing, moves a catcher to the predicted landing point, and catches its own projectile.
It reads the launch angle and calculates the range using projectile speed and gravity. An Arduino then moves the catcher along a rail to the calculated target position and returns the mechanism to its home position for the next shot.
Put the thrower and catcher into the same machine and even a one-person game of catch no longer needs the person.
Mark Rober invited engineers and makers to CrunchLabs Casino to build and test devices for cheating at casino games. Cheating itself was allowed, but getting caught was not.
The creations included a remote-controlled robotic poker chip that could move a roulette bet after the wheel stopped, dice whose internal weighting could be changed with heat, and a concealed wearable card-counting assistant. Another contestant hid a pinhole camera in a sleeve and used computer vision to reconstruct the order of a deck.
Change the rule from “no cheating” to “cheating is fine if you don't get caught,” and a casino suddenly becomes an engineering contest.
Motion Mosquito Swatting Game is a motion-controlled game in which the player swings a StickS3 like a flyswatter to hit mosquitoes flying around a PC screen.
The StickS3's gyroscope tracks hand orientation and swinging motion, using them both to aim the on-screen reticle and detect the swatting action. The project was created by Hujunfeng.
Instead of mapping mosquito swatting to a button, the game makes you do the real motion. The interface has looped all the way back to actual life.
Super Valid Designs built a semi-automated ski lift to live-catch mice in a chicken coop and carry them down a hill. Each gondola doubles as a mousetrap: bait lures a mouse onto a ceiling trapdoor, which drops it into the car.
The occupied gondola then travels downhill, where another trapdoor opens over a brush pile to release the mouse. The lift was assembled largely from wood and parts on hand and was made to transport and release the mice automatically.
The goal was simply to get mice out of the coop, and somehow that led to dedicated gondolas and a ski lift. The mice now have public transit.
Natasha Dzurny built an Arduino UNO Q cyberdeck inside a fuzzy orange hand puppet. Opening its mouth reveals a five-inch display and keyboard, while there is still room to put a hand inside and operate it as a puppet.
The computer can play a local collection of audio and video, and a small webcam on a telescoping rod can be used to monitor puppetry practice on the built-in screen. Close the mouth and attach the strap, and the whole device also works as a furry shoulder bag.
Combine a computer, puppet, practice camera and handbag, and the keyboard naturally ends up inside a mouth. Opening your laptop has never looked so much like being eaten.
The Black Thunder Driven Development device monitors token usage in AI development tools such as Claude Code and automatically dispenses Black Thunder chocolate bars when usage reaches set thresholds. An indicator shows progress against the five-hour usage limit, with a full limit corresponding to five bars.
When a reward is triggered, the machine cuts open the wrapper and presents the chocolate ready to eat. A robot arm also replenishes the stock. The project won the Blackathon hackathon and was built by YS_beaver, Yota Saito, Mikihiro Urano, and Tomoki Banno.
The more work you give the AI, the more chocolate the human receives. The robot even opens the wrapper for you.
Issen Boy is a 1.1 cm-square handheld game console built around the world of Issun-boshi, combining light, Japanese-inspired design, and electronics. The tiny circuit board implements the functions of an actual game console, including an input method that makes it genuinely playable.
The project was created by Yugi Tech Lab and won the grand prize in DigiKey Make ONE Challenge 2026. Its ProtoPedia page also lists the team's roles, including overall software, hardware, planning, and implementation by Yugi Tech Lab, AI work by KIRA_YTL, and 3D CAD work by mackey_YTL.
While other game hardware competes on screen size, this one won by shrinking the entire console to 1.1 cm. Your eyes and fingertips become part of the challenge.
Maker Mirza Makes modified a television remote so its number and control buttons can be used as a computer keyboard. The remote is an input device rather than the computer itself, and it was demonstrated with a Raspberry Pi 5-based handheld PC.
Inside the remote, the membrane keypad is connected to an MCP23017 I/O expander, which sends the button states to the Raspberry Pi over I2C. Rather than appearing as a conventional USB keyboard, the remote's buttons are read directly and turned into computer input.
All those buttons that used to control a television have found a new job typing on a computer. A remote control is suddenly responsible for writing.
James' Programming built a physical illusion inspired by Portal: throw an object into one frame and a matching object appears to shoot out of the other. There is no video compositing; the entrance detects the incoming object while a flywheel launcher at the exit fires a duplicate.
Time-of-flight sensors detect the approaching object early enough to compensate for the launcher's mechanical delay. The build took about nine months, and the full detection and automatic realignment sequence was still finicky, succeeding roughly one time in twenty.
Instead of inventing teleportation, it catches the object at one end and aggressively launches a duplicate from the other. Portal, but fully compliant with physics.
BB Korry’s “Anything Runway” is a small automated stage that sends hand-sized objects down a catwalk as if they were fashion models. Curtains open, an object moves along the narrow stage, performs turns or pauses at the end, and then returns so the next “performer” can appear.
Lighting and sound can change for each object, letting figures, snacks and even a bottle of shichimi spice receive full runway treatment. Magnets and a moving platform handle the automatic performer changes.
If the model cannot walk, simply make the runway do the walking instead. Suddenly even a spice bottle has stage presence.
Maker zomb23 built a drum machine around a rotating cylinder covered in LEGO studs. Orange pieces are placed on the grid to program beats, while a smartphone camera watches the cylinder and triggers sounds according to which pieces reach the front.
Spin the cylinder faster and the tempo increases; turn it the other way and the sequence plays in reverse. A software-style step sequencer has been turned into a physical object you can reprogram with LEGO and control by hand.
Remove the tempo knob and suddenly how enthusiastically you spin the cylinder becomes the tempo control. Music sequencing has become unexpectedly athletic.
Most people put the snack on a finger and pretend it could shoot. This team added compressed air and completed the thought all the way to a working launcher.