Reaction time game in Raspberry Pi - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Reaction time game

📖 Scenario: You want to create a simple reaction time game on your Raspberry Pi. The game will measure how fast you can press a key after a signal appears.This is like testing how quickly you can catch a ball after someone throws it to you.

🎯 Goal: Build a reaction time game that waits a random time, then asks the player to press Enter as fast as possible. The program will then show the reaction time in seconds.

📋 What You'll Learn

Use the time module to measure time.

Use the random module to wait a random delay.

Prompt the user to press Enter to start and to react.

Calculate and display the reaction time with 3 decimal places.

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Reaction time games help improve focus and hand-eye coordination. They are used in sports training and cognitive testing.

💼 Career

Understanding how to measure time and handle user input is useful in many programming jobs, especially in game development and interactive applications.

1

Setup imports and initial message

Write code to import the time and random modules. Then print the message "Get ready to test your reaction time! Press Enter to start."

Raspberry Pi

# Import time and random modules
# Print the starting message
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use import time and import random. Use print() to show the message.

2

Wait for user to start and add random delay

Write code to wait for the user to press Enter using input(). Then create a variable called delay that stores a random float between 2 and 5 using random.uniform(2, 5). Use time.sleep(delay) to pause the program for that many seconds.

Raspberry Pi

import time
import random

print("Get ready to test your reaction time! Press Enter to start.")
# Wait for Enter key press
# Create delay variable with random float between 2 and 5
# Pause program for delay seconds
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use input() to wait for Enter. Use random.uniform(2, 5) to get a random delay. Use time.sleep() to pause.

3

Measure reaction time

Write code to record the current time in a variable called start_time using time.perf_counter(). Then print "Press Enter now!" and wait for the user to press Enter again. After that, record the current time in a variable called end_time using time.perf_counter(). Calculate the reaction time by subtracting start_time from end_time and store it in a variable called reaction_time.

Raspberry Pi

import time
import random

print("Get ready to test your reaction time! Press Enter to start.")
input()
delay = random.uniform(2, 5)
time.sleep(delay)
# Record start_time using time.perf_counter()
# Print "Press Enter now!"
# Wait for Enter key press
# Record end_time using time.perf_counter()
# Calculate reaction_time as end_time - start_time
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use time.perf_counter() to get precise time before and after the key press. Subtract to find reaction time.

4

Display the reaction time

Write code to print the message "Your reaction time is: X.XXX seconds" where X.XXX is the reaction_time rounded to 3 decimal places using an f-string.

Raspberry Pi

import time
import random

print("Get ready to test your reaction time! Press Enter to start.")
input()
delay = random.uniform(2, 5)
time.sleep(delay)

start_time = time.perf_counter()
print("Press Enter now!")
input()
end_time = time.perf_counter()

reaction_time = end_time - start_time
# Print the reaction time rounded to 3 decimals
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use an f-string with {reaction_time:.3f} to show 3 decimal places.