A Portable Console Dedicated to Games of Go on the Go

Go is an ancient game — very likely the oldest board game that has survived to the modern day. It doesn’t require anything beyond the ability to draw a grid and collect suitable stones. But a standard Go board does require a 19×19 grid and a small quarry’s worth of stones, which can be difficult to carry in one’s pocket. So, Evan Shu Kahn built this handheld console dedicated to playing games of Go on the go.

Pulling that off wasn’t easy, because Go isn’t easy to play well. The rules are simple, but the strategy is complex and difficult to perform with simple algorithms. Exact approaches vary, but they tend to work by mapping out potential moves in advance and selecting those that seem to yield the best results. Because there are so many valid moves a player can make on each turn, there are a lot of possibilities to compute.

Despite all of that, Evan was able to get Gnu Go, an open source program first written in C way back in 1989 and continuously refined since, running on an ESP32-P4 microcontroller. On large boards, good players should still be able to beat Gnu Go. But on a small 9×9 board, Gnu Go can use a better simulation that should give serious players a challenge.

Evan put that ESP32-P4 on a custom PCB with a monochrome LCD. That consumes very little power, but is easy to see thanks to backlight. Power comes from a 400mAh lithium battery, which is good for several hours of play. Players interact with the board through a responsible capacitive touch sensor. That hardware fits into a simple 3D-printed enclosure.

Evan hopes to sell his Go console next year and wants to aim for a price of $64.