Guitar Hero is fun. Playing Guitar Hero with real live flames? Even better. If you don’t believe us, take a look at FireHero, a fire-breathing contraption that interfaces with a Guitar Hero controller to spew flames on cue.
Created by Chris Marion, the assembly uses propane fire poofers to send fireballs up in the air every time you hit a corresponding button on the plastic guitar. That way, even pyromaniacs can finally find a reason to waste their time on rhythm games. Yay!
The FireHero setup involves a regular guitar controller, connected to an Arduino board that sends power to five individual relays (they correspond to the five buttons on your fake instrument). Each relay then activates the solenoid valves on whichever fire poofer is assigned to it, allowing you to make a veritable disco inferno right in your backyard (or, we suggest, the neighbor’s backyard).
According the Chris, this is only the first version. He’s currently at work on its successor, which will have color-changing flames, a whammy bar interface to control the height of the flame and a special flame-throwing Star Power mode. Crazy.
You can check out the video below to see it in action, with another video available right from Chris’ website.
[Chris Marion via Gamma Squad]