The microcontroller card game with dev boards
Get to know the boards by battling them!
Board Wars is a trump-style card game where real microcontroller dev boards go head to head. Clock speed, RAM, power draw, price – instead of dry datasheets, a quick battle shows what each board is good at. While playing, you almost effortlessly learn which one to reach for in your next project.
- 2–4 players
- ~10 min
- 32 cards
- 8 categories
- 4 languages
What is this?
Dev boards instead of cars: Arduino, Raspberry Pi, ESP32, STM32 and friends. The jungle of specifications can be tough even for professionals – here, just like in the classic trump card games, sometimes the higher number wins and sometimes the lower one (e.g. in price or size). Every value comes from official datasheets: you learn without noticing.
Real hardware
All 32 cards feature existing dev boards with real specs.
QR on every card
One scan takes you to official pinouts and documentation.
In 4 languages
Hungarian, English, German and Italian text on every card.
Two game modes
Classic battle
Pick a category and call your value – the best takes the cards. Careful though: in price, power draw and size the lower value wins! Run out of cards and you're out; the last one standing wins.
Quartet
Collect the 4-card sets (e.g. 0A–0D). Ask anyone for a specific card from a set you already hold – guess right and you get to ask again. Most sets wins.
Build, don't just play
Scan the QR code on the front of any card and you land right on the official pinout and technical docs. The deck doubles as a lab bench tool.
For teachers and club leaders
Board Wars is a gamified learning tool: students explore the world of microcontrollers while playing, with nothing at stake. Instant feedback, small-group cooperation, playful competition – exactly what motivates Generation Alpha, born after 2010.
Concepts through play
Clock speed, memory, GPIO, power draw – they stick while picking categories, and every round is instant feedback: you see right away who won and why.
Real data
Every number comes from official datasheets, no made-up stats.
Project-ready knowledge
After playing, students know which board to reach for in their next project – by price, power draw and pin count.
Fits a lesson
A round takes about 10 minutes in groups of 2–4 – everyone plays, nobody gets lost in the crowd. Perfect for the end of class or a club warm-up.
Behind the game
I, Andor Czafik, created Board Wars. My background is in electrical engineering, and I know how hard it can be – sometimes even for professionals – to find your way through the dry specs of dev boards. With the game I wanted to make that easier and more fun.
After the cards were finished, I started training as a vocational teacher, and in my essay on effective learning methods Board Wars became the example of gamification. What I described there, based on the research literature, is built into the game: instant feedback, small-group cooperation, and the fact that in technical subjects dry theory is worth little without practice.