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US 4,072,310 AGranted
Control apparatus for a card game simulator
OwnerDale R. Beaminventor
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OwnerDale R. Beaminventor
Estimating the term…
A card game simulator simulates a card game by means of a set of hand displays, which may be seen only by one player at a time, and a set of corresponding play displays, which may be seen by all players. Each hand display includes a set of light emitting diodes which are lit to indicate the cards held by the hand simulated by that display. Cards are played by placing a photosensing probe against an activated light emitting diode, which action causes the corresponding play display to indicate the playing of the card corresponding to the light emitting diode sensed by the photosensor. The light emitting diode in the hand display is then de-activated. The invention as disclosed is adapted for simulating a game of bridge, and the circuitry for the simulator includes a recirculating hand memory for cyclic sequential readout of fifty-two hand codes and a recirculating trick memory for cyclic sequential readout of fifty-two trick codes. The two memories recirculate in synchronism, and the output codes correspond respectively to hand assignments and trick assignments for the fifty-two cards in a standard bridge deck. Cards are indicated on the hand displays and play displays in accordance with the hand codes and trick codes read out from the hand memory and the trick memory. Hand codes may be loaded into the hand memory in a random sequence for simulating a standard game of bridge, or they may be loaded in a predetermined sequence from a programming unit for playing duplicate or team bridge.
A card game simulator comprising a plurality of hand displays each of which has a plurality of light generating elements for representation of playing cards capable of being held by that hand, card assignment means for assigning playing cards to each such hand, a recirculating hand memory for storage of said card assignments, illumination control means responsive to said hand memory for periodically activating in each hand display the light generators representing cards assigned to that hand, a photosensitive detector for detecting illumination of any of said light generators when placed in close proximity thereto, a recirculating trick memory synchronized with said hand memory and actuated by an output from said detector for remembering the time period of said output, and gating means connected to said trick memory for preventing said illumination control means from activating a light generator during occurrence of time periods remembered by said trick memory;
A card game simulator comprising a first recirculating memory for receiving, recirculating and reading out hand codes corresponding to hand assignments for a predetermined sequence of cards, a second recirculating memory operated in synchronism with said first recirculating memory for receiving, recirculating and reading out trick codes assigned during the course of play to the cards in said predetermined sequence, a plurality of hand displays responsive to card designation signals for simulating cards held by participating players, card designation means for generating said card designation signals in said predetermined sequence and in synchronism with the operation of said memories, steering means for steering said card designation signals to selected ones of said hand displays under control of the hand codes read out from said first memory, means for generating said hand codes and causing said hand codes to be loaded into said first memory, manually operated playing means for indicating the playing of cards simulated by said hand displays, a trick code generator responsive to said playing means for generating said trick codes and causing said trick codes to be loaded into said second memory in sequential positions for association with the cards being played, and gating means responsive to trick codes read out from said second memory for gating the simulation by said hand displays of cards corresponding to said trick codes.
A card game simulator comprising a recirculating hand memory for sequentially and repetitively reading out a series of hand codes corresponding to hand assignments for each of a plurality of cards to be used in a card game being simulated by said simulator, a plurality of hand displays each including a separate light generating element for representation of each of said cards, decoding means for decoding said series of hand codes and generating hand enabling signals for the hand displays represented thereby, means for generating card designation signals is synchronism with the generation of said hand codes, means responsive to said hand enabling signals and said card designation signals for causing said light generating elements to indicate on a sequential basis all cards being simulated, each such indication being made in the hand to which the simulated card has been assigned, manually operable sensing means for sensing a selected card indication, and inhibiting means for inhibiting card indications after they have been sensed by said sensing means, said inhibiting means comprising a recirculating trick memory operated in synchronism with said hand memory and provided with output terminal means for reading out trick codes associated with the same cards for which said hand memory reads out hand codes, trick code generating means, means responsive to said sensing means for causing a trick code to be loaded from said trick code generating means into said trick memroy whenever said sensing means senses a card indication, logic means connected to said trick memory output terminal means for generating a hand strobe when the signal appearing at said terminal means indicates that the associated playing card has not yet been played, and means preventing card indications in said hand displays in the absence of a hand strobe.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.