US 4,974,857 A · Electronic dart game

Abstract

An electronic dart game capable of being played by sight-impaired persons. The game includes a dart face forming a target for darts thrown by the players, the dart face including a plurality of scoring segments. An electronic processor is associated with the dart face for detecting a hit segment and determining the value of the segment which has been hit. An audible announcing device is associated with the processor and is responsive to the processor for audibly announcing sufficient information to direct and score the game without the need for viewing of visible indicators. As a further feature of the invention, as rollout mat is provided having an integral throwing line and affixed to the cabinet. In one condition, the rollout mat is completely stored within the cabinet and in the other can be simply rolled out to automatically position the throwing line, the throwing line being physically perceptible by a sight-impaired person to locate him with respect to the target face.

Claims11

Dependent claims

An electronic dart game capable of being played by one or more sight-impaired players throwing one or more safety tipped darts at a dart board to advance the game intermittently from throw to throw and player to player while keeping track of the score of each player, the electronic dart game comprising the combination of:

a dart board forming a target for the darts thrown by the players of the dart game, the dart board comprising a plurality of scoring segments, and a sensing means for detecting when one of the scoring segments is hit by a thrown dart,
processor means responsive to the sensing means for determining which of the plurality of scoring segments has been hit and assigning a value to the hit scoring segment, the processor means, in response to determining the value of a hit segment, determining the advance of the game and the score for the player who had thrown the dart, and
audible announcing means responsive to the processor means for audibly announcing, at least in part in words or phrases, sufficient information to score and direct a sight-impaired person through the game without the need for viewing of visible indicators, the audible announcement including an indication of the target segment hit by each thrown dart.

An electronic dart game capable of being played by one or more sight-impaired players throwing one or more darts at a dart board to advance the game intermittently from throw to throw and player to player while keeping track of the score of each player, the electronic dart game comprising the combination of:

a dart board forming a target for the darts thrown by the players of the dart game, the dart board comprising a plurality of scoring segments, and a sensing means for detecting when one of the scoring segments is hit by a thrown dart,
processor means responsive to the sensing means for determining which scoring segment of the plurality of segments has been hit and assigning a value to the hit scoring segment, the processor means, in response to determining the value of a hit segment, determining the advance of the game and the score for the player who had thrown the dart, and
audible enunciator means responsive to the processor means for timely announcing, at least in part in words of phrases, audible information regarding the score and status of the game triggered by each hit of a scoring segment, the audible information being sufficient to direct a sight-impaired person through the game and including an announcement of the target segment hit by each thrown dart in a timely manner after the dart hits the target.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Electronic dart game

Life of this patent

Electronic dart game

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims11