I've known about MacroFab's design contest since the beginning of June and intended to participate. But the days turned to weeks that turned to months, and today I woke up with just a day left before the deadline and nothing more than a vague idea in my head.

I wanted my entry to be Game Boy related somehow – I'm a big fan of Nintendos old handheld. The theme of the contest is "Useless Machine," and contesters should "build an electronic project that is useless." So, in the end, I have to come up with some kind of useless electronic accessory – but what exactly?

Given the short amount of hours available, I gave myself the following constraints:

• just breadboard the thing – no time for PCB design and manufacturing
• solve as much as possible with firmware/software

Happy with limiting myself this way, I jumped on my bike and started pedaling to the local second-hand store. Why? To find something interesting that I could hack, hook up to my Game Boy, and do something useless with.

I browsed the store for a while, chitchatted with the owner and, suddenly, there it was. In a cupboard, on the shelf closest to the floor, it stood. In all its glory. The Zinger – a joystick for the Nintendo Entertainment System by Beeshu Inc.

"Jackpot! That's my entry to the competition.", I thought. Hacking the joystick to work with the Game Boy is the perfect useless accessory:

• it's about 20–30 years late to the party
• it makes it harder to play on the go, like on a crowded train
• there are no games compatible with it

Can you imagine anything more useless? An accessory for a handheld video game console that is not compatible with any game.

It must work, though, so I have to figure out a way to connect the Zinger to the Game Boy, reverse engineer the joystick communication protocol and write some demo homebrew software to prove everything operates as intended. And I have to do it in less than 18 hours.