Gaming & Vision Studio Domain

Daedalus — Robot Vision Lab

A desktop learning lab where three robots teach path planning, computer vision and maze algorithms: program Argus with command cards, drive it with hand gestures, let Echo read your face, and race Theseus through generated mazes. All vision runs offline.

3Robots
7Arcade games
11Hand gestures
7Maze solvers

One App, Three Robots

Daedalus (version 2.0, the successor to RoboForge Lite) turns robotics fundamentals into something you can see and play with. Each robot covers one discipline: Argus for programming and path planning, Echo for computer vision, and Theseus for maze generation and search algorithms.

It installs as a standard Windows 10/11 desktop application. The computer-vision models ship inside the app, so it needs no internet connection and no image ever leaves the computer.

Daedalus home screen Fig 1: Home screen with the three robots, the arcade and recent activity.

How a Session Flows

A mandatory, seven-step Boot Camp walks every new user through the whole lab before it unlocks.

1. Meet the robots

Wake up Argus, Echo and Theseus.

2. Place a card

Drag a Forward card, set the number, run.

3. Move the goal

Click to move the flag, auto-plan, run.

4. Face or hands

Use the FACE / HANDS slider and try gestures.

5. Solve a maze

Generate a maze and watch A* solve it.

Argus path studio Fig 2: Argus auto-plans a route; the dashed path previews exactly what the program will do.

Argus: Path Studio

The advanced replacement for a Scratch-style editor. Big numbered command cards (Forward, Back, Turn, U-turn, Repeat, Until goal, If <sensor>, Feel, Wait) build a program, and the grid shows a dashed live preview of the route before it runs.

  • Live preview: the coloured number on the grid matches the card; hovering a card highlights its part of the route
  • Auto-plan: the robot computes the shortest route with breadth-first search
  • Drive & record: arrow keys or the pad drive the robot and write the cards for you
  • Hands-free: point to drive, thumbs-up to run, open palm to pause

Echo: On-Device Computer Vision

Echo is the heart of the project. A FACE / HANDS slider decides what the camera scans, and only that model runs, keeping it fast on ordinary laptops.

9 Expressions

Happy, Sad, Angry, Surprised, Thinking, Confused, Excited, Eager and Neutral, with live confidence bars.

11 Gestures

Thumbs up, fist, open palm, point, victory, OK, rock on and more, each remappable to an expression.

Live Mirroring

Echo copies blinks, eyebrows, mouth and head tilt in real time.

Fully Offline

Google MediaPipe models are bundled; no image is uploaded or saved.

Echo vision robot Fig 3: Echo's FACE / HANDS scanner, animated robot face and expression analysis.
Theseus maze lab Fig 4: Theseus solving a generated maze with A*, explored cells and route highlighted.

Theseus: Maze Lab

Square, circular and hexagonal mazes built by five generators (recursive backtracker, Prim, Kruskal, Wilson, hunt-and-kill), with a loops slider for multiple routes.

  • 7 solvers: BFS, DFS, A*, Dijkstra, Greedy, wall follower and Trémaux
  • Constraints: battery move budget, mud cost and fog of war
  • Analysis: a compare-all-solvers table shows how each algorithm behaved

Arcade & Reports

Seven games put the same skills to work, and every action is logged for review.

Daedalus arcade Fig 5: Mine Sweeper Bot, Snake Bot, Mirror Me, Gesture Simon, Gesture Pilot, Gem Rush and Labyrinth Race.
Daedalus audit log Fig 6: Audit log with filters and CSV, JSON, HTML or PDF reports.

Quickstart & Local Setup Guide

1. Install on Windows

  1. Unzip the release folder anywhere.
  2. Double-click Daedalus-Setup-2.0.0.exe.
  3. If SmartScreen appears: More info → Run anyway (the installer is not code-signed).
  4. Launch Daedalus Robot Vision Lab from the Desktop or Start menu.

2. Run from Source

cd source
npm install
npm start        # run in development
npm run dist     # build dist/Daedalus-Setup-2.0.0.exe

Requires Node.js 18+ on Windows. The UI is plain HTML/CSS/JavaScript in source/app/.

3. Camera Troubleshooting

  1. Close other apps using the webcam.
  2. Windows Settings → Privacy & security → Camera → allow desktop apps.
  3. Several cameras? Pick one in Settings → Camera & computer vision.
  4. If video freezes, switch processing from GPU to CPU.

4. Code Map

app/js/argus.js     Argus path studio
app/js/echo.js      Echo vision robot
app/js/vision.js    camera + MediaPipe
app/js/maze.js      maze engine
app/js/arcade.js    arcade hub
app/js/audit.js     audit log + reports

Try It Yourself

Run the project live in your browser, or install the open-source build on your own machine.

Live demo

Run it in your browser

The full Daedalus lab runs in this page: Boot Camp, Argus path studio, Echo’s face and gesture vision, Theseus mazes and the arcade. The camera is processed locally by the bundled models; no image leaves your device.

RUN DEMO

Allow camera access for Echo and gesture driving; everything else works without a camera.

Open source

Install it on your machine

Get the Windows installer or run the Electron source with Node.js. Progress, missions and settings are stored on your machine.

INSTALL THE PROJECT (OPEN SOURCE) Source code on GitHub

Explore the Source Code

Download the installer and the complete Electron source: Argus path studio, Echo vision robot, Theseus maze lab, the seven arcade games and the reporting module.

View Repository on GitHub