JanW built a Part Ninja on perfboard. He used a DIP cased microcontroller and through hole parts. He also replaced the 2.5V voltage reference with the similarly specced LM385-2.5.
The connections were made with enamelled copper wire AWG 28. The lacquer is burned off by tinning it with a very hot soldering iron (400 ° C). The fumes are pretty aggressive, I guess a fume extractor won’t help much, you’ll need a gas mask :)
The Part Ninja is a electronic component testing tool. It identifies electronic components like transistors and FETs, determines the pinout, and measures basic specifications.