Hey, I just happened to be in the neighbourhood...

Hey everyone, it's been a while since I made my last blog post. Right now I'm in my last semester of school, and I'm currently taking a course called Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). Now with a month and a half left, I have to make a new game for this HCI class as a final project.

This is a group project, were each group is to choose one of three "themes" to base their game around, using one of a few given input devices. One of the devices was the Leap Motion, which is a very tiny device that you set on a table, and it tracks your finger movements above it with insane accuracy. I figured that it was an incredibly intuitive device, and would be perfect for a quirky fun game. I instantly thought of a game where users can use their fingers to fill in gaps for a water-flow system - a puzzle game. One of the themes was "time", so I figured that such a theme would be perfect for this game; the user must time where they put their fingers, so that water flows through the system without spilling. Think of it as a broken water park tube ride. You have to make sure that the kids enjoy the tube ride without falling out of the ride. Or perhaps a Leap Motion game with augmented reality, where people can use their bare hands to pet a virtual dog?

Don't... make... the kids fall off the ride....
Image © Music Road Inn

I was excited of the possibilities. Once everyone was called to form a group and pick a theme and device, I immediately rushed to gather a team, and shouted to the professor which theme and device we wanted. We were then told by another student that there was a line. So I stood and waited, until I realized that I was standing in the wrong spot. I finally found the correct line, and asked everyone in front of us which devices we planned to use. With only three groups in front of us, just the group in front of us said that they're going to claim the Leap Motion. This was a major disappointment for us. So we had to rethink our strategy.

I figured to book the Emotiv EPOC brain-wave tracker in advance, just so that we have a good device to work with, and then leave our theme as a blank until we thought of a new game idea. I then recalled a game idea I had last semester, called Awkward Penguin Simulator. The premise of the game is that you're a penguin in contemporary human society, and your goal is to move from A to B in common settings (like a mall, a school, a friend's house, etc.) while being the least awkward as possible. For example, if the player enters an elevator, and then waits while facing toward the people instead of the doors, the people will look at the penguin strange, and then the player's "awkwardness" meter would rise. If the player is in the middle of a conversation with a non-playable character, and he/she doesn't look at the character's face, the character will react puzzled, and then the awkwardness meter would rise even higher. As the awkward meter rises, the penguin will start to walk more awkwardly, flapping his fins... like a penguin. Once the awkwardness meter hits its peak, the penguin would squawk, and then hide in a corner. This game would use the Emotiv brain-wave input device to measure the user's tension and awkwardness, and a camera to track the user's eye movements. The theme of this game would naturally be the other theme given to us, "change" - a game that changes the personal outlook of an individual. The goal of the game would be to help the user learn social customs, and participate in society a lot more comfortably. This would be a perfect serious game to help people with Autism and Asperger's Syndrome, although the game isn't so much "serious" as it is quirky and funny. We then went back in line to register our theme, and to our disappointment again, the theme of behaviour was already taken. I was shocked, as I didn't hear that there was a limit of themes that groups could choose from; there are only three teams that could choose one of the three given themes. I thought that people only had to book the devices, not the themes; if I would have known that, I would have booked "change" in advance.

Image from Memestache.com

We then had to rethink our strategy AGAIN. But fortunately I realized that I could make a prototype of a future AAA game that I wanted to make. Of course a group of six students cannot make a full fledged AAA game in a month, so I figured that we can just make its basic mechanics, and showcase it in one level. I pitched this third idea of mine to my group, and they seemed to approve of it. It is basically a stealth game centred around the Clawshot mechanic from The Legend of Zelda - a high-tech grappling hook that propels the user linearly from their original position to the position that they shot the hook at. The player will be put in a maze, and will have to dodge security guards in order to eventually climb over a giant wall. The player can grapple to pretty much anything - people included. The player can also choose to grapple toward a person, or pull the person toward the protagonist - depending on how the player maneuvers the controller. We plan to use the Wii Remote Plus & Nunchuck controller as the primary control method, and connect it to a PC via BlueTooth. However, what would we use the Emotiv for? The interface. The last theme of the three is "glance", and that is what my group and I settled for. Although we plan to make a simple prototype of a traditional-esque game, we will thoroughly rethink how to convey non-diegetic game information using the Emotiv. For example, if the user feels confused, the game will automatically render a heads up display of important information. If the user becomes frustrated, the "lock-on" mechanism of the grapple hook will have a more generous threshold for the user to progress through the game. We also will be open to ideas on how to convey important game information diegetically without the Emotiv. At this point, we don't know the full potential of the device, but once we figure out what it can do, we will develop our control mechanics and interface design around it.

Thank you for reading, and wish us luck!! :)
Mario Greco