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Duration

Duration and any kind of digital experience is often presumed to be a bad thing however in my experience the duration is one of the key factors. That is because my experience forces the user to practice it in order to get good at it. This is largely due to the main fact that the first time that they experience the game they are never going to pick it up straight away and this is a good thing. This is classed as a good thing because the player has to practice which is time consuming and keeps the player in the experience for so long that they eventually without realising it become immersed in the game. Prensky(2007) “ People don’t like to practice. Games capture their attention and make it happen.” I have used duration in my experience effectively because it is around 3:30 minutes however there are obstacles that they must face even at around 15 seconds in that will most likely result in them restarting because they are not expecting the object to be there. The blueprints below show the blueprints for spikes to lift through the floor without the player realising straight away resulting in a restart.

References

Prenksy, 2007, Computer Games and Learning: Digital-Based Learning, Available online: https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/6851163/computer_games_and_learning_2006.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A&Expires=1547773252&Signature=G6cub2dtsZ%2F6vMOQfiWCb7ROv8Y%3D&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DComputer_games_and_learning_Digital_game.pdf

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Value/Significance

The value and significance of my interactive experience is the achievement that the user gains from playing. It is significant because it drives and motivates the user to get to the end of the experience because they will base the value and significance of their personal experience on whether or not they were able to play the game successfully. Weiner (1985) “a theory of motivation and emotion in which causal ascriptions play a key role.” In this quote Weiner suggests that motivation influences emotions and achievements affect motivation. So in terms of Weiner’s suggestions motivation, emotion and achievement is all linked in one continuous circle. This can be best described as a emotional domino effect because achievement encourages motivation which in turn activates certain emotions related to progress and positivity. Muller and Fritz(2015) “developers experience a broad range of positive and negative emotions during change tasks that are similar to the ones experienced in other situations and that these emotions are highly correlated with progress”. This is another example of emotions linking to progress and achievement. One example of negative emotions with progress is in my experience when the player dies they get a message on screen that says “RESPAWNING”.

 

References

Muller and Fritz, 2015, Stuck and Frustrated or in Flow and Happy: Sensing Developers’ Emotions and Progress. Available online: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/7194617

Weiner, 1985, An attributional theory of achievement motivation and emotion. Available online: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1986-14532-001

 

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Interactivity

Friedl (2002) “Interactivity is one of the key elements that truly distinguishes a game. Designing effective,  Interactivity, however, can be a challenge for even the most experienced game developer.” This quote suggests that Friedl is implying that Interactivity is one of the most important features of a game or experience. In my opinion this is because it keeps the player interested for longer. However Friedl also states that it is very hard to create good interactivity in a game and this is true as in my game the section of blueprint to control the Spacecraft is very large and time consuming as you can see in the screenshot below. Lenhart* (2008) “Video games provide a diverse set of experiences and related activities and are part of the lives of almost all teens”. This enforces how important interactivity is in the experience and keeping the audience engaged because there is such a large audience and range of people that this project is aimed at.

References

Friedl M, 2002, Online Game Interactivity Theory with Cdrom, Available online: https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=579311

Lenhart* Amanda; Kahne, Joseph; Middaugh, Ellen; Macgill, Alexandra Rankin; Evans, Chris; Vitak, Jessica, 2008, Teens, Video Games, and Civics: Teens’ Gaming Experiences Are Diverse and Include Significant Social Interaction and Civic Engagement, Available here: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED525058

 

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Intensity

This post will evaluate the effect on intensity on people and how it is combined with my interactive experience. Boone (2001), “Changing intensity of competition changes the identity of the innovator and consequently the way the innovation is valued.” In this particular extract Boone implies that adding the factor of intensity to any situation will encourage the person in question to perform slightly better than if there was no intensity at all. Bullinger D, Biggerstaff K, Rogers R, Nichols D, And Ben-ezra V (2014) “Competition can increase an athlete’s performance. The competitive drive frequently displayed by athletes may not exist if athletes are unaware of the competition.” This explains intensity is also a large motivation for professional athletes to push harder and perform better as they want to beat the competition. This enforces the reasons behind me implementing intensity into my experience. Intensity was placed through the use of flashing lights and sirens manipulating a police car. Therefore you could argue that the intensity in my experience was that of fear and not competition whilst on the other hand some may say that there is a competition between the police car and the average person inside of the experience.

References

J Boone 2001, Intensity of competition and the incentive to innovate, Science Direct. Available online: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167718700000904

 

Bullinger D, Biggerstaff K, Rogers R, Nichols D, And Ben-ezra V, 2014, Effects of Competition on Performance and Physiological Responses in Female Athletes. Available online: https://digitalcommons.wku.edu/ijesab/vol2/iss6/50/

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Triggers

According to Nathan Shedroff (2010) “every sensorial decision is a trigger”. Therefore every decision or emotion connected to the senses is a trigger according to Shedroff. Furthermore this links to the senses that are triggered in my experience which would consist mainly of sight and sound. This brief blog post will cover the triggers explored in my experience. Ekan (2008), “The importance of sound for establishing mood in audiovisual media is well recognised.” This suggests that triggers, which are according to Shedroff related to senses, are also neurologically linked to moods and emotions. This suggests that the sound imported into my experience not only can be described by Shedroff as a trigger but also an emotional trigger not only affecting the player’s decision making in the game but also affecting the emotional state of that player. Another sensorial trigger trigger included in my game is sight and I have manipulated this through the use of lighting. V Laganier (2012) “Light triggers ambiances in different ways and has a profound impact on the way people perceive and experience their environment.” This is the explanation behind the dark ambient lighting I have included in my game to create a suspenseful environment and atmosphere.

 

References

Shedroff 2010, Meaning is the most important thing that you can focus on, Big D Design Conference, Dallas. Available online: https://www.slideshare.net/NathanShedroff/meaningful-experiences

 

Ekman, I 2008, 3rd Conference on Interaction with Sound, Psychologically Motivated Techniques for Emotional Sound in Computer Games, Helsinki. Available online: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Inger_Ekman/publication/233406205_Psychologically_motivated_techniques_for_emotional_sound_in_computer_games/links/09e415139aeb592a18000000/Psychologically-motivated-techniques-for-emotional-sound-in-computer-games.pdf

 

Laganier V 2012, Exploring lighting cultures – Beyond light and emotions. Available online:

https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00745524/document

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Reflection

After putting the pitch together and presenting it as a group we had time to reflect on the work we have done in the past few weeks. One thing that I think as a group we did very well was assign tasks and get them done in a short amount of time whilst also ensuring they were of good standard. However one problem that became a repetitive issue throughout the project was communication. This was because a few members of the group did not show up to a large portion of the sessions making it difficult for work to progress. In conclusion overall I think the presentation was delivered to a very good standard however if I did the project again I would try to ensure that everyone participated equally and showed up all the time.

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Draft Designs

After going away from the last meeting I decided to begin work on my part of the pitch which we as a group decided would be Design and Gamification. I decided to create some draft ideas which I can then turn into a complete version through Illustrator and add to the pitch. I decided to make the physiotherapy a game by creating a game in which the players had to stretch to pop balloons to earn points. This will distract the children from the fact that they are completing physiotherapy and also entertain them at the same time.

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Assigning Tasks

Having decided exactly what our product would be and what it had to include we asa group decided that we needed to start working on our presentation and pitch. This was so we could decide exactly what style we would present our product in and how we could make it look as good as it possibly could. We decided to create a powerpoint to display our project on and assign certain slides to different people within the group so we could complete the presentation as quickly and as efficiently as possible in order to give us time to practice giving the presentation. We decided on five key areas we all wanted to see in the presentation and then split these amongst our group so each person had one area to work on. After a lengthy discussion with a few members of the team and a lot of messaging between team members that could not make it we decided that the roles for the presentation would be as follows: Sam will talk about the issues that our product could solve and why this is important, I will focus on the design of our product such as a logo and colour scheme and also create a visual representation of our gamification, Rich would talk about the technology we were planning to use and the prices of hardware, Keiran will talk about the advantages and disadvantages of our product and why we had to rule out other technologies such as VR and finally Joe will talk about marketing our product and how we can sell it and make it look appealing to our clients.

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Discussion after completion of research

 After everyone in the group had completed their research and uploaded it to the group padlet account we decided to meet in the next session and discuss where we would go from completing the research. After looking in detail at the large amount of research the whole team had done we sat down and began to talk about what we actually wanted our product to be and based on research what it would need to include. We decided the screen would be interactive through the use of a projector and a microsoft kinect kit because this was cheap yet very useful. We also decided the product should be aimed at bedridden children and would have to incorporate the use of gamification to make physiotherapy fun. Another thing we talked about is the possibility of the product being a means of contact for the parents through the use of video or audio chat.

 

References:

https://padlet.com/lupus9332/jrygjq6hqzah?utm_campaign=added_post&utm_medium=desktop&utm_source=notifications

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Research

After solidifying an Idea we knew that before going any further we have to conduct our own research. After having a discussion about research we came to the conclusion that it would be a lot more efficient if we did research separately. However although we decided to do our research separately we still wanted to all have assigned areas to research and a place to put this research so we created a padlet account. This was so that we had a place to store all of our research where the full team could access it. It was decided that Richard would research what technology we could use, Keiran would look at common Illnesses amongst Children, Sam would look into accessibility of the product and I would look at our target audience and mainly focus on their needs and limitations.