12. VR mechanics & Physical Rig

Core Mechanics

The main mechanics of the game is to allow the player to role-play as a war reporter, explore and interact within the scene by making decisions that are relevant to the narrative development. Our players would have the Oculus headset on and two handles on their hands. The headset presents both the virtual and auditory information of the environment. Players are able to use the handles to interact with the scene by transporting between different spots, making movements and interacting with game objects such as grasping and touching to explore the space. By going through the narrative, the player is able to understand the circumstances of the after-war battlefield and how the war has affected innocent people and soldiers since the player will explore the behind story of people who evocate and sacrificed themselves due to the war. Also the decision-making of this game would push the player to consider and think further about the influences and consequences of suffering war. 

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Secondary Mechanics

The designed VR experience is for one person at a time. Our target audiences are aged from 18-30 who are interested in VR technology and willing to know war-related information. Players would first be invited to dress up like a war-reporter and our team member would also role-play as the war reporter’s superior to inform the game instruction. Player will receive a press card and the mission letter from us to understand the story background and the player’s goal. Then the player will take the headset on and walk into the scene that is sprinkled by sand to imitate the battlefield walking feeling. After loading the game, the player is able to see and hear the virtual scene. Player is able to hold the handle to point within the game scene. By pointing to a different teleport, the player is able to move around the scene. Also, the player is able to grab the object in the scene by moving their arms.

 

Envisioned Physical Setup 

For physical equipment helping enhance our user experiences, we would like to add theme-related objects. To add to the realness of the role-playing, we would like to invite our players to have the war reporter custom dressed up before entering the game scene. Our team members would also dress up as the superiors of the war reporter, provide the player with the press card and mission letter to inform the player as well as introducing the game story background. And in terms of the scene set-up, if possible, we would like to have a sandpit or sprinkling sand on the floor that helps imitate the feeling of walking on the battlefield, to enhance the tangible interaction when the player is walking into the scene. Beside that, we would also add broken wood or broken tires to the physical space. And our game might feature some bomb sound effect, we would add a heated wind using a hair dryer to imitate the hot wind for the player. 

 

Locomotion Technique 

1. Hand selection pattern

We would like to add the virtual hand for the player to select objects and manipulate the game object within the scene. The pro for this approach is that it could be efficient for players to control the virtual environment and the physical movement could help restore the realistic movement that usually the player would act in the physical world. 

The con for this approach is that the player might need to make a lot of efforts to explore the virtual world since hand selections require the movement of hands and arms, it might be quite movement-intensive, though it helps present realistic experiences.

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2. Pointing pattern 

The second locomotion approach that we discussed is by using the pointing pattern for players to transport within the game scene. The pro for using this approach is that the player could control the game scene on a larger scale and it would be easy for the player to select objects that are small and have some distances with the player’s current position. It also requires less physical movements. However, the using pointing pattern might have the problem of lacking a realistic feeling since these approaches barely integrate with the physical movement except the hands that control the handels. Also, using pointing locomotion to transport within the scene might cause possible cybersickness as it is unmatched with the virtual movement and physical one.

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3. Walking pattern

We also talk about the walking locomotion as one of the approaches to facilitate the presentation. Players experience real-walking while walking in the virtual world to achieve the consistency of physical and virtual movement. The pro of walking pattern is that it offers realistic experience and enhances the movement consistency which helps avoid motion sickness. However, the con of this pattern is that it requires large space to perform. Space in VR experiences is usually limited and for advanced devices that could provide the player to have a constant walking movement is costly and infectible. 

 

13. Inspiration Analysis

Game Inspiration:  LONE ECHO

YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pmV2mwAV9k

LONE ECHO is a VR game providing experience of narrative adventure and otherworldly scenarios. It is meaningful because of the serious fun of the narrative development as the player goes through the game. The player is able to create human emotional moments between the player and the artificial avatar. The game is inspiring because it not only provides sensory immersion as other VR games provide, based on the narrative and game promise, it also offers great imaginative immersion. The artistic style of the game as well as all those sound effects created works perfectly to build up a virtual immersive world. The narrative parts and the sensory experiences created by the VR technology (how realistic all those movements are) also inspire our project. It’s funny that players are in an unfamiliar place but they are able to explore in their familiar ways. This is a good integration of abstract content and the player's prior knowledge. We would like to develop VR games with a strong narrative/ imaginative immersion since players are able to immersive role-play and believe the explored VR world is critical for the success of a VR game.  

 

Game Inspiration: Life is Strange

URL: https://store.steampowered.com/app/319630/Life_is_Strange__Episode_1/

Life is Strange allows players to choose what the character would say or do in the game. Different choices have different endings and storylines, which makes this game interesting and brings the players into the world of the game to explore the town with the protagonist. We believe involving a choice-making system makes the players easily immerse into the gameplay and recognize themselves as the character because players would think about the choice they made easily as they encounter the accidents in real life. Additionally, players would reflect on their own life if the choice they made is correct or not. 

 

Game Inspiration: Death Stranding 

URL: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1190460/DEATH_STRANDING/

Death Standing is a metaphorical doomsday fairy tale. Beneath the seemingly gorgeous and mind-boggling sci-fi setting, Kojima explores one of the oldest and most fundamental themes of all: humanity. Also, I think Death Stranding is an art game with its unique mechanics. I love the "human connection" narrative it uses to do so. But I think the main story is a bit disconnected from the mechanics, which hurts the integrity of the story. Our team is really attracted by the theme of humanity from this game, and we believe we can build several virtual post-war scenarios to help people reflect on human nature.

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14. Immersion Frameworks

(a) In what way will your project support immersion, flow and/or presence etc.? 

Our project supports immersion in the way of flow. 

 

(b) What type of immersion are you focusing most on, and why? How do you plan on using these to support your overall project objectives and desired user experience? 

The immersion we are focusing on is the imaginative immersion. We focus on imaginative immersion because the story being told through the gameplay will make the player feel that they have experienced the events themselves. Hence, the imaginative immersion gives the player a stronger impression when reflecting on the events they experienced. During the gameplay, the player will be the role of a reporter and has to interact with the items in the scene to complete a series of missions, and every mission plays a part in the storytelling. When the game ends, the player will see the story in the newspaper which gives the player a chance to review and reflect on the story. 

 

(c) Please explain in detail how your team plans on evoking your chosen immersion aspects. 

To make the player fully immerse into the environment, we will have every teammate in the uniform, and the booth to be covered by sand with broken cloth pieces hanging around. The sand on the ground makes the player feel like they are walking on the sand as a sensation when they move their feet in the VR experience. We will also introduce the background story first before the player enters the VR experience, and give them a reporter ID which brings the player's mental state into the immersive experience. This plan enhanced the immersion aspects because the player will regard themselves as the role of reporter walking on the sand, which makes the events they experienced during the VR game more impressive and more realistic.  

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15. Why Your Project is Innovative

(a) What’s new/interesting/cool/exciting/different about your project?

The most interesting thing that makes our project stand out is the background story. Overall, our game is telling a story of a war reporter who is going to visit a small town after war, and the player needs to take some pictures of several locations in order to restore the story that happened in the town. The atmosphere of the game would be warm and touching, instead of cruel and stressful. By considering most war relevant games asking the player to act as a soldier, or allow the player to fight against the NPC with certain attack methods, we are doing the opposite way to build the awareness of anti-war from a neutral perspective.

 

(b) Why is your project relevant? How does it provide a meaningful/desirable experience to the users? 

In order to have the most realistic user experience, we have done a lot of research, then we decided to set up the story happening in the period of World War II. The aesthetic of the game would be based on this background, and we have applied many relevant 3D models in the game in order to increase the immersive feelings to the player. Besides the visual style, the background story is also highly relevant to the topic “Peace”: the reporter, who is played by the player, would find the dark side of war and how people are suffering from it gradually, and the player need to make the decision in the end of the game to decide if he would like to take part in anti-war movement, or get a promotion. We hope both the visual style and game mechanism would provide a meaningful experience to the users, and it could help them to reflect their own behavior or take some actions.

 

(c) For your showcase, what would be your main “selling points”? Why should anyone care about it?

Our project has various physical rigs, besides a realistic visual style and impressive storyline, which contributes to an immersive experience. The players would be stimulated before they put on the headset, so their psychological states would be more easily influenced by the game. The purpose of the physical rig not only makes the project more interesting, but also lets the players believe that they are actually experiencing what the main character does. We believe the transformative experience would be the selling points, which means the player’s behavior may be changed after gameplay. The other thing is that our game is providing different perspectives to look at the war and understand the impact of it, which would be different with other war relevant games. Players may care about those elements, because they are looking for both entertaining  and immersion, and our game could meet their needs.

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16. User Testing Goals and Outcomes

(a) Goal: 

Goal 1: Navigation Test. To see if the player can navigate themselves within the game. To testify if the current locomotion is properly used to guide the player.

Goal 2: Motion sickness Test. To see if the player feels uncomfortable while playing or has motion sickness after playing. 

Goal 3: Narrative Test. To see if the player finds the game narrative reasonable and if they have problems of understanding and interpreting the story. 

     Questions: 

Question-based on Goal 1: 

• Is the background in the game clear enough? Please rate the clarity of the background information in the game (clear/average/ambiguous). What other information do you think could be added to complete the background story?

• Which quest puzzles you? Why is it confusing to you?

• Which story direction did you choose in the game? (Protect people/keep photos)

Question-based on Goal 2: 

• Please rate the smoothness of the interaction in the game (smoothness/average/screen lag)

• Did you come across a UI that directed you to explore or take photos while gaming? If not, where do you suggest we should add UI to effectively guide players? 

Question-based on Goal 3: 

Narrative test survey questions

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeTAcVY8WbezGw8fAn6foPEKe5TAw1goNla8rShVKazCpIRpA/viewform 

 

     With this user test we wanted to test the hypotheses: 

• If the player can’t not find any interactable items in house one, they might not want to search the others. 

• If the player is unable to trigger the NPC’s animation, the player will feel confused and lost navigation. 

• If the player is unable to find out all the notes hiding in the house, the player will have difficulty understanding the plot. 

• If the player is unable to locate the teleporting points, the player might feel annoyed about the locomotion system.

 

（b）Method:  Guerrilla Testing / Based on https://vroxygen.com/TestGuide.html

• Participant: 2 team members and 6 SIAT students;

• Platform: Oculus Quest;

• Environment: Pay attention to the surroundings, set up everything having enough space from the walls and other objects, ensure there are no obstacles or hazards near the participant.

• Hygiene: During the pandemic, we need to take preventive measures, so we will prepare wet wipes, alcohol tablets for disinfection.

• Test: Following the distribution of the quest script to the players, team members watched the game live on a computer screen and recorded the players' comments on what they observed at each stage. Throughout the trigger event section of the game, team members should record data on the player's decisions (save the person or save the photo). Simultaneously, following the game, players should be questioned about their feelings, and their emotions should be classified. 

• Filling up the Survey.

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（c）Result

Result 1 (Navigation System Test): The player finds out that the navigation system is unclear to guide. The navigation clues do not work properly, and the NPC animations make confusion to the player. 

 

Result 2 (Narrative Test): The player understands the character’s goal and the background story, however, the way of displaying the searching items confused the player. Especially the note containing many words and player might be lost patient to read through. 

 

Result 3 (Motion Sickness Test): The player does not find any motion sickness after playing the game.

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（d）Meta-Reflection

We need to improve our navigation system with a clear guided UI display. We also need to fix the NPC’s animation where has some triggering issues. We are also required to reduce the reading content and make the notes display in a proper way, such as having them display full screen with a UI window so that player will be concentrated on reading the information. The Player feel comfortable using the teleporting transition within the game and did not feel any motion sickness. However, in order to enhance the playing experience, we would like to make the laser points and hand gestures shift smoothly so that reduce the feeling that the player might feel unreal. 

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17. Prototyping Process

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