As we’re already well into production of our project, I think the main question for our team is less of a conceptual one and more about how to articulate the fine points of our idea, iterate, and then deliver on them. After all, VR and escape games are already huge markets on their own, and our thesis is an amalgamation of these recognizable types rather than a redefinition of them. Our goal was always to create an entertaining product that toed the line between the two game genres. I use the term “genre” because VR, if not both, are really more of a medium, and yet both spawn a large amount of content with the same inherent constraints which define much of the medium. Spatial puzzles, immersive environments, and engaging overarching environmental and object themes via the first-person perspective which serves directly or indirectly as narrative are all important when analyzing popular games in either case.
Through research and collaboration, we’ve already made certain stylistic decisions; most importantly, a fun narrative and light-hearted, humorous approach was our main sticking point, as we both wanted to counteract the often dark and fear-driven experiences that tend to flood the market in new immersive mediums. Now that we’re putting these decisions into production and play-testing, we’re getting direct feedback on how to keep these aspects at the forefront of the project, be sure to maintain that feeling while improving usability. It is notable that we’ve quickly understood that usability is actually key to the feeling of light-heartedness and humor. Even just with our first play-test, users can have a good time with some parts of the game acting buggy and irregular, because this is funny, while other parts – namely interaction and controls – need to be extremely tight, as it quickly leads to frustration and confusion.
With the feedback we obtained during playtests, we’ve already pivoted one of our technical decision slightly (the ability to visibly grab and hold objects as opposed to storing them in an inventory). With this change, however, I feel that our project has better aligned with some of the commonly accepted aspects of VR games. Further, I don’t see any other major usability changes or design changes and expect future playtests to act as introductions to lesser design elements and a honing of currently implemented/prototyped functions. As our production timeline charges on, we’re going to do our best to make our experience balanced between our two design goals; a stylized, memorable package around a cleanly usable interface.
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By Hasibe Erdemir, Christina Goefron, and Claire Hu