Haphazard Journey by Starlight

I'm always going on about how I believe we can convey meaning to location-based experience participants through movement. Not our own movement...but theirs. That all sounds a little macabre..thoughts of human puppetry spring to mind, however spaces are constantly effecting our movement through space - architects know that....and although I haven't researched this in any detail, I'm sure filmmakers do something similiar using camera movements through space - now there's the ultimate control - not only do they have power over the direction in which we move through a location, but also the pace, speed, even the direction in which we LOOK. However, there's only so far you can control a users' movements in a game or would want to. One of the reasons we love games, after all, is because they give us a sense of agency.

So let's flip the idea on it's head...

Anyone watching big brother's little brother knows that we give a lot away through body language and psychologists know, saccadic eye-movement tells us a lot about the way a viewer perceives an image or a scene. What about our movements through space? Lancaster university have begun a research project called D-Sent to explore just that.

According to Usability News, they'll test their concepts using a location-based gaming environment. That in itself is interesting but I'm even more interested in considering the gaming applications! What an incredible game you'd have if game-play was based entirely around creating meaningful or misleading movements through space! Now that would REALLY get you thinking about movement and meaning!

Posted by Celinelj at 01:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Proprioception. How come we never talk about it when to consider learning? I believe it plays a huge role.

Almost anyone involved involved in Serious Games will have heard the saying (usually attributed to Edgar Dale and his Cone of Experience), that...

"we remember 20 percent of what we read, 30 percent of what we hear, 40 percent of what we see, 50 percent of what we say, 60 percent of what we do, and 90 percent of what we see, hear, say and do".

It's a claim that could probably do with clearing up (as all a bit convenient), but at the same time one that a large number of educators (me including), feel probably has some small element of truth..."

What I'd like is for someone to revisit this model, and when they do, include Proprioception in the mix. How is Proprioception involved in what we "do". How does doing something we do, sitting at our desk, manipulating an avatar differ from doing in "in body"?

Posted by Celinelj at 09:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

me and some floozie. 8.5 x 11 ink drawing by Honoria, circa 1991

Referring back to my last post on locating emotions...there's the potential to create quite an interesting game that might support bonding or at least the practice of empathy.....

Player 1 walks round an area - Ideally somewhere quite dramatic..perhaps personally meaningful in some way. Physiological arousal is tracked...(other things could also be tracked...facial expressions for example and levels of stress).

Player 2, who either already knows Player 1 or is provided with some context as to player 1's personality, personal history, likes and dislikes is then asked to follow exactly the same path around the location. As they go around they must try to walk as if in the shoes and mind of Player 1....trying to emulate the kinds of reaction Player 1 might have had to the changing environment.

The winning team is the pair that can most closely emulate one anothers' emotional reaction to place, in other words the most empathatic team, or perhaps the team most skilled at emulating emotion....and possibly most control over their own emotional responses!

Posted by Celinelj at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Celine LJ's biomap tracking levels of arousal during a walk along the ExCel Dock. Just coincidence that it's purple but very apt ;-)

I've always been fascinated by Christian Nolde's BioMaps so I jumped at the chance to have a go at making my own map a couple of weeks ago when I attended the Mapping Change for Sustainable Communities Workshop held on the Sunborn Yacht Hotel, Docklands.

Hooked up to a sensor measuring the moisture given off by my index finger (in other words sweat), I wasn't quite sure what was being tracked and apparently that's just the point - it's impossible to really map emotion or get an exact reading so the best you can do is measure arousal...which might be caused by anger, exertion, excitement, happiness.....and half of the fun is trying to work out afterwards how you were actually feeling! I did the mapping along the dock and for the whole way I chatted to another particpant - Gordon...Comparing visual maps, it's clear that even on the same walk it's impossible to assume the reactions of participants. Our maps were entirely different. Maybe it wasn't the walk at all and just the conversation....

Posted by Celinelj at 08:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Following on from my last post - I was overjoyed to see a whole page in this month's Wired mag (my techno bible) on the MScaper's game "Prisoner Escape from the Tower".

Posted by Celinelj at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This isn't exactly hot news to anyone already using the msapers site, but for me, it's a big step for location-based gaming that's worth a mention here.

Posted by Celinelj at 12:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)