First of all, I really like video games. They perfectly demonstrate how code, design, and art can work together. And as an interaction design student, it’s always inspiring to see all the little details that cause a great user experience. During the second semester, we had a little workshop called „mixed reality“. The workshop was hosted by ph.d. Franklin Hernandez-Castro. We had two weeks to develop a little game with Box2D. Box2D is a game engine that can simulate rigid bodies in 2D. So in order to that, we all had to learn the basic functions of the engine. At first, it was not that easy but after a while, I understood the principle. I had a lot of fun working on that project. We used the makey makey classic and build it into a controller.
The idea was to develop a classic Jump ‘n’ Run game with a little twist. Instead of running from left to right you have to climb to the top in order to complete the game. We build a little parkour with tricky traps. I tried to reference a few of the all-time classics like super Mario by creating traps like moving platforms and unstable bridges. Unfortunately, we had not enough time to develop all the crazy obstacles I had planned and some of them were just too difficult to code. The story was also not spectacular. Personally, I think that good storytelling converts a good game into a fantastic one. But we simply didn’t have the time for that. So long story short, the protagonist was a little flame who’s aim was to collect more fireballs in order to become stronger and bigger. That was only to survive the rain and all those evil raindrops. In the end, I think we did a good job. The games itself is nothing spectacular but I learned a lot about Box2D and the design process that is necessary to create a video game.
- Interaction Design 2, WS 2016/2017
- Mixed Reality workshop by Prof. Dr. Franklin Hernandez-Castro
- Group Members: Felix Feil, Rana Cakir, Roberta Grobosch and Stefan vom Bruck
