Procedural content generation of virtual terrain for games

Abstract. Game developers use Procedural Content Generation (PCG) in aid of game development to reduce costs, reach better memory consumption, increase creativity, and augment our limited human imagination by generating content algorithmically. Virtual terrain is one of the main topics of PCG; how well do these techniques support the special needs of game level design? To answer this question, a literature review was conducted to analyse correlation between the capabilities of various PCG-techniques and the needs of level design patterns. We observed that techniques permitting higher degree of local control increased their applicability for virtual terrain in games and that traditional fractal techniques, such as the midpoint displacement method and noise-functions, performed poorly despite their popularity. Our foremost contributions to this field of study were new insights towards more suitable PCG-techniques for use in game development

WebGLadiator Game Engine for Web Developers

Kaasaegse WebGL tehnoloogiaga veebimängude juurutamine on meeletult kasvanud, luues lõhe WebGL arendajate nõudluse ja pakkumise vahel. Kuna WebGL töötab JavaScript baasil, võib suure tõenäosusega näha WebGL arendusega liitumas veebitehnoloogiate taustaga arendajaid. JavaScript ökosüsteemis on arendajad harjunud JavaScriptiga koodi osas, HTML-ga struktuuri osas ja CSS-iga välimuse ja disaini osas. Praegused mängumootorid on ehitatud WebGL baasil ja omavad mängudeks selleks ettenähtud funktsionaalsust, kuid need ei võta arvesse Javascripti ökosüsteemi, mis raskendab veebiarendajate sisseelamist veebimängude arendusse.WebGladiator on mängumootor veebiarendajatele, mis hõlbustab veebiarendajate liikumist mänguarendusse, pakkudes sama lähenemist, nagu veebiarenduses. Selleks, et hoida sama lähenemist, JSON on võetud kasutusse HTML-i asemel struktuuri tehnoloogiana. VFL tehnoloogiat kasutatakse CSS-i asemel paigutuste ja disaini jaoks ning JavaScript jääb programmeerimiskeeleks, milles kirjutatakse loogika. Selles projektis me kasutame avatud lähtekoodiga teeke, mis töötavad koos ühes mootoris, järgides õigeid tarkvaraarenduse mustreid ja arhitektuuri, et luua hübriid ECS, mis utiliseerib ECS arhitektuuri, pakkumaks sama lähenemist veebiarenduse jaoks.With the modern WebGL technology, the adoption of web games has increased drastically leaving a gap between the low number of available WebGL developers and high demand for them. Since WebGL resides in JavaScript ecosystem, developers are more likely to come to WebGL with web development background. In the JavaScript ecosystem, developers are accustomed to JavaScript for coding, HTML for structure, and CSS for layout and design. The present game engines built on top of WebGL do have a set features to develop games, however, they do not take JavaScript Ecosystem into consideration which makes it hard for developers with web development background to migrate to web games development. WebGladiator is a game engine for web developers that facilitates the migration from web development to game development by providing the same approach used for web development. In order to keep the same approach, JSON, used as blueprint files, will be used instead of HTML to structure games, VFL will be used instead of CSS to layout them, and JavaScript remains the programming language to write the logic. In this project, we are going to use open source libraries that will inter-operate under one game engine following proper software design patterns and architecture to create a hybrid ECS that utilizes the ECS architecture to provide the same approach for web development

Aprendizaje de técnicas avanzadas de Programación Orientada a Objetos mediante programación de juegos

Los juegos constituyen un área muy adecuada para la elaboración de prácticas de programación. En muchos casos, permiten la aplicación directa de los contenidos teóricos impartidos en otras asignaturas teóricas, como las relacionadas con estructuras de datos y algoritmia. Además, al ser prácticas que se alejan de los típicos “problemas de juguete”, permiten introducir nuevas técnicas o tecnologías con demanda en el mundo laboral. En este artículo presentamos la experiencia realizada en un curso de Laboratorio de Programación III, en la que hemos propuesto la implementación de Sudokus en Java. Como veremos, el problema nos ha permitido poner en práctica conceptos de estructuras de datos y algoritmia, así como patrones de diseño y programación de dispositivos móviles

SUPPORTING THERAPY-CENTERED GAME DESIGN FOR BRAIN INJURY REHABILITATION

Brain injuries (BI) are a major public health issue. Many therapists who work with patients who have had a BI include games to ameliorate boredom associated with repetitive rehabilitation. However, designing effective, appropriate, and engaging games for BI therapy is challenging. The challenge is especially manifested when considering how to consolidate the different mindsets and motivations among key stakeholders; i.e., game designers and therapists. In this dissertation, I investigated the ideation, creation, and evaluation of game design patterns and a design tool, GaPBIT (Game Design Patterns for BI Therapy) that leveraged patterns to support ideation of BI therapy game concepts and facilitate communication among designers and therapists. Design patterns, originated from the work of Christopher Alexander, provide a common design language in a specific field by documenting reusable design concepts that have successfully solved recurring problems. This investigation involved four overlapping phases. In Phase One, I interviewed 11 professional game designers focused on games for health (serious games embedded with health-related goals) to explore how they perceived and approached their work. In Phase Two, I identified 25 therapy-centered game design patterns through analyzing data about game use in BI therapy. Based on those patterns, in Phase Three I created and iterated the GaPBIT prototype through user studies. In Phase Four, I conducted quasi-experimental case studies to establish the efficacy and user experience of GaPBIT in game design workshops that involved both game designers and therapists. During the design workshops, the design patterns and GaPBIT supported exploration of game design ideas and effectively facilitated discussion among designers and therapists. The results also indicated that these tools were especially beneficial for novice game designers. This work significantly promotes game design for BI rehabilitation by providing designers and therapists with easier access to the information about requirements in rehabilitation games. Additionally, this work modeled a novel research methodology for investigating domains where balancing the role of designers and other stakeholders is particularly important. Through a “practitioner-centered” process, this work also provides an exemplar of investigating technologies that directly address the information needs of professional practitioners

The Impacts of Gameful and Interactive Technologies on Hindering or Promoting Self-regulation

Self-regulation is the essential component of goal pursuit that allows us to make better decisions and resist temptation of unwanted desires, which ultimately impacts our well-being. It is essential to identify and understand factors that hinder or facilitate our successful self-regulation that have the potential to improve people’s competency to effectively self-regulate their thoughts, emotions, and behaviours. Interactive media technologies, specifically games, present environments that could greatly affect self-control and self-regulation processes for better or for worse. Despite the considerable impact of rapidly changing technologies on self-regulation, the relationship between design aspects of technologies and self-regulation or self-regulation improvement are not well studied. The downside of the rapid pace of modern technological advancement is constantly encountering new phenomena that could hinder self-regulation mechanisms, without these phenomena being properly studied. On the other hand, such advancements provide a compelling opportunity to design interactive technologies to help people improve their self-control and self-regulation. Specifically, there is great potential of media technologies to shape our motivations and the ways we experience the world (e.g., our visual experience), which increases the appeal and importance of exploring the connection between interactive technologies and self-regulation, especially with respect to self-regulation improvement, which is the primary focus of this thesis. I first investigate how design elements can impact self-regulation success or failure in a widely used yet underexplored phenomenon of free-to-play games. In chapter 3, I present a correlational survey study (Study 1) that explores the connection between free-to-play games and their impact on self-regulation. The findings of the study indicate a relationship between trait self-control and players’ in-app purchasing decisions. It also identifies players’ self-regulation struggles and failures when playing such games. I then explore improving a person’s self-regulation through increasing their capacity for self-control. In chapter 4, I present the design and implementation of a self-control game to investigate how we can use gameful interactive technologies to improve cognitive control. I also present an empirical study (Study 2), which shows the potential of using self-control games to engage players without creating a negative player experience or undermining intrinsic motivation. In chapter 5, I provide a commentary on the resource model of self-control (i.e., ego-depletion research) and controversies surrounding the topic. The commentary provides a critical review of current state of research and a possible approach to tackle the issue. I next demonstrate and evaluate the need for a broader approach to improving self-regulation of desires and behaviours in a series of three experimental studies. I first discuss the importance of adopting broader approaches that can directly target and improve self-regulation mechanisms. In chapter 6, I provide a critical review regarding the role of psychological distance in understanding self-regulation and self-regulation mechanisms and its potential for new insight to create novel interactive technologies that is explored in the next experimental studies (Studies 3-5). In the following chapters 7-9, I therefore highlight a need for broader approaches for improving self-regulation of desires and behaviours, which encompasses a series of experimental studies to implement and test simple interaction techniques to boost and improve self-regulation. In chapter 7, I present a pre-registered online experiment (Study 3) that explores the possibility of impacting perception of temporal distance and abstraction through simple design considerations such as using a framing effect, the results of which did not reveal a considerable impact of the framing effect on temporal distance and on abstraction. Notably, I found contradictory evidence to what is presented by construal-level theory on the relationship between abstraction and psychological distance. In chapter 8, I present a lab experiment (Study 4) to study another simple interaction technique to distance tempting foods through saturation and framing effects using tablet technologies, the results of which show the effectiveness of using saturation to reduce temptation and unwanted desires by visually mediating the experience of tempting palatable food items. In chapter 9, I present the design of a mobile application for testing the use of the saturation effect and increasing the perception of distance directly in a mobile application. I then present a pre-registered longitudinal experiment (Study 5) that explores the effectiveness of this technology and the interaction techniques in a more realistic environment. The findings revealed preliminary evidence of the effectiveness of design features and interaction techniques such as changing saturation and perceived distance of tempting food items. Overall, the focus of the research presented in this thesis has been on the connection between design and self-regulation and self-regulation improvement, and particularly, in using interactive technologies and simple interaction techniques to help people improve their self-control and self-regulation, and ultimately achieve their goals

Video Game Values: Play as Human-Computer Interaction

Video games are a form of software and thus an obvious object of study in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). Interaction with video games differs from the usual understanding of HCI, however, because people play video games rather than use them. In this dissertation we ask: " How can we analyse human-computer interaction in video games when the interaction in question is play?" We propose video game values, defined as sustained beliefs about preferable conduct during play, as a basis for video game HCI. In order to describe and analyse play we use activity theory, focusing on how the interface mediates players' beliefs about preferable conduct. Activity theory allows us to address the multiple levels of context and detail in play as well as the role of conflict. We employ a qualitative case study methodology to gather data about five popular video games: Civilization III, Fable, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Half-Life 2, and The Sims 2. Our core data comes from observation and interview sessions with twenty-five experienced players of these games. We collected further data based on the games' interfaces, participant observation, and documentation such as manuals and walkthroughs. We make three key contributions to video game HCI: 1) We introduce video game values as a means to analyse play as a form of human-computer interaction and show how the values of PAIDIA and LUDUS influence all aspects of play; 2) we develop a video game activity framework for describing and analysing video game play at multiple levels of detail and context; and 3) we extend the video game activity framework to include contradictions and breakdowns as a means to describe and analyse the role of conflict and challenge in video game play

Modellbasierte Generierung von Benutzungsoberflächen

Die Arbeit stellt einen integrierten Gesamtprozess zur modellgetriebenen Softwareentwicklung von Benutzungsschnittstellen und Geschäftslogik vor. Dazu notwendige und unterstützende Deklarationsmodelle, sowie Modelltransformationen für dieses Verfahren, werden entwickelt und präsentiert. Weiterhin werden Meta-Modelle für Aufbau und Wartung eines HCI-Patternkatalogs vorgestellt und zur Erstellung eines solchen Kataloges benutzt. Die darin enthaltenen Einträge werden in Bezug auf Ihre softwaretechnische Komponentisierbarkeit untersucht und klassifiziert.The thesis presents an integrated model-driven approach for developing software. This approach supports the generation of user interfaces, as well as artifacts of business logic. Suitable meta models and model transformations are developed and explained. Secondly, this thesis dwells on the topic of HCI patterns. It is researched how such patterns may be classified, componentized and made use of in a model-driven process. This work eventually yields a pattern language, whose entries are declared using state-of-the-art model-driven technologies

Design Patterns for Games

dxnguyen @ rice.edu, swong @ rice.edu Designing a two-person game involves identifying the game model to compute the best moves, the user interface (the "view") to play the game, and the controller to coordinate the model and the view. A crucial task is to forms. This can prove to be a difficult and subtle endeavor. It is made easier however by the use of good objectoriented (OO) design principles to help maintain a high level abstract viewpoint during the design process. The state pattern is used to represent the game board and is coupled with the visitor pattern to provide state-dependent, variant behaviors. The rain-max algorithm and its variants are implemented as the strategy pattern, which allows flexible and extensible computational capability. Careful analysis is performed to properly abstract the interactions between the model and the view. The command design pattern is used to provide callback services between the model and the view. Leading students through this design process enables them to learn algorithms and architectures that easily scale to full-sized applications.