Human factors in entertainment computing: designing for diversity

Although several casual gaming systems have been developed during the past years, little research examining the impact of human factors on the design and use of digital games has been carried out, and commercially available games are only partially suitable for audiences with special needs. The research project described within this paper aims to analyze and explore design guidelines for diverse audiences and results of focus group gaming sessions to develop a research toolbox allowing for the easy creation of adaptable and accessible game scenarios. Thereby, a controllable environment for the detailed evaluation of the interrelations between human factors and entertainment systems is provided. Results obtained by further testing will be integrated in the toolbox, and may foster the development of accessible games, thus opening up new opportunities for diverse audiences and allowing them to further engage in digital games. Copyright 2011 ACM

Design an engaging interactive experience for people with dementia

The population of the world is increasing resulting in a higher number of people dealing with dementia–whether being diagnosed with it or taking care of someone that is diagnosed with it. This master thesis aims to investigate which types of multi-media technology-based experiences can improve the quality of life for people with dementia. To reach the goal of the thesis–investigation will be done through different iterations of a design method; divergence, transformation and convergence. These iterations will include observations, interviews and using personas as a tool to design. The results from the methods were used to create a high fidelity prototype which was evaluated by an expert in the field of dementia

The use of interactive game technology to improve the physical health of the elderly : a serious game approach to reduce the risk of falling in older people

University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology.The elderly population is growing dramatically both in Australia and globally. With age, the human body undergoes a series of changes that can lead to decline in mental and physical health. Decline in motor functions increases the risk of developing health problems such as postural instability, balance disorders or simply having a fall. Falling is the main cause of disability and fatality among the elderly. Statistics show that one in three older adults might experience a fall every year. This could be prevented with regular exercise. Exercises with a walking component have proven to reduce falls by 40%. However, compliance with physical activity is often poor due to the mode of delivery, which is often unattractive. One approach that might help alleviate this is the use of commercial video games to engage the elderly in physical exercise. However, this practice may have undesirable results as such games are not designed to provide therapeutic support for the elderly but instead to entertain a much younger audience. This thesis aims to solve the above problem through the use of interactive game technology by testing that optimal results for the health of the elderly come from the combination of three elements: • the integration of a formal method to assess progress towards and the achievement of the desired health outcomes, • inclusion of meaningful tasks aligned with the specific health objectives • an appropriate game design through the use of user-centred design methodologies. Firstly, literature in the area of video games with health purposes for the elderly is reviewed to develop a clear understanding of the health issues and the research opportunities in the area. Secondly, a series of game prototypes is built and tested to investigate whether off-the-shelf game technology can be used to reliably perform a clinical test for fall risk assessment. Then a game is developed that aims to reduce the risk of falling by training a set of specific cognitive and physical functions that have been shown to be associated with falling. This prototype, known as the StepKinnection game, integrates the concept of an appropriate game design for the elderly, inclusion of meaningful tasks and the collection of stepping performance data. Thirdly, a series of studies on independent-living people aged 65 years and over are conducted. These studies confirmed the ability to reliably perform a clinical test using off-the-shelf game technology, the acceptance and ease of use of the StepKinnection game, and the potential of StepKinnection to reduce the risk of falling in the elderly. Finally, an analytical framework is developed for designing interactive games with health purposes for the elderly. This framework aims to assist the development of games aligned to particular health outcomes. This framework emphasises the importance of aligning the game goals to the expected health outcomes as well as the continuous assessment of progress and effectiveness

Academic methods for usability evaluation of serious games: a systematic review

In the last years, there has been an increasing interest in the design of video games as a tool for education, training, health promotion, socialization, etc. Usability, which is a key factor in any video game, becomes even more important in these so-called Bserious games^, where the users’ special characteristics should be considered, and the game efficacy depends on the users’ adherence and engagement. However, evaluation of the usability of this kind of games requires a redefinition of techniques, methods and even terminology. In this paper, we elicit six research questions and conduct a systematic review of the scientific literature, which resulted in the selection of 187 papers that contained the most relevant responses. The conclusions of this systematic review illustrate the general status of current academic usability evaluations of these games and the main trends in the selection of methodologies and how are they applied. This view may be a very valuable foundation for future researchMinisterio de Ciencia e Innovación PROCUR@-IPT-2011-1038-90000

Designing interactive virtual environments with feedback in health applications.

One of the most important factors to influence user experience in human-computer interaction is the user emotional reaction. Interactive environments including serious games that are responsive to user emotions improve their effectiveness and user satisfactions. Testing and training for user emotional competence is meaningful in healthcare field, which has motivated us to analyze immersive affective games using emotional feedbacks. In this dissertation, a systematic model of designing interactive environment is presented, which consists of three essential modules: affect modeling, affect recognition, and affect control. In order to collect data for analysis and construct these modules, a series of experiments were conducted using virtual reality (VR) to evoke user emotional reactions and monitoring the reactions by physiological data. The analysis results lead to the novel approach of a framework to design affective gaming in virtual reality, including the descriptions on the aspects of interaction mechanism, graph-based structure, and user modeling. Oculus Rift was used in the experiments to provide immersive virtual reality with affective scenarios, and a sample application was implemented as cross-platform VR physical training serious game for elderly people to demonstrate the essential parts of the framework. The measurements of playability and effectiveness are discussed. The introduced framework should be used as a guiding principle for designing affective VR serious games. Possible healthcare applications include emotion competence training, educational softwares, as well as therapy methods

Wearable Augmented Reality Application for Shoulder Rehabilitation

Augmented reality (AR) technology is gaining popularity and scholarly interest in the rehabilitation sector because of the possibility to generate controlled, user-specific environmental and perceptual stimuli which motivate the patient, while still preserving the possibility to interact with the real environment and other subjects, including the rehabilitation specialist. The paper presents the first wearable AR application for shoulder rehabilitation, based on Microsoft HoloLens, with real-time markerless tracking of the user’s hand. Potentialities and current limits of commercial head-mounted displays (HMDs) are described for the target medical field, and details of the proposed application are reported. A serious game was designed starting from the analysis of a traditional rehabilitation exercise, taking into account HoloLens specifications to maximize user comfort during the AR rehabilitation session. The AR application implemented consistently meets the recommended target frame rate for immersive applications with HoloLens device: 60 fps. Moreover, the ergonomics and the motivational value of the proposed application were positively evaluated by a group of five rehabilitation specialists and 20 healthy subjects. Even if a larger study, including real patients, is necessary for a clinical validation of the proposed application, the results obtained encourage further investigations and the integration of additional technical features for the proposed AR application

Motion Tracking Exergames for Elderly Users

This paper reports the results from the field tests of two custom made exergames, based on a commercial off-the-shelf technology, aimed for the elderly people. First game resembles the guided mobility and stretching class, and the second one is more game-like with youthful theme and active movement. Both exergames were tested on two sites, urban and rural setting, totaling 19 elderlies. Usability findings are reported in a form of System Usability Scale (SUS) score analysis, and playability aspects as a Game Experience Questionnaire (GEQ) analysis. Results from the questionnaires are supplemented with observation and interview material. The second game, which had more familiar setting and appropriate pacing, received positive feedback and higher scores from the tests. Based on this material we discuss about the design of exergames aimed for the elderly persons who are not experienced computer game players, the importance of graphical clarity and the need for specialized game experience questionnaire for the elderlies.</p

PhyDSLK: a model-driven framework for generating exergames

AbstractIn recent years, we have been witnessing a rapid increase of research on exergames—i.e., computer games that require users to move during gameplay as a form of physical activity and rehabilitation. Properly balancing the need to develop an effective exercise activity with the requirements for a smooth interaction with the software system and an engaging game experience is a challenge. Model-driven software engineering enables the fast prototyping of multiple system variants, which can be very useful for exergame development. In this paper, we propose a framework, PhyDSLK, which eases the development process of personalized and engaging Kinect-based exergames for rehabilitation purposes, providing high-level tools that abstract the technical details of using the Kinect sensor and allows developers to focus on the game design and user experience. The system relies on model-driven software engineering technologies and is made of two main components: (i) an authoring environment relying on a domain-specific language to define the exergame model encapsulating the gameplay that the exergame designer has envisioned and (ii) a code generator that transforms the exergame model into executable code. To validate our approach, we performed a preliminary empirical evaluation addressing development effort and usability of the PhyDSLK framework. The results are promising and provide evidence that people with no experience in game development are able to create exergames with different complexity levels in one hour, after a less-than-two-hour training on PhyDSLK. Also, they consider PhyDSLK usable regardless of the exergame complexity