DippaOut:comparing the player experience of different interaction methods in mobile games

Abstract. Mobile phones are one of the most common platforms for gaming. They also provide a wide selection of possible interaction modes, such as touch, tilt, and eye-tracking. Different kinds of games can be created with these interaction methods, but game designers constantly develop new ways to play with various accessories and game designs. Since people carry mobile phones everywhere, mobile phones have enabled playing games everywhere; in buses, during school breaks, and in restrooms. The most popular mobile phone platforms are currently Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android, which provide touching the screen via finger or stylus as a primary interaction method. The game design challenge provides a good user experience since there are no hardware buttons available as in gaming console controllers. The problem that mobile phones lack hardware buttons has forced game developers to think differently and develop games with only a few interactions available. This thesis focuses on taking a different approach to that problem. What if the user can control the game by rotating the mobile phone or using eye movement. The goal was to create a simple game with five different interaction methods: touching the screen, rotating the mobile phone, closing left and right eyes, using head and eye-tracking. Data was automatically collected with those five interaction methods during gameplay; additional material was collected after each level about gameplay and after test-session with questionnaires about testers’ demographics and opinions. The questionnaires were later analyzed to see how those interaction methods differ from each other; the users’ views of those methods and the data collected during gameplay are in line with testers’ answers. The gameplay data was analyzed and the most suitable interaction for playing DippaOut was rotating the phone, and the worst was eye tracking. The order of the remaining three interactions was: touch, head tracking, and eye closing. From the end level questionnaire, players’ opinions revealed that they did not like playing DippaOut with eye-tracking, and rotating the mobile phone was the most suitable way to play on players’ opinions. In players’ view, the touch was the second-best interaction method, and the eye closing, which was a new way to play, was ranked in results to be the third-best interaction method. Head Tracking, which some players were familiar with, was in the fourth position. After the testing session, players filled out a postquestionnaire where they could express their opinions and results were quite similar than on other measurements and end level questionnaire.Tiivistelmä. Matkapuhelimet ovat yksi yleisimmistä pelialustoista. Ne tarjoavat myös laajan valikoiman mahdollisia vuorovaikutustiloja, kuten kosketus, kallistus ja katseen seuranta. Näillä vuorovaikutustavoilla voidaan luoda erilaisia pelejä, mutta pelisuunnittelijat kehittävät jatkuvasti uusia tapoja pelata erilaisilla lisävarusteilla ja pelien suunnittelulla. Ihmiset kantavat matkapuhelimia kaikkialla ja matkapuhelimet ovat mahdollistaneet pelien pelaamisen näin myös kaikkialla; busseissa, koulumatkojen aikana ja vessoissa. Suosituimmat matkapuhelinalustat ovat tällä hetkellä Applen iOS ja Googlen Android, jotka tarjoavat ensisijaisena vuorovaikutustapana kosketuksen näyttöön sormella tai stylus kynällä. Pelien suunnittelussa on haasteena hyvän käyttökokemuksen tarjoaminen, koska fyysisiä näppäimiä ei ole saatavana kuten pelikonsolien ohjaimissa. Fyysisten näppäimien puuttuminen on ongelma verrattaessa perinteisiin peleihin, mikä on pakottanut pelikehittäjät ajattelemaan erilailla ja kehittämään pelejä eri vuorovaikutuksilla. Tässä opinnäytetyössä keskitytään mobiilipelien vuorovaikutusongelmaan. Entä jos käyttäjä voi hallita peliä kääntämällä matkapuhelinta tai käyttämällä silmän liikkeitä? Tavoitteena oli luoda yksinkertainen peli viidellä eri vuorovaikutustavalla: näyttöä koskettamalla, matkapuhelinta kääntelemällä, sulkemalla vasenta tai oikeaan silmää, päätä kääntämällä ja katseen seurannalla. Tiedot kerättiin automaattisesti näiden viiden eri vuorovaikutustavan avulla pelin aikana. Pelin jälkeen kerättiin lisämateriaalia tason jälkeisellä kyselylomakkeella ja testisession jälkeisellä kyselomakkeella pelaajien mielipiteistä ja väestötiedoista. Kyselylomakkeita analysoitiin myöhemmin sen selvittämiseksi, miten nämä vuorovaikutustavat eroavat toisistaan. Sekä miten pelaajien näkemykset näistä menetelmistä ja pelin aikana kerätyt tiedot eroavat toisistaan. Pelitiedot analysoitiin ja pelaajakokemukseltaan sopivin vuorovaikutus DippaOut pelin pelaamiseen oli puhelimen kallistaminen ja huonoin oli katseen seuranta. Kolmen muun vuorovaikutuksen järjestys oli: kosketus, pään kääntäminen ja silmien sulkeminen. Pelaajien mielipiteet paljastivat tason jälkeisestä kyselylomakkeesta, että he eivät pitäneet DippaOutin pelaamisesta katseen seurannalla ja matkapuhelimen kallistaminen oli sopivin tapa pelata. Kosketus oli toiseksi paras vuorovaikutusmenetelmä, ja silmien sulkeminen, joka oli uusi tapa pelata, luokiteltiin tuloksissa kolmanneksi parhaaksi vuorovaikutustavaksi. Joillekin pelaajille tuttu pään kääntäminen oli neljänneksi paras vuorovaikutusmenetelmä

Rayleigh scattering in the transmission spectrum of HAT-P-18b

We have performed ground-based transmission spectroscopy of the hot Jupiter HAT-P-18b using the ACAM instrument on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). Differential spectroscopy over an entire night was carried out at a resolution of $R \approx 400$ using a nearby comparison star. We detect a bluewards slope extending across our optical transmission spectrum which runs from 4750 to 9250\AA. The slope is consistent with Rayleigh scattering at the equilibrium temperature of the planet (852K). We do not detect enhanced sodium absorption, which indicates that a high-altitude haze is masking the feature and giving rise to the Rayleigh slope. This is only the second discovery of a Rayleigh scattering slope in a hot Jupiter atmosphere from the ground, and our study illustrates how ground-based observations can provide transmission spectra with precision comparable to the Hubble Space Telescope.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

The GROUSE project III: Ks-band observations of the thermal emission from WASP-33b

In recent years, day-side emission from about a dozen hot Jupiters has been detected through ground-based secondary eclipse observations in the near-infrared. These near-infrared observations are vital for determining the energy budgets of hot Jupiters, since they probe the planet's spectral energy distribution near its peak. The aim of this work is to measure the Ks-band secondary eclipse depth of WASP-33b, the first planet discovered to transit an A-type star. This planet receives the highest level of irradiation of all transiting planets discovered to date. Furthermore, its host-star shows pulsations and is classified as a low-amplitude delta-Scuti. As part of our GROUnd-based Secondary Eclipse (GROUSE) project we have obtained observations of two separate secondary eclipses of WASP-33b in the Ks-band using the LIRIS instrument on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). The telescope was significantly defocused to avoid saturation of the detector for this bright star (K~7.5). To increase the stability and the cadence of the observations, they were performed in staring mode. We collected a total of 5100 and 6900 frames for the first and the second night respectively, both with an average cadence of 3.3 seconds. On the second night the eclipse is detected at the 12-sigma level, with a measured eclipse depth of 0.244+0.027-0.020 %. This eclipse depth corresponds to a brightness temperature of 3270+115-160 K. The measured brightness temperature on the second night is consistent with the expected equilibrium temperature for a planet with a very low albedo and a rapid re-radiation of the absorbed stellar light. For the other night the short out-of-eclipse baseline prevents good corrections for the stellar pulsations and systematic effects, which makes this dataset unreliable for eclipse depth measurements. This demonstrates the need of getting a sufficient out-of-eclipse baseline.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysic

Seamless nowcasting system development at the Finnish Meteorological Institute

Presentación realizada en la 3rd European Nowcasting Conference, celebrada en la sede central de AEMET en Madrid del 24 al 26 de abril de 2019

Masses and Phase Structure in the Ginzburg-Landau Model

We study numerically the phase structure of the Ginzburg-Landau model, with particular emphasis on mass measurements. There is no local gauge invariant order parameter, but we find that there is a phase transition characterized by a vanishing photon mass. For type I superconductors the transition is of 1st order. For type II 1st order is excluded by susceptibility analysis, but the photon correlation length suggests 2nd order critical behaviour with \nu ~ 1/2. The scalar mass, in contrast, does not show clear critical behaviour in the type II regime for V \to \infty, contrary to the conventional picture.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures. More data gathered, allowing more definite conclusion