Carlos Delgado-Mata

From competitive to social two-player videogames

In this paper we present a strategy to design social videogames (from classic competitive ones) which allow parents to play with their children and have fun in spite of their different levels. A first tennis videogame (based on the classic Pong) which implements this strategy has already been developed. In the paper we first motivate this work and briefly survey related work. Then we describe the general strategy and its application to the case of the tennis videogame.

Low cost video game technology to measure and improve motor skills in children

Videogames are ubiquitous in modern day life. Unfortunately, several children are overweight or even obese because they spend a lot of time watching television or playing non-physical video games, instead of perfoming physical activities. Furthermore, this lack of exercise affects their development. The fact that children are becoming overweight or obese is a health concern for many countries that are economical developed (like England) or are in development (like Mexico). In this paper we present a project that uses devices to measure and improve childrens gross and fine motor skills through the use of low cost video game technology. Preliminary studies have shown that children are enganged with the framework presented herein.

Vibrating insoles for tactile communication with the feet

This paper presents further development of a wearable electronic tactile display that stimulates the mechanoreceptors in the foot sole with vibrations. Following the lessons learned from a previous prototype, we propose a technologically improved second device and new optimized tactile patterns that lead to significant advances in tactile-foot perception. A series of experiments involving directional information, pattern and emotion recognition, and language learning were conducted with 20 healthy sighted voluntary subjects. Results obtained confirm the pertinence of these advances and show the potentials of podotactile stimulation and the proposed device.

Adaptive two-player videogames

This paper presents a strategy to design two-player videogames which are able to adapt themselves to the level of the layers who are playing at each moment. The goal of the strategy is to allow the players enjoying the game in spite of their different levels. A first tennis videogame (based on the classic Pong) which implements this strategy has already been developed and evaluated through user studies. In the paper we first motivate this work and survey related work. Then we describe the general strategy and its application to the case of the tennis videogame. We also present the user studies carried out and analyze the interesting results.

Insights into the Capabilities of Tactile-Foot Perception:

This paper presents a novel wearable interface for the foot: a shoe-integrated tactile display that enables users to obtain information through the sense of touch via their feet. A 16-point array of actuators stimulates the sole of the foot by inducing different vibration frequencies. A series of experiments were conducted with 20 sighted and 5 blind voluntary subjects to evaluate the role of tactile perception by the human foot and the tactile sensitivity of the plantar surface. Tests evaluated the perception of simple shapes, patterns and directional instructions. The results showed that some information is discriminable and that tactile-foot stimulation could be used for a wide number of applications in human-machine interaction. Furthermore, the results also suggested that the blind perform better in some key tasks and support the feasibility of footwear providing tactile feedback for situational awareness, mobility and the navigation assistance of the blind.

Lessons from research on interaction with virtual environments

Nowadays, virtual environments provide great potential for new applications. However, the management and interaction with virtual environments raises new open problems. In this sense, this paper discusses important ideas and findings from research on interaction with virtual environments and virtual agents which we think are relevant for the design of successful virtual environments. More concretely, the paper discusses three aspects which are the representation of virtual environments, navigation support and addition of life to the environments. For each theme we introduce and discuss relevant work. In the view of the work discussed, we also provide recommendations to guide the design and development of virtual environments.

An Ergodic Sum-of-Cisoids Simulator for Multiple Uncorrelated Rayleigh Fading Channels Under Generalized Scattering Conditions

In this paper, we present a new method for the design of ergodic sum-of-sinusoids (SOS) simulators for multiple uncorrelated narrowband Rayleigh fading channels. The method, which is intended for a special class of SOS models known as sum-of-cisoids (SOC) models, enables the generation of an unlimited number of mutually uncorrelated Rayleigh fading waveforms with specified autocorrelation properties. This is in contrast to all known methods proposed for SOS simulators, which are restricted to the simulation of multiple uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels characterized by autocorrelation functions (ACFs) derived under the isotropic scattering assumption. The excellent performance of this new method is exemplarily demonstrated by comparing the correlation properties and the envelope distribution of a set of waveforms generated by the simulator with the corresponding quantities of a reference set of multiple uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. The methods performance is evaluated in not only theoretical simulation scenarios, where the lengths of the generated waveforms approach infinity, but also practical scenarios, where the waveform lengths are limited. The simulation approach described in this paper is important to the performance analysis of mobile broadband communication systems using diversity, multicarrier, or multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) techniques under generalized scattering conditions.

Flocking techniques to naturally support navigation in large and open virtual worlds

This paper proposes and explores the use of flocking techniques to naturally support navigation in large and open virtual environments. The proposed approach comprises both a flocking algorithm (which simulates the behavior of a flock of virtual beings) and a control algorithm (which manages the navigation information and parameterizes the flocking behavior). The model was developed and evaluated through a user study which investigated whether the addition of the proposed model has an effect on the user experience when exploring a virtual environment. In the research the experiment group explored a virtual environment where the proposed flocking model was added to suggest places to visit. The participants were not informed about the guiding abilities of the virtual animals. The control group explored the same virtual environment without the animal flock. The impact of both cases was compared. The results indicate that the proposed model is adequate to suggest places to visit in large and open virtual worlds.

Behavioural reactive agents to define personality traits in the videogame Überpong

Nowadays, the video gaming experience is shifting from merely realistic to believable. The increasing graphic power of current graphic cards has made it possible to render near life-like images. Unfortunately, the behaviour of the computer driven player and non-playing characters is often poor when compared to their visual appearance. In this sense, there has been a recent interest in improving the video gaming experience with novel Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques. This paper presents a robotics inspired behavioural AI technique to simulate characters personalities in a multi-award winning commercial video game. Furthermore, the paper describes a study with users.

Emotional Line: Showing Emotions through the Sharpness, Height, Width and Speed of a Series of Concatenated Digital Shifting Curves

This paper proposes and explores an abstract approach to express emotions. Emotions are represented in terms of valence and arousal dimensions and they are visually expressed through the shape and speed of a series of concatenated digital shifting curves that together compose a curved line that resembles a non-periodic wave. In particular, the valence value is expressed through the sharpness of the curves (the more negative the valence, the sharper the curves), while the arousal value is expressed through their height, width and speed (the greater the arousal, the higher, thinner and quicker the curves). Furthermore, the paper describes a user experiment which investigated whether the valence and arousal expressed by our model are appropriately perceived by the users or not. The results suggest that combinations of sharpness, height, width and speed are perceived correctly as particular emotions; that sharpness is perceived as valence; that height, width and speed are jointly perceived as arousal; and that the perceptions of both valence and arousal are independent of each other.