Rod McCall

Guidelines for designing augmented reality games

The growing popularity of augmented reality (AR) games in both a research and more recently commercial context has led for a need to take a closer look at design related issues which impact on player experience. While issues relating to this area have been considered, to date most of the emphasis has been on the technology aspects. Furthermore it is almost always assumed that the augmented reality element in itself will provide a sufficient experience for the player. This has led to a need to evaluate what makes a successful augmented reality game. In this paper we present a set of design guidelines which are drawn from experiences of three mixed reality games. The guidelines provide specific guidance on relationships between real and virtual space, social interaction, use of AR technologies, maintaining consistent themes and implicitly address higher level aspects such as presence within a particular augmented reality place.

On the role of presence in mixed reality

Previous paradigms for presence research were primarily established in the context of virtual reality (VR). The objective of this paper is to introduce a new agenda for research on presence suitable for the domain of mixed reality (MR). While established assumptions and methods of presence research from VR are applicable to MR experiences, we argue that they are not necessarily meaningful or informative. Specifically, a shift of attention is needed away from psycho-physiological studies coming from a laboratory experiment tradition, toward an ecological-cultural approach that is applicable in real world situations and relies on ethnographic rather than fully controlled methods. We give a series of examples taken from the work on the European integrated research project IPCity, and discuss the implications of our findings.

Measuring presence in virtual environments

This demonstration presents findings from two studies on presence that use a new technology for developing photo-realistic virtual environments. Our studies have used a combination of qualitative and quantitative measures, and in doing so have pointed to the importance of exploring place as part of presence. The demonstration explores issues of presence in such environments and the range of data capture methods we used and methodological issues found..

Ethics, Privacy, and Trust in Serious Games

This chapter presents a set of ethical concepts and related guidelines starting from a historical review perspective leading through to present day work on computer ethics, privacy, and trust. The review forms a basis for a discussion on ethics within serious games including related types such as persuasive games, gamification, and pervasive games. The objective being is to identify common issues and areas of interest where the boundaries between these types of game blur. The result is a set of concepts which specifically explore the gaps which have arisen, for example, in areas such competing values between stakeholders, the effect of serious pervasive games on non-participants, rules of play, transparency, consent, and autonomy. The guidelines contain sets of issues, questions, and examples that aim to alert researchers and practitioners to key concerns.

Methodological issues in studying player experiences of location aware games

In the wake of ubiquitous computing and boosted by the proliferation of the Global Positioning System (GPS), a new genre of games emerged during the last 10 years, which combined two traditions of game play mutually exclusive till then, outdoor and digital games. Such games come under various names including but not limited to mobile, pervasive, ubiquitous, augmented reality or location aware games. What makes all of them location aware is that the player physically navigates within a game world, which blends the real world and virtual dimensions. This combination significantly changes what players, designers and developers have until now understood about digital games. Furthermore, as the GPS phone market grows, and the number of start-ups developing these games increases, proven concepts and appropriate play tests methods are required to guide the development and counterbalance the risks. This has all given rise to the need for researchers to not only focus on prototypes and demonstrate the technology but also aim for a comprehensive understanding of player experiences in location aware games. In pursuing this goal, however, researchers encounter unprecedented theoretical and methodological challenges that question traditional models, theories and methods of game research and human–computer interaction. Location aware games are not separated anymore from the everyday life. Situated in the real world, the borders of the playground of these games become permeable from the influences of everyday life. The issue of the unforeseeable context of play, which more or less could be ignored before, now has come to the fore. Every time a game is played, the game is played differently [cf. 1, p. 340]. What are the consequences for the designer, the player, or the researcher of location aware games? Is it possible to study such play experiences in a scientific manner and if so how is this possible? This special issue of Personal and Ubiquitous Computing focuses on methodological issues in studying player experiences of location aware games. It has been inspired by the interest in the first workshop on this topic, which was organized in conjunction with HCI2008 ‘‘Evaluating Player Experiences in Location Aware Games’’. The papers selected cover a range of topics in the field. Three papers argue directly at the empirical level. They report results of empirical studies representing different methodological approaches. There is a quasi-experimental study on location, play action and emotion in location aware games (Baillie et al.), and there is a quantitative study of players’ feeling present in an augmented reality game using additionally some qualitative observations (McCall et al.). There is also a study of social interaction in location aware games by means of a complementary approach, combining quantitative and qualitative methods (Diamantaki et al.). Two further papers argue directly at the B. M. Gruter (&) Hochschule Bremen, Neustadtswall 30, 28199 Bremen, Germany e-mail: Barbara.grueter@hs-bremen.de

Short paper: user study for mobile mixed reality devices

In this paper we present a user study comparing four different mobile Augemented Reality (AR) interfaces. The focus of the study was on the usability of the devices, with respect to the unique nature of AR experiences, especially in the context of MR games, namely: the user usually needs at least one free hand; the interface might be used outside, the users will move around and they have to carry the equipment with them. The study found that Ultra Mobile PCs (UMPC) are preferred to Head Mounted Displays (HMD) and presents a number of concepts to the design of such systems.

Navigation: within and beyond the metaphor in interface design and evaluation

Over the last few years we have been exploring an alternative conceptual isation of human-computer interaction (HCl) that sees HCl as the navigation of information spaces (Benyon and Hook, 1997). As a corollary cognitive engineers can be seen as the creators of information artefacts (Benyon, 1998b). The work is closely allied to some interesting developments in HCl, notably the concepts of “social navigation” presented in this volume and in (Munro, Hook and Benyon, 1999), but also to the ideas of distributed cognition (Hollan, Hutchins and Kirsh, 2002). Elsewhere in this volume (notably in the chapters by Spence and Chalmers) the concept of navigation itself is explored. In this chapter we report on our work concerned with exploring how well concepts that have been developed in disciplines such as architecture and urban planning transfer to information spaces.

Patterns of Place: An Integrated Approach for the Design and Evaluation of Real and Virtual Environments

This chapter describes an approach to the development of virtual representations of real places. The work was funded under the European Union’s €20 m Future and Emerging Technologies theme of the 5th Framework Programme, “Presence”. The aim of the project, called BENOGO, was to develop a novel technology based on real-time image-based rendering (IBR) for representing places in virtual environments. The specific focus of the work presented here concerned how to capture the essential features of real places, and how to represent that knowledge, so that the team developing the IBR-based virtual environments could produce an environment that was as realistic as possible. This involved the development and evaluation of a number of virtual environments and the evolution of two complementary techniques; the Place Probe and Patterns of place.

Urban mixed realities: technologies, theories and frontiers

This workshop will address the approaches, challenges, benefits and aspects of interaction within urban mixed reality environments. It will seek to draw upon existing research into place, presence and situated interaction while exploring areas of art, flow, ambience, urban design, performance and technology. In doing so, it will bridge the divide between art and science which exists in the growing research area of urban mixed realities. The anticipated outcome is a closer examination of the issues relevant to interacting within urban mixed realities and how to drive the research agenda forward.