Games on the SurfaceThe similarities and dissimilarities of current applications compared to our own

Our Idea Virtual air hockey game that can be played on the surface

while using a custom built wireless controller. In order to slow the user down we have decided to add extra

elements to the game We want to slow the game down for a few reasons

The slower the user moves the better the tracking of his motion will be

The Surface isn’t extremely large and if users try to move too fast it could disrupt their opponent

Controller The controller needed to be

something stable and user friendly

We wanted to keep it similar to an actual air hockey mallet

This is the current design, however upon actually constructing the controller things may change.

Similar Applications The following video is a 4 player version of air hockey being

played on the Microsoft Surface

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgyCY-oiero

PROS CONS

Comparison

Up to 4 players is an interesting aspect

Multiple Pucks could allow for a fun change of pace

Resizable Controls provide different attributes

Speed seemed to be a little overwhelming

Delay/Failure to register on some of the motions

4 Players made the game very crowded

The following video is a 103 inch Multi-Touch Panasonic screen that has been transformed into an air hockey table

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jxbS1c_HU4

Panasonic Table Stayed very true to a classic air hockey game

The tracking seemed to work much better than the previous video

The size of the actual table was the key to its success It allowed for a lot of motion without the other player getting in the

way The distance the puck had to travel on table itself was a good

distance which allowed for smoother, less frantic gameplay

Microsoft Surface This video goes into detail about a game called Galactic

Alliance made specifically for the surface

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4uBW5vuD5o

Galactic Alliance We can take a lot about the platform from this video which

can help us design our game to be more compatible Galactic Alliance didn’t have a lot of constant motion, it was more

of a strategy based game. This lead us to re-think how our game could be played to most

suit the surface The Surface doesn’t seem to be built for lots of fast and finely traced

movements, which is one of the reasons why we are designing a controller to go along with the game, to help track the movements of the players

Overview From these videos we can begin to formulate what we want

and don’t want our game to do. Reasonable pace of play User needs to be well tracked Some type of statistic logging in addition to the score Strategy:

Character Attributes Power Ups

“Brick Breaker” Board Tilting Force-Field

Questions/Thoughts?