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Kyube!
Children's Choice Award
Holland Bloorview Kid's Rehabilitation Hospital
Created with a team during Sprint Week (5 days).
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Roles: Art Director, Game Designer
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The premise was to create a game for a waiting room at a children's hospital, utilizing the hospital's build-in floor sensors.
As seen on:
gameplay video
a space for safe play
Oftentimes, children and their family are required to wait for extended periods of time at the hospital prior to their checkup. The people at Holland Bloorview wished to create a solution that simultaneously physically and mentally engaged children while they waited. They engineered ScreenPlay--a large projection wall with which both kids and adults alike can interact with, through the use of the floor sensor.
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The ScreenPlay floor sensor is comprised of 100 sensors, overlaid by a mat with four different colours. Both the hardware and the game are designed to accommodate people with physical disabilities and different age groups, such as children too young to stand, or children in wheelchairs. Parents are also encouraged to participate with their children.
engaging experience with intuitive controls
By pressing down on a floor sensor pad, a similarly coloured "Kyube" is created on the corresponding floor tile. The longer the floor sensor pad is "held" (eg. the longer someone stands on it), the larger the Kyube grows, until it reaches the maximum size and starts to hop around autonomously.
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If there is already a Kyube present on the square the user initiates, the Kyube would hop in place to help indicate the user's position on the screen. If there are surrounding Kyubes, the user Kyube would then instead jump onto adjacent Kyubes, forming towers.
encourages group play and social interaction
The stacking mechanic encourages players to cooperate both in reality and in the virtual world. By stacking their Kyubes together, they charge the weather bar and unleash special effects across the field.
rewards players of varying abilities
Mobile or immobile, Kyube! rewards all.
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Players who scurry across multiple tiles will generate multiple, yet smaller, Kyubes. Players who stay put in one place will generate fewer, but larger Kyubes.
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Players with varying physical capabilities can all contribute to creating Kyube towers, and filling the weather bar!
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Children in wheelchairs take up multiple sensors, and would thus generate multiple large Kyubes at once.
Kyube!'s simple controls and minimalistic player input puts the emphasis on player interaction in the virtual world. It reaches out to a wider range of audiences, enjoyable regardless of their accessibility or handicaps.
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Only imagination and curiosity are needed to explore the world of Kyube!