Part B - Scientific Project Description

Summary of aims and objectives

Future research

The Summary Report

The basic goal of the project is to investigate a design process of a non-visual computer game that resembles the same level of accessibility and fun as a game with visual output. The demonstration game has to be as exciting and challenging as visual games. The game is designed for blind children of the age of 10 to 14. During our concept phase, we eliminate all visual terminology and base every output on sound only. Elements of visual concepts are avoided, which makes sure that blindness is not a handicap in this game. The design process contains two parts; a design process purely based on sound and a design process that focuses on the blind.
This project is the first step in researching the possibilities of using sound as the main fundamental throughout a design process. Our research indicates that there is a difference between designing and styling audio.

We chose to research the design process of a computer game for the blind because of the huge, unexplored gap between present-day games and games made for visually impaired users. A gap that is getting bigger and bigger. While seeing gamers venture into 3D gaming worlds such as 'Myst' and 'Final Fantasy', blind gamers are forced to play yet another game of Blackjack, Battleship or Memory.
Several attempts to create a game that is as exciting as a game for the seeing have failed because they translated (i.e.: 'sonified') the visual content and visual concept elements of existing games. In doing so, various aspects of what makes the game fun to play get neglected in this process, because these other aspects are not translated into the audio-domain. In this project, we focused on the essence of the game instead of the visual output.
This project is the first step in researching the possibilities of using sound as the main fundamental throughout a design process. Our research indicates that there is a difference between designing and styling audio. Further studies may lead to a definition of Audio Design Principles.

Summary of aims and objectives:

· To create a non-visual computer game that resembles the same level of accessibility and fun as a game with visual output. Important is that, in this game, blindness is not a handicap.
To illustrate that accessible does not mean 'an adapted original' but 'a re-designed original based on the essence' .
To give an example of a design process (and product) that is fully based on audio. This to amplify the functional use of sound.
To find out how one can design (sound) for the blind community, based on the needs, characteristics and possibilities of this user group.
To define the relationship between sound and emotion in a game environment.

We playtested 'Drive' with a large (blind) audience and the overall opinion was that ' Drive' is an exciting and accessible game. The blind users could handle the game just as good as the seeing users. In general, we discovered that blind users are capable of reaching higher scores than seeing users. This shows 'Drive' is a game in which the blind game player is not handicapped. Several seeing users joked they felt handicapped themselves, because they were used to receiving visual feedback.

We based 'Drive' on the essence of a racing game. Throughout the concept-phase, we tried to sonify every element of this essence. This proved to be quite fruitful because once we laid to down the first copy of the concept both the accessibility-factor and the fun-factor became clear. This shows that 'Drive' is a good example of a design-process purely based on sound, one of the aims of the project. It also illustrates that accessible does not mean 'an adapted original' but 'a re-designed original based on the essence'.

We wanted to examine how one can design for the blind computer user. Prior to this project, we had already researched the needs and characteristics of this user group. We avoided visual terminology. So in this project, we introduced terminology that fits the perceptive world of the blind.
We learned that the blind children prefer racing games and shooters above all and that they would like an exciting game that is equally challenging for blind users as well as seeing players. We also learned that competition is highly important between players and that dynamic game-elements like levels and score should be applied. This because current games don't really provide for these.
The blind users indicated that they would rather have a real voice than the synthesized voice they are used to hear all day when using the computer. We used recorded voices to give the game more depth and to add variety in the experience of using the computer.
The balance between functional sound and figurative sound is very important. In 'Drive', we kept a clear balance between these two.
Our first tests gave us the idea of force-focusing (using obstruction sounds to break the concentration of the player) to make a game more difficult to play. We also found out that sometimes the content of a specific sound is responsible for the difficulty of the game. Parameters for this remain undiscovered; we would like to explore this issue in a future project.
We applied adaptive music to create a more dynamic environment. This, together with the voice recordings, the intro, the website and the menu all contribute to the immersion and the meta-gaming.

All this provided us with a better view on how one can design for the blind community. Not only games, but other projects based on sounds as well.

Future research

In earlier research we discovered the difference between 'audio design' and 'audio styling'. In our opinion styling is the application of audio into an existing concept while designing is creating a concept primary based on sound.
We found out that many people at our school and other institutes are very interested in this point of view. Unfortunately there is a lack of experience and research on this subject. Research until now has focused on audio elements like audio icons/earcons and adaptive composition.
We think these elements are very useful to use in a concept, but they don't tell us anything on how to create a concept based on audio. We would like to investigate the possibilities of formulating and exploring such Audio Design Principles.

These Audio Design Principles could be applied to design-processes in which audio acts as an active element. These could include audio-only projects or projects in which audio is combined with another discipline e.g. Visual or tactile design. Audio can act superior to the other discipline or have an equal role. 'Drive' is good example of a project in which sound acts superior. When audio is inferior to the other discipline or is not present at all the Audio Design Principles do not influence the design process.

To define the Audio Design Principles we want to continue the study on this subject.