Slashdot Mirror
Using Wireless Signals in Games
MetaByte writes "A swiss group has created a game for the Nintendo DS that utilizes the surrounding WiFi transmissions to set up the game world. By moving through the city, the game changes. Another game for the Nintendo DS creates an audible city from the wlan-waves. The Austrian artist Gordan Savicic takes the wlan landscape to a painful level. The density of the waves and strength of the encryption cause servos to tighten a corset. Moving lets you feel being disclosed of encrypted digital worlds that turns into useless electrosmog."
how much fun these games must be in a Faraday cage!
Based on what I suspect all my neighbors are downloading, the game world should turn into a giant red-light district.
"Moving lets you feel being disclosed of encrypted digital worlds that turns into useless electrosmog."
Double You Tee Eff?
Try:
10 RANDOMIZE TIMER
There was a game of "Monopoly" in London a while back that did this. I believe it's called Monopoly Live
The Austrian artist Gordan Savicic takes the wlan landscape to a painful level. The density of the waves and strength of the encryption cause servos to tighten a corset.
I'd like to see this designed by H.R. Giger. Forget the corset: you'd be enclosed in a giant organic vagina, which would pulsate rhythmically to indicate encryption strength.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
The cool comes from the potential to make it less random. For example, taking the results of a portscan and feeding that into an enemy generator - if there's a lot of AIM traffic, you'd be able to deduce this from the fact that you're fighting a lot of trolls... if more people are using Yahoo IM, you'd run into more Orcs, etceteras. I probably misspoke when I said random "seed" - the attraction with something like this is using the traffic to generate enough variation in the game environment to make each play experience different.
If ever there was a perfect example of useless electrosmog, that sentence is it.
A-Bomb
David Braben's pc game Virus (several years old) had the contents of your hard drive popping up during gameplay. For instance, the contents of random text files might scroll by while playing. The game was aware of your disk structure, account settings, etc. At least, that's how it was described to me.
Seemed neat but dangerous. A certain amount of awareness of your environment can make games more interesting. Animal Crossing is another example; it's aware of the real time and date, and the passage of non-game time.
Imagine the Gamefaqs walkthrough on games like these: "If you're running into too many Orcs, try moving across the state, or hiding in the woods. No, not your in-game avatar. You physically. Oh, and never play in crowded cities or subways, that's just asking for hurt."
"Operating systems suck: you're better off using only the BIOS" --trainsaw.com
I really don't see the point. What good is it to integrate data into your game that has no relation what so ever with your game? The only good use I can think of would be Dr. Kawashima making some witty comments when you are in a Wifi flooded area, but enemy formation and such? What would be the point in connecting that with random Wifi data?
Like Solios said, the point is to have less randomness, not more. The point is to make the game respond to the physical environment in which the gamer exists, unlike most games which are their own little universe. Mobile gaming platforms allow us to move our games through cities and public spaces, which are awash with life. Wireless network traffic is just one type of information with which a game designer can make the game dynamic to the gamer's surroundings, but it has the neat property that the necessary hardware is already available.
There was a game years back which used your computer's directory structure to generate game maps. I think the idea of this game was you were fighting viruses within your own computer or something like that, but it's unimportant. The point was that the game design was dynamic to factors beyond the 'game world'.
The DS also has a built in mic. Mostly I've seen it utilized in-game such that the player has to talk or yell or blow on the mic (e.g. in the latest Zelda you blow on the mic to blow out a candle). There's also potential here to collect ambient (audio) noise from the environment and integrate that somehow into the game. Combined with the wifi sampling, and you could have a very interesting way to change the game in very populous / busy areas.
"I'm a Laver, not a Phyto[plankton]"
As an avid RPG fan, IMHO this approach to enemy generation is very appealing. Let's look at it this way. If I have a reason to battle a specific foe (often generated by hotspot X) it would be fun to travel in the "Real World" to a specific location as opposed to some place within the game. This is just a simple example. I'm sure there are more intuitive ways to apply this. I'm not saying that all RPG's should adapt to this approach but it would be neat on some, or in certain aspects of the game.