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Cooperative Sculpturing in a VR Game

Cooperative Sculpturing in a VR Game
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In this project, we investigated the effect of interaction methods and vibrotactile feedback on the user's sense of social presence, presence, engagement, and objective performance in a multiplayer cooperative VR game. In order to do sculpturing, participants need to manipulate the simple 3D objects such as a cube, a sphere, or a cylinder. By combining and manipulating the simple 3D objects, players create completely new artifacts. Along with the gameplay, we developed the fingertip vibrotactile feedback device that provides haptic feedback while players are using hand tracking.

To conduct this research project, we had three designs steps and one evaluation step.

First design process was to design the experiment. In this stage, we investigated the dependent and independent variables, conditions, and psychological and technological hypothesis for our research topic. We hypothesized that natural interaction with vibrotactile feedback will provide better sense of social presence, presence, and engagement for the users in the virtual environments. We also designed to measure the usability of our prototype device to evaluate the potentials and possible applications for vibrotactile feedback devices in VR games.

Second design process was designing the prototype hardware device. We invented the fingertip vibrotactile device using microcontrollers and electronics to provide the vibrotactile feedback while they are using hand tracking in the virtual environment.

Third design process was designing the cooperative VR game platform. We developed the two-player multiplayer game that enables the users to cooperative each other to manipulate the objects and create the new artifacts in VR. This cooperation was conducted using both VR controllers and hand tracking technology provided by Meta Quest 2. In addition, the multiplayer game platform was designed by using Unity game engine.

Last step was to evaluate our hypothesis by conducting the user study. We recruited 28 participants (four pilots) and ran a user study. It was within subject design, and each participant played cooperative VR game with one of our researchers together. Participant played game with four different conditions: 1) controller without vibrotactile feedback, 2) controller with vibrotactile feedback, 3) hand tracking without vibrotactile feedback, and 4) 1) hand tracking with vibrotactile feedback. After each condition, participant filled out a questionnaire to evaluate their level of social presence, presence, and engagement in the VR game. We also measured the usability of our prototype vibrotactile feedback device.

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Team

  • Hye Sung Moon, College of Engineering, Computer Science, Mind Music Machine Lab
  • Myounghoon Jeon, College of Engineering, Industrial and Systems Engineering, Mind Music Machine Lab