Scheduled Meeting No.1

So we had our first scheduled meeting together with Dan and basically discussed what needs to be added to the bike in order to control the game and to give user feedback whilst playing.

Firstly we decided that feedback needed to be added to the bike controller to simulate various aspects of the game and to give the user a physical indication of what is happening. The use of rumble packs in key areas of the bike will provide good feedback for the user. The rumble packs will be taken from existing controllers (possibly PS1 dual shocks) and positioned on the handle bars, in the seat and underneath the pedals. The handlebars packs may have to be incased in custom bar grips in order for them to vibrate efficiently. The seat and the pedal mounts may also have to be incased. The rumble packs themselves tend to be cam like ovals which are offset and rotated at speed to create a vibrating shock simulation.

The second aspect of the bikes functionality as a controller will be the use of the existing brake levers in which the possibility of adding electro magnets to measure the distance between lever and handlebar to act as a way of slowing the game character down. The other option is to add springs to the levers that will then use a sensor to measure the distance. This is still in the process of being decided.

The next idea that was discussed was how we would interact with the game when it came to delivering the paper. The initial idea was to have numerous physical papers (rolled up) that the user would actually throw at a pressure pad in time with the game. Upon further discussion we all felt that this was going to cause potential problems. These would include accuracy of the throw as well as timing issues due to the game not providing feedback when the paper is thrown as it has no way of knowing when the paper is in mid flight. Another idea was to hang these physical papers from a zip wire that would be dropped down onto the pressure pad. This solved the accuracy of throwing but still the problem with game feedback and timing wasn't solved. The idea of using a Nintendo Wii remote to trigger the throwing of the newspaper. This would then solves the timing and feedback issues as the game would be able to see the remote and provide visual feedback for the user. This idea would also be a solution to the accuracy issues as the user is not physically throwing anything across the room so there is less chance of failure and user annoyance.

Next stage of project is to plan out an annotated design of the bike controller and create a solid visual plan of the technology that needs to be included.