As our year at Abertay was the last to work on the old PlayStation2 Linux Devkits, Applied Game Technologies was a last chance work on the new Vita Devkits. The purpose of this module was to choose either Augmented Reality or Stereoscopic 3D, and build a small demonstration game application to aid in discussing innovation within the chosen field.

This project was in C++, using the Abertay Framework for PlayStation Vita.

I chose to explore the idea of creating an RTS style game that would utilise Augmented Reality. The main concepts I wished to show where that of the device acting as a viewport into the game world, and interacting physically with this world to control the units.

In this demonstration application the player has to look through the PSVita to get a view of play area, and position their three towers correctly to destroy incoming enemies.

This implementation was rather difficult to use – holding a Vita in one hand while using the other hand to move the markers around. Key issues around this technologies reliance on marker identification such as limitations with tracking range, speed and stability were encountered – with possible solutions suggested.

The focus of this module was however to demonstrate how this technology could be used for further innovation. I suggested that the current movement towards headset based AR technologies coupled with gesture recognition could provide a fantastic opportunity for innovation within the RTS genre. Such upcoming technologies could allow RTS games to played within your own environment, much like a physical tabletop game – relying on user gestures for interactions rather than controllers or markers.