APD (5); Force

THEME

Forces

CONTEXT

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/oobleck-bring-science-home/

When thinking about ‘force’ as a theme within the context of play the first thing that popped into my mind was slime, particularly the kind that is also a non-newtonian fluid (like Oobleck). 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dramaton.slime&hl=en_AU

This is a randomly picked example of a genre of app I didn’t know existed before this week, which is slime generators/simulators for pretty much every type of phone and OS. There must be some demand for it, purely based off of the sheer quantity of similar apps I found.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/210970/The_Witness/

The puzzles in ‘The Witness’ aren’t exactly what I was nebulously imagining in relation to this hypothetical slime app, but it’s a good example of a game that is nothing but puzzle-based play that remained engaging throughout. 

METHOD 

I still had applications on the brain from last week’s object, and since I still have no experience or skill with actual app development I decided to do another mockup and brief conceptualisation of a game instead. Bearing the weekly theme in mind, I decided that an app that utilises non-newtonian liquid as a gameplay mechanic could be a lot fun. 

Puzzle games are some of the only apps that I keep on my phone for more than a day or so, as they’re easy to pick up and put down as well as not requiring a lot of time invested to master. I had the idea that a sort of platformer where you navigated via a slime (oobleck) would be both relevant to the overall theme of ‘force’ as well as being something I would personally download. Using the gesture controls of the iPhone a user would be able to control whether the slime was in a solid or a liquid state in order to move from the start position to the end goal (currently a bucket). 

RESULTS

I went back and forth for quite a while on what I wanted to explore this week, and I’m quite satisfied with the end conceptual result. It’s frustrating to me that I don’t currently have the ability to create prototypes or anything behind visual mockups, but time constraints being what they are that’s a skill to be acquired at a later date. From a design standpoint I think a marriage of 8bit interface and smooth dynamic simulation for the slime would be quite an interesting fusion, and would be more memorable than either going only 8bit or sleek.