Author: sharritt

Gaming, HCI, Psychology, Serious Games, Simulations, Usability

Crossing the UI Rift with Oculus


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Virtual reality opens the doors to a new era for user interface design. Oculus VR speaks to Develop about its opportunities Virtual reality doesn’t present user interface design with its first opportunity for transformation. The dawn of 3D long ago afforded games makers the prospect of moving beyond flat heads-up-displays and conventional menus. And when

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Gaming, HCI, Usability

Xbox One: The Wobbly Third Leg of Microsoft’s Non-Desktop Trifecta


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With the complete hardware, services, and pricing unveiled for the Xbox One at E3, we now have the totality of Microsoft’s “next-generation” consumer-oriented lineup: Windows 8 on the desktop, laptop, and tablet, Windows Phone 8 on the smartphone, and Xbox One in the living room. On paper, this trifecta, seamlessly connected via Microsoft Account, SkyDrive, and Xbox Live,

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Gaming, HCI, Serious Games, Simulations, Usability

The Future of Gaming – It May All Be in Your Head


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Gaming as a hobby evokes images of lethargic teenagers huddled over their controllers, submerged in their couch surrounded by candy bar wrappers. This image should soon hit the reset button since a more exciting version of gaming is coming. It’s called neurogaming, and it’s riding on the heels of some exponential technologies that are converging

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Gaming, HCI, Psychology, Simulations, Usability

Oculus Rift at SXSW: Is Virtual Reality the Holy Grail of Gaming?


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Cliff Bleszinski, Chris Roberts, Paul Bettner, and Palmer Luckey share their vision for the future of gaming The SXSW Gaming Expo is preposterously loud. At one side of the room, aStarcraft tournament is reaching its climax, but on the other side, one group of guys is yelling louder. They sound like a basement full of adolescents

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Gaming, Serious Games

SimCityEDU: Using Games for Formative Assessment


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As game-based learning gains momentum in education circles, teachers increasingly want substantive proof that games are helpful for learning. The game-makers at the non-profit GlassLab are hoping to do this with the popular video game SimCity. GlassLab is working with commercial game companies, assessment experts, and those versed in digital classrooms to build SimCityEDU, a downloadable

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Gaming, Psychology, Serious Games, Simulations

Fear of Fun


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Some day not all that far in the future, a new kind of entertainment is going to be perfected that will either be the coolest video game ever, or the media equivalent of a lethal man-made super-virus. You can predict what that entertainment might be like just by extrapolating from technology that already exists.

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Gaming, HCI, Serious Games, Simulations, Usability

Sculpting in Virtual Reality: Meet Leonar3Do


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Hungarian startup Leonar3Do (pronounced “Leonardo”) today demoed its mind-boggling virtual reality software for PC and Mac that lets you manipulate 3D objects as if they were right in front of you. Using a combination of triangulation (using sensors latched on to your computer) and 3D goggles, Leonar3Do creates an environment for interacting with 3D objects

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