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INDEX



Overview

This NYU Research Grant funded project uses interactive media and storytelling to prompt socially-engaged conversations about the environmental crisis.  
Timeline: June 2023 - October 2023
Project Type: Immersive Game Installation
Role: Environmental Researcher, Designer, & Unity Developer (group member of 6)
Group members: Luna Chen, Annie Li, Henry Haoyu Wang, Leo Ji, Ruijie Sun

               




Background

New York's sea level has risen 9 inches since 1950 due to global carbon emissions, and as of 2018, New York was recorded as the third-largest city contributor - amassing a grave footprint on global warming.

Since then, in 2019, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the Lower Manhattan Coastal Resiliency Project. Early in 2022, Rutgers professor Jason Barr proposed an expansion of NYC, "New Mannahatta" as a single solution to both the growing housing crisis and climate threats.

Aside from adaptive plans, NYC is working on transitioning energy systems from fossil fuels to renewable energy as well as its corresponding socio-economic policies to make a direct impact on climate change itself. The city has become a role model for environment-focused governance across the United States.

However, NYC is certainly still miles away from the net-zero carbon target by 2050, and the urgency of the situation has caused grave concern for environmental injustice and climate apartheid. Our team believes that with the right mindsets and actions from residents, business owners, and policy-makers, carbon neutrality is in no doubt achievable.




Rising is a card-tapping game and an immersive roleplaying experience that aims to educate users about their impact on sea level rise and how their contribution differs from that of other socio-economic roles.





Project Objectives

Key Words/Phrases: Climate Apartheid, Socio-Economic Vulnerability, Disparity in Power, Conversation

More specifically, the game aims:
  • To educate on the impact of socio-economic actions on sea level rise.
  • To foster empathy by immersing players in different socio-economic roles.
  • To stimulate conversations on collective responsibility for climate action.





Process









Preliminary Research

Before diving into the game design process, we needed to first test out some hypotheses we had about the relationships of rising sea levels with CO2 emissions and arctic ice extent, and to visualize these numbers together to make the data more digestible. Additionally, with game goals that were highly social and based on differences in socio-economic roles, we needed to also establish what the roles were exactly.

Research Objectives

  • To investigate the cause and effect relationships between:
    1. CO2 emissions and sea level rise - United States and Global.
    2. Global CO2 emissions and arctic ice extent.

  • To investigate to what extent those of different socio-economic backgrounds can reduce GHG emissions.

  • To investigate how people from different socio-economic backgrounds impact the environment based on their everyday actions and to what extent they can reduce GHG emissions.


Research Method

  1. Use research from journals and databases to determine roles of citizens (based on socio-economic backgrounds) that play a role on the environment.
  2. From the categories of roles, list out potential relevant actions that might impact GHG emissions or climate action. And from these actions, find the percentage of carbon emission it would produce.
  3. Build a sea level prediction model using python and Auto ARIMA (time series library) to forecast the sea level in future years, assuming all other factors unchanged. The second model will link arctic ice extent directly to global CO2 emissions.
  4. Use the models built as a prediction for however the accumulation of citizen GHG emission from step 2 impact sea level rise and arctic ice extent.




Determining Socio-economic Roles

First, we determined the five roles in our game - socio-economic positions that vary in power and impact to the environment:



Then, using data from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), we found the different New York State CO2 emission proportions by sector from 2018, as shown on the right.

Looking at the sectors that contribute the most to emissions, we picked out activities that each role could carry out to potentially reduce emissions.

To see how much impact would be made from specific activities carried out to reduce emissions, we compiled and calculated data from various government websites like from EPA, Energy Saver (DOE consumer resource) and the NYC Mayor's office. The below show the five groups of people chosen, along with actions they can take. 






Data Models

Prediction Model #1

This first data model maps out two graphs: the actual values of sea level rise (ft) from 1890 to 2020, and the predicted values of sea level rise (ft) from 1978 to 2020.



  • Both graphs show a steady overall increase through the years, with the actual values fluctuating yearly.
  • Data for the predicted values results in the graph values:
    • RMSE: 0.121
    • R2: 0.6507 
  • The R2 value isn’t very high, so planning some design decisions around this was important. 

Prediction Model #2

This second data model maps out the Arctic ice extent (million km2) against global CO2 emissions (billion tons) on a scatter graph, with a linear regression graph.



  • The scatter graph shows an overall decrease in the Arctic ice extent as global CO2 emissions rise, which is as expected.
  • Like data model #1, the line graph allows for prediction on Arctic ice extent based on any summation of CO2 emissions that are calculated - allowing for different scenarios to be played out and explore.




All of the research above served as the foundation of our installation project. We wanted to ensure that the project had a strong conceptual framework and that it was backed by research and data.





Gameplay

The game requires five players, each representing a socio-economic group residing in the US: working class citizens, middle class citizens, higher class citizens, corporations, and policymakers.

The main actions from the five players involve tapping action cards (which correlate to emissions) on a card reader as the rounds progress. Their actions are cumulatively analysed to determine the sea level rise and glacial melting feedback which is then shown on a projection.

The story begins in 2022, where each round represents two years passing by, and once 2042 is reached, a summary and point system is revealed to all players so they can see what went wrong, and take the time to reflect.

An animation of a character surrounded by glaciers introduces the players to the game. As the rounds go by, the glaciers slowly start descending at a rate based on the actions played. Each round is followed by a summary of what each player did, and players can read and discuss or skip to the next round. This summary includes a description relating to both their impacts on the environment, as well as impacts to their quality of life, if relevant.






Flow Diagram

We drew out a more detailed flow diagram to support the development part of our production process.





Design Decisions

Experience: Card Tapping Game

Games are effective education tools because they keep people engaged with an aim and result. Card games are especially fun because they are strategy-based, so we wanted people to be critically thinking about how to play out their options based on the ones given, and find the best solution. 

There’s also something quite comfortable and cathartic in the tangibility of card games. Our intention was to recreate that immersive and open environment, allowing people to experience a similar sense of freedom.

Game Type: Roleplaying

Role-playing enhances this sense of immersion. Our goal for this game was to explore and ponder the choices individuals can make within different socio-economic positions. By putting people in these positions, we hoped for people to be able to gain another perspective and learn from it.

Visual Style

We wanted the overall tone of the installation to be reflective, open, comfortable, calm with a sense of urgency and darkness. Our moodboard helped to shape the aesthetics of the installation during development.



Spatial Design

Initially we wanted to do create something that used projection in a more innovative way with space. We thought it would be interesting to have projection act as a hologram, where multiple projections would simulate an almost three-dimensional environment. This type of spacial design would have allowed for another level of immersion and for the roleplaying game to be played in all different kinds of ways. However, after much deliberation, we decided to stick with a normal curved projection screen due to the technicality of this initial idea. Below are some 3D renderings of our inital design.



Following these decision, we needed to make some design choices to optimize the potential of our new spacial set-up. 
  • For an optimal feel of immersion, we decided to buy a tent to isolate the environment and put up black curtains around to make sure the projection showed clearly.
  • We added blue LED light strips that were responsive to the game. As the game progressed and sea level rose, the blue light strips incrementally turned on to diffuse the space with a deep blue hue.
  • With the in-tent setup, we spread out cushions evenly, and placed headphones on top of them, connecting to the center block, where we had the card reader and button. 
  • We realised that with the amount of wires we had connecting to all the headphones, LED lights, and Arduino, and with us wanting to keep things mostly minimal so that the space allowed people to feel calm, and able to contemplate, we needed to design the space in a strategic manner - which we were able to do using lots of black tape, wire structuring, and symmetry play.








Early Testing & Refining

Before diving deep into development, we first tested the game out with a lo-fi prototype. We tested with a simple projection of an animation, someone narrating with a script, and paper cards, and found key insights:

  • Some participants felt anxious from the game's fast pace, while others thought it was just right.

  • Participants didn’t feel like there were repercussions to their actions, making them meaningless.

  • Only one group out of three were discussing amongst each other their decisions throughout the game. There wasn’t an incentive or instruction for players to talk to each other. As games tend to be competitive, the introduction should make it clear that this is a collaborative game.

  • Some participants thought their cards were a little arbitrary. Tweaking the language and specificity of the cards needed to be done.


We refined the design of our gameplay based on these insights. Other than editing the language of our script, cards, and the UI, some key edits included:

  • Player-paced progression: extended round durations with pauses and added a quick card tapping mechanism so players can skip them whenever ready.

  • Impact scores: introduced a final summary with numerical impact scores to underscore each player's environmental influence.

  • Space for discussion: implemented mini summaries and narrative prompts after each round to facilitate reflection and discussions.





Development Process

During this phase of the project production, our team divided into two groups. One group focused on the physical computing aspect, utilizing Arduino Uno with card reader technology. Meanwhile, the rest of the team and I concentrated on the digital computing side, which involved Unity and Python development for the content displayed on the screen and responses from Arduino.

The main obstacle was the three way connection between Arduino, Python, and Unity, which we needed for the entire game to work. This took a significant amount of time to get working, with several debugging nights. However, we were able to eventually get it working.




Final Outcome

To view a full video of this working, click here.






The Opening

*This Is Not A Drill* Exhibition on Technology, Equity, and the Climate Emergency was held from September 2022 to December 2022 at the New York University Bobst Library. 

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Reflection

This was one of the most intensive and complicated projects I have worked on; however, it was precisely the challenge that made it truly fulfilling and worthwhile. The below are a few of the many valuable lessons I’ve learned:

  • Immersive and intensively technical installations are difficult to maintain for a long period of time. Because the exhibition was held from September to December, we knew that making sure the technical aspects were able to hold up on its own was crucial. However,  as people played, unexpected bugs still popped up.
  • Less is more - overcomplicating only blurs the message and we found this out through user testing. We then were able to simplify it during our design and development process later on.
  • Player behaviors individually and collectively are unpredictable - we wanted people to discuss. We wanted this project to be a highly discussion based experience for players. But when players weren’t familiar with each other or when players were maybe shyer, this wasn’t really the case. Although somewhat out of our control, it was a learning lesson for how important immersion and comfortability is in designing something like this.