Passing On
Passing On is an Geolocational Multiplayer Mobile Game in which teams of players compete against each other to be the first to pass on. Each team consists of two players with two different roles: Investigator and Ghost. One player helps the other to find the right location. One can talk to the other, but the other one can only communicate by knocking on his device.
Birlinghoven Castle, Sankt Augustin, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.
The Story
Our team was intensely interested in the opportunities presented by asymmetric gameplay and by the compelling nature of our surroundings. We created a geolocational experience that kept close ties with the Birlinghove Castle, telling the story of three restless ghosts haunting the castle, each with a unique story.
The current inhabitants of the castle have found that mobile devices have increasingly come under the influence of the three restless spirits. To rid himself of the nuisance, the castle chancellor has secured the services of three paranormal investigators to communicate with the troubled ghosts. The investigators use their mobile devices to navigate the historical space of the castle and its surrounding gardens to discover the memories lost to the ghosts, and in re-connecting them with their past, heal the fracture within them that is preventing their passing on.
Features
Deliberate limitations in communication
Team competition mode
Multi-player game
Physical movement
Interaction between players
GPS-tracking between players
Real world physical artefacts
Lightweight
Technology
Passing On uses the ZebroGamQ protocol developed by TOTEM to manage the game session, take care of sending GPS and knock patterns between teammates, and keep the game state synchronized across teams.
TOTEM Designer has been used to easily create assets and parse them into the program after exporting to XML, and TOTEM Scout to precisely tie assets to a location in the field using a smartphone.
Walkie Talkies were used to make voice connection from investigator to ghost.
Playing the Game
To start the game players have to decide about their roles in the game. Once the roles have been selected, the Ghosts initiate the game by creating an instance and the Investigators join that session. Finally, the game starts after connecting to the server. It should be considered that neither the investigator nor the ghost know each other. This means, they will meet each other by solving last part of the game.
The Investigator has no interface on their mobile device. They talk to the ghost through a phone call established by the system. They receive "knocks" from the ghost in response-one knock for yes, two knocks for no, or perhaps one knock for left, one knock for right. The knocks should be even more obvious that there is no given language, and that they will have to invent that.
They follow the ghost's instructions, which lead them to a specific location. At that location an impressionistic haiku is in the bottle which is a part of the ghost's story. The investigator reads the text to the ghost over the phone. The ghost enters the correct order of key words then gives them directions to the next location.
The Ghost has a mobile device displaying a Google map with two points on it: one point represents the location of their Investigator, and the other shows the location of the memory site. They receive communication from the investigator through a phone call, but they can only respond by "knocking" via clicking a button on the interface. When the investigator reads them the text, they click on the "Memories" tab where they must enter in a three-number combination to solve the memory, and move to the next one.
Once three memories have been solved in this fashion, the investigator and ghost alike are directed to meet at a single location, where the player guides the ghost through the portal so that they can pass on.
Acknowledgments
The Game Passing On was created by Jacob Garbe, Marta Clavero Jiménez, Jon Back, and Sahar Vahdati during summer school “TOTEM Mobile Mixed Reality” Summer School in 2012 at Fraunhofer FIT.