BLOCKOUT


Classical Blockout Game for Virtual Environment
Project duration: 1997-1998
Contact: Wolfgang Greimel, Zsolt Szalavari 

Description

 It is a implementation of the classical Blockout game for a augmented reality environments. 

Aim of the Game

 With the racket the player should hit the ball in a way that the ball hits all bricks on the wall. The game is over when all bricks are lying on the floor.

As there are falling bricks please wear a helmet :-) 

Control

 Hit the ball with the racket, just like table tennis or squash. Try to keep your hand fixed and make the movement with the arm. Due to the position of the sensor small rotation using only the hand do not result in a equivalent speed of the ball.

On top of the racket there is a small cone, which points to the ball. The length of the cone represents the distance to the ball.

There are 3 Buttons on the racket:

  • hit the upper button on the side of the racket to reset the ball

  • hit the lower button on the side of the racket to restart the game

  • hit the button on top of the racket to quit the game.

    		•  

    Keyboard Control

    		 the following keyboard inputs can be used:

  • D turn draft on / off
  • G turn gravity on / off
  • P print position of ball
  • Q quit game
  • R reset ball
  • S turn sound on / off
  • T turn ball movement around
  • SPACE stop ball movement 

    • Approach

    		 Using the Inventor Virtual Environment discription language a scene is created and connected to the virtual environment devices. Using engines and sensors the movement of the ball is tracked and collision with other objects in the scene graph are detected. The source code of the game is written in C/C++. 

    Files

    		 The default configuration is within the file "blockout.config". There the features as number of bricks, gravity, draft, and others are defined and can be modified to fit the users demands. When using values of different magnitudes the game may show a very strange behavior.

    The scene surrounding the game is withing the file "Vr_lab.iv". This file is written using the Inventor scene language (ASCII). It contains all objects except the background picture, bricks, ball and racket. When modifying this file please take notice that for a correct collision detection all objects must be in the leaves of the scene-tree. 

    Related Sites

    		 Personal Interaction Panel : Zs. Szalavari.

    Virtual Environment Group homepage

    Screenshots:

    the scene, simulating the VR-lab

    the same scene in wireframe-style, the walls are clearly visible

    detail of the game, some bricks have already been hit

    note the needle on top of the racket pointing to the ball

    datail of racket

    This page is maintained by Wolfgang Greimel. It was last updated on May 25, 1998.
    If you have any comments, please send a message to greimel@cg.tuwien.ac.at.