D I S A S T E R O I D
A collaborative AR game, aiming to save the world.
D E M O
Welcome to the Demo of the collaborative AR game Disasteroid!
Play the video and have fun!
Goals & motivations
The goal of Disasteroid is to make fun dark humor themed collaborative AR game. The game involves the player to save the earth from asteroids using missiles and a special weapon. Creating missiles and the special weapon involves using resources from the earth. The player, therefore, has to deal with the dilemma of whether or not they are actually saving the earth.
Graphics
Disasteroid is an earth-based game. It involves low poly earth. The earth is painted according to a vegetation map to give the player information about the population density. The player can then try to deflect the asteroids in a less dense area.
Interaction
The game is supported on Android 7.0 'Nougat' (API Level 24) or higher. The game is meant to be played by multiple people working as a team. An image based marker as a single source of truth for all players was used to avoid any pre-mapping of the playing environment before every game session. Using Photon networking package for Unity with smart compensation for any lag in the network, smooth and synchronized asteroid motion, impacts and player interactions are achieved, allowing for a truly immersive real-time multiplayer experience in AR on a whole room scale.
3D Models
A satellite with a gun on top of it was 3D printed to represent the special weapon. A image was attached to it in order to be able to track the satellite on the AR scene.
Technologies
Challenges & Lesson Learned
One of the main challenges was the multiplayer mechanics. Because of the nature of the game the AR scene has to be consistent from the players' viewpoint. While most of the physics simulations are run locally on each phone , a centralized master node is employed, processing game events and providing authoritative positioning data to all the clients for correction of any possible discrepancies.
Arturs Kurzemnieks
Technical lead for the project. Implemented the networking and synchronization of all objects and events in the game to ensure a consistent multiplayer experience, as well as parts of the user interactions, including satellite spawning and missile mechanics.
