Inspiration
We were inspired by the TV show Squid Games where Computer Vision and AI were used in a modernized Child-Like Game of Red-light Green-light. We believe computer vision and AI interactive games is the trend for the gaming market as we see the rise of VR games, so we felt this was the perfect opportunity to begin exploring this field!
What it does
The user(you) represent the character Santa who is on his mission to deliver gifts once he comes down the Chimney. The Webcam of your computer sees your movements and translates them into the movements of Santa, where the objective is to not be caught by little Johnny as he randomly turns around. Johnny isn't wearing his glasses, so deciphering still objects/people is difficult for him, but when he sees moving objects he can tell who it is! Thats why its important that Santa doesn't move when Johnny turns around!
How we built it
We used Node.js,React and Python to employ the Computer vision aspect that can translate our visual movements through out webcam into actual movements in the game in real time. ,HTML/CSS/Javascript were used for the aesthetic and visual elements of the game, along with a little help from photoshop.
Challenges we ran into
Creating a real time translation between the movements of the user and the character in the screen proved to be initially difficult as any lag in a time-sensitive game can ruin it. We fixed this issue by accommodating for the delays by creating a turn delay for Johnny that matches the movement delay from the webcam. We used optimization softwares to calculate run-time for the movements along with those of johnny (203 ms avg), to match the two.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We are really proud we were able to make a fully functional video game in our first attempt using Computer Vision! Also we are really proud of how well we collaborated and were able to split up roles/tasks.
What we learned
We learned how to tackle projects in game development, how to collaborate and use Github to track our progress, as well as general coding experience in Python to make games with the Webcam/vision functionality.
What's next for Untitled
We aim to create fully integrated, multiplayer games using the same concept of Red-Light Green Light, where we can relive our very own childhood games! We think that much farther down the line, if we can integrate this into VR, it would be as if we were playing with each other in person! There's really a multitude of possibilities using Computer Vision but these are very viable avenues.