Overview / Usage

Blindspot is an Entertainment Technology Center (ETC) project in partnership with the Data-Driven Diversity Lab (D3) at Carnegie Mellon University. D3 uses data and insights from psychology and behavioral economics to understand how different groups experience student success, thriving, and a sense of belonging at Carnegie Mellon University. Using D3’s insights, our team (Shengyao Xiao, Xiaoyu Cui, Boyuan Lu, Yuanqin Fan, and Haiyun Wu) created an interactive transformational experience that aims to raise awareness and inspire action to counteract the negative impact of stereotypes and microaggressions that emerge in everyday contexts.

The deliverable is a 2D web-based game that tells a story of a Chinese girl, Meimei, who just arrived in America and experiences microaggressions in her college life. Meimei is upset and hesitant at the beginning when facing those issues. Playing Meimei, the player picks choices and different branches follow, where Meimei learns to use research-proven techniques to better deal with those issues. As the game progresses, Meimei becomes stronger and eventually stays true to who she is.

In terms of the game structure, it firstly shows a prologue that introduces the background of the protagonist. Then it follows three chapters that happen in different university scenes: the classroom, dining hall, and apartment. In each chapter, the player's choices result in different story branches, puzzles, and endings of the chapter. Finally, an ending cutscene summarizes the whole experience.

The game is now delivered to the client (D3). It will facilitate D3's research, workshops, and teaching.

Methodology / Approach

The game is a semester-long project developed by team Blindspot that consists of a designer, an artist, a writer, a programmer, and a producer. Using Agile development methodology, the team worked together from pitching, story scripting, design, development, iterating, testing, to handoff.

• Weekly team meetings to set up sprint milestones and distribute tasks
• Daily scrum team meetings to update the progress of the individual task
• Weekly client meeting to update the progress to the client and receive feedback
• Weekly instructor meeting to receive advice from instructors
• Playtests and iterations are practiced throughout the semester

As the experience is about a Chinese girl, one of the important aspects is to keep the authenticity. The team (all Chinese students) wrote the story based on personal experiences and researches. The voice-over of Meimei is created by one of the team members. The team also leaned on the client's knowledge of microaggressions and transformational games.

Technologies Used

Programming

• Unity3D
• Git/GitHub
• Google Form API
• Visual Studio Code

Art

• Photoshop
• Procreate
• Maya
• Premiere
• Adobe Illustrator

Repository

https://github.com/michaelbylu/Blindspot

Other links

• Edited Demo Video
• Project Website
• Playable Demo