Possession techniques for interaction in real-time strategy augmented reality games

• Authors: Keith Phillips;Wayne Piekarski
• Venue: Proceedings of the 2005 ACM SIGCHI International Conference on Advances in computer entertainment technology
• Year: 2005

There have been a number of interactive games created for Augmented Reality (AR) environments. In this paper, interaction techniques to support Real-Time Strategy (RTS) games in AR environments are investigated. One limiting factor is that the user's position within the virtual environment must correspond to their position in the physical world. If it is obvious to the user there is no correspondence between the two, the illusion of a consistent environment will be broken. The primary problem with adapting an RTS game for an AR environment is that the player will need to manage a large force of life-sized military units, which cannot be done effectively if the user is confined to what they can see and how fast they can move in the physical world. In this paper, we introduce the use of AR-VR transitions and a new technique that is called possession, which attempts to address these problems. Possession essentially gives the player the ability to move inside the head of any of their units. This allows the user to see everything that is visible to that unit, and manage their forces with the usual interface even though they are detached from their own body. The possession technique allows control of units over large ranges, makes micromanagement of distant groups possible, and implements realistic views of the world that match what a user would expect in the physical world. Our user interface supports a more realistic interface than is possible in traditional desktop games. Our new techniques were implemented in an operational AR-RTS game that we have named ARBattleCommander.