Reflection

Having completed the prototype for the Invisible Maze; the thing that I consider the biggest success of the project is the completeness of the prototype. Through our combined efforts we have made something that actually could; with no further development be utilised in an installation. It is the scalability of the invisible Maze however, which I believe is its greatest strength. Though the prototype consists of only one floor with two alternate endings; it would be a simple matter of coding further floors, passageways and ultimately experiences. Similarly, the wall tiles were created in vector not only to compliment a Liechtenstein pop-art look but also so that they could be scaled infinitely without loss of quality, meaning this maze could as easily occupy a small room or an entire auditorium.

Something that I think would make the project even stronger as a finished piece would be a way of randomising the experience. Using vector components to construct new wall-tiles from reused props (eg. ‘Doorforwardtype2’ with ‘vasetype4’ on ‘walltype1’) a randomisation engine could generate new paths, rooms and the tiles for those options each time a player steps into the game. This would enure that no two experiences would ever be the same!

One of the things I feel we could have improved on is the conceptualisation and realisation of perspective. Representing different types of spaces accurately but still uniformly was one of the difficulties our concept presented us with. While we wanted the walls to present a 3d space by themselves, we didn’t wish for the tiles to appear flat. Thus there arose problems with overlap in tiles due to mock peripheral-vision on the walls. Similarly, the direction of the walls relative to the user and their motion suggested the use of lateral and unilateral perspective in different places, disturbing the uniformity of the styling.

All in all I think the project was hugely successful due largely to the effective distribution of development areas and the way each aspect complimented the others.