"Le Secret d'Ityria", an adventure game combining game board and augmented reality

"Le Secret d'Ityria", the graduation project by Maxime Druart, Thomas Bagnolati, Guénolé Moreau, Ophélie Ostermeyer and Victor Soulié, graduates of the Master's degree in Design and Innovation Management in 2023, has been selected as part of Numok, the digital culture festival organized by the City of Paris libraries.

This game of enigmas and adventure invites players to explore a singular universe through a physical game board and augmented reality interactions.

A look back at the project with Maxime, Thomas and Victor.

Victor: It's an augmented reality adventure game played both on a physical board measuring around 80 by 60 centimeters, and on a tablet, via an app.

The app superimposes the game's characters, interactions and a few set elements onto the board.

Our role in "The Secret of Ityria" is toinvestigate the spread of a mysterious evil that is gradually destroying and poisoning living beings. To find the source, players will have to solve a series of enigmas.

Each of these takes the form of a mini-game using the mechanics of augmented reality.

Victor: I first came into contact with the festival when I was a post-graduate student at epsaa. I had produced an augmented reality project that was exhibited during the 2023 edition. I contacted the team again to tell them about "Ityria's Secret", and they were immediately interested in the concept.

Our game will be available to visitors free of charge at the Aimé Césaire library in the 14th arrondissement from Wednesday April 17 to Saturday May 4, 2024.

The Secret of Ityria" game board

Maxime: Our initial ambition in using augmented reality was to blur the boundary between the real and the digital as much as possible , to immerse users in our story in a unique way.

It was also an opportunity for us to test this medium, which isn't always easy to set up (Victor was the only one to have already worked on augmented reality projects).

The project enabled us to create both a physical and a virtual object, and to make them interact.

As "Le Secret d'Ityria" is a puzzle game, our aim was to avoid as far as possible imagining puzzles that could be solved without augmented reality. The player is constantly required to interact with the game board in order to advance. For example, they may blow behind a boat to move it forward, or use their phone as a gyroscope to orient themselves in a building.

The game also explores the physicality of the board and the player. Some puzzles will only work if the player is in the right place around the board.

Thomas: Our target audience is young teenagers. They can easily use a tablet, and they also tend to move back and forth between the physical and digital boards much more naturally.

In our user tests, we found that teenagers are much more comfortable moving around during the game, and are more in motion. Adults remain fairly static.

For the rest of the project, we'reaiming more at young adults. We'd like to develop the game into an installation or interactive experience to be presented at other festivals.

Ityria's Secret" application and tray

Thomas: We were 3 designers and 2 developers.

Initially, we put all our ideas together to try and make the most of augmented reality. Once we'd defined our story and game mechanics, we divided up the tasks according to our skills.

On the design side, Ophélie was in charge of the graphic charter, including the logo and symbols that form an integral part of our game's language. Victor designed and produced the game's physical boardand environments, and I took care of the characters and UI.

Maxime and Guénolé, the two developers, were in charge of setting up the interactions,integrating the 3D elements and designing the sound environment using Unity.

We also produced a number of elements together, notablythe characters' voices , which we recorded and mixed in the GOBELINS studio.

The game's music was composed by sound designer Adrien Melchior.

Victor: We'd like to finish the project, as the game is only 2/3 finished. We're looking for a structure (festival, art venues, libraries, mediatheques...) that could accompany us and enable us to offer a complete experience.

Once the game is finished, we'd like to find a board game or video game publisher. As augmented reality is still fairly new on the market, we're thinking about the best ways to make the game exist after the festival.

Practical information:

Numok 2024: Augmented reality adventure game, "Le Secret d'Ityria" (The Secret of Ityria)

Bibliothèque Aimé Césaire - 5 rue de Ridder, Paris 14e

Wednesday April 17 to Saturday May 4, 2024

Free admission