An Interactive Immersive Serious Game Application for Kunyu Quantu World Map

Abstract

In recent years, more and more digital technologies and innovative concepts are applied on museum education. One of the concepts applied is “Serious game.” Serious game is not designed for entertainment purpose but allows users to learn real world’s cultural and educational knowledge in the virtual world through game-experiencing. Technologies applied on serious game are identical to those applied on entertainment game. Nowadays, the interactive technology applications considering users’ movement and gestures in physical spaces are developing rapidly, which are extensively used in entertainment games, such as Kinect-based games. The ability to explore space via Kinect-based games can be incorporated into the design of serious game. The ancient world map, Kunyu Quantu, from the collection of the National Palace Museum is therefore applied in serious game development. In general, the ancient world map does not only provide geological information, but also contains museum knowledge. This particular ancient world map is an excellent content applied in games as teaching material. In the 17th century, it was first used by a missionary as a medium to teach the Kangxi Emperor of the latest geologic and scientific spirits from the West. On this map, it also includes written biological knowledge and climate knowledge. Therefore, this research aims to present the design of the interactive and immersive serious game based installation that developed from the rich content of the Kunyu Quantu World Map, and to analyse visitor’s experience in terms of real world’s cultural knowledge learning and interactive responses.