We present Pingball, an audio-based mobile game that makes the classic experience of a physical pinball machine accessible to everyone, including those with visual impairments or complete blindness. Pingball keeps the essential game mechanics of traditional pinball, but both the game design and the level design were totally overhauled, to be playable without any visuals. This was accomplished by building every feature from the ground up using only sonification techniques, such as shifting pitches and varying volumes, and spatialization techniques, such as moving audio sources through three-dimensional space. The level design makes use of a broad stereo-field by having a widened playing area featuring gameplay objectives spread over different locations. Evaluation has shown the game was considered quite playable and enjoyable by players both with and without a visual impairment.

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Unlike classical physics, quantum physics is harder to explain, as it involves very small scales and phenomena that are not visible to the naked eye. Understanding the differences between classical and quantum physics is difficult, especially for children, who cannot grasp the subtleties conveyed in complicated formulae.

We propose to achieve this in a playful and immersive manner, which is a more familiar and convenient way to introduce children to new concepts. For this we developed Save Schrödinger’s Cat, a puzzle game in virtual reality featuring a classical physics mode and a quantum physics mode. As virtual objects and phenomena behave differently in each mode, this mechanic encourages players to toggle between modes, in order to explore the differences between quantum and classical physics in an immersive, entertaining and challenging way. A preliminary evaluation showed that players could better identify various distinguishing features of either mode.@en