About the project

In the room-scale VR experience for the HTC Vive, visitors slip into the role of an up-and-coming surgeon of the future. Tasked to complete their final medical exam, players try to remove as many damaged blood vessels out of a dummy patient's organs in a simulated sci-fi surgery. To do that, they first have to examine the patient's body with a scanner and find an injury. They then get to control a nanobot that is injected into the affected organ. Equipped with two forceps loosely based on actual surgery equipment, players pull out the malicious vessels to earn points and beat the high score. A leader board allows for comparison to other participants and works as an incentive to try again and improve one's performance.

Players start the VR experience in a lobby where they have to place a key card into a corresponding slot, learning the basic interaction of grabbing and holding objects, which is used exclusively in various forms throughout the rest of the game.

In an attempt to offer obvious affordances, both the scanner and the nanobot injector have big handles that invite players to grab and interact with them.

To add a bit of extra challenge to the mini-game, there are two kinds of damaged blood vessels that can only be collected with either the left or the right forceps, indicated by their color. Score and time are conveniently displayed on the controller.

In addition to the final score and ranking, a trophy to grab and throw around is presented to the players as a small virtual reward after completing the surgery.