Game Information
| Title | The ROV Game (student-created game) |
| Presenter(s) | Peter Guenther |
| Session | Conference Reception, Game Exhibition, and Poster Session |
| Time | Wednesday, October 12, 7:00p-9:30p |
| Location | MSU Union Ballroom |
| Format | Game Exhibition |
| Screenshot |  |
| Description | The ROV Game is an educational game to introduce middle and early high school students to the process of engineering design and iteration by building and piloting underwater Remote Operated Vehicles. Essentially, it's Kerbal Space Program with underwater robots.
The game includes a lab where students can build an ROV by clicking nodes to add PVC pipes and connectors, similar to how many students build real-world ROVs for competitions like MATE, SeaPerch, and Square One Network's Underwater Innovative Vehicle Design Competition. After building the ROV, the student will be able to tune it in a tank in the lab, adding and adjusting floats to get to neutral buoyancy. Then they'll "wire" the thrusters to controls and take it into the pool to practice and compete. After they see how the design fares, they can take it back into the lab and modify it, learning to iterate a design for the best performance. I'm on course to have a fully playable version with a piloting orientation and two pool missions by mid-August 2022. Future plans include additional, increasingly challenging pool missions as well as "real-world" missions where students can test their ROVs in exciting outdoor contexts. |