Do you Indie? Whether the answer is yes or no, you more than likely just thought of video game graphics. Some gamers only go in for high end interactions- gaming was originally intended to be a virtual experience, a platform for entertainment that came with a user interface. Some of us are perfectly happy with a great story that has the emotional distance that 8 or 16 bit provides (or Flash).

Either way there is an artistic element to video games that's unique. Adult learners have the hardest time with a computer because they can't touch the objects they're working with (hence all the hype about hand eye coordination). Once they conquer that hurdle, the next problem is user interface. That's true for work as well as play.

Programmers have a real problem properly using empty spaces, because in the programming world they don't exist. What you run into time and again, causing parsing error after parsing error, is overlap. As a result programmers come up short when they translate polygonal interaction into a three dimensional video game.

The short version of the problem (also seen in 2D, although less so), is that programmers don't measure the distance from an object to the interface avatar (your character), they only measure the other way around. This creates a flat and unreal experience which causes the player to walk into things, makes for a herky jerky walking mode, and makes backgrounds lack depth. The fix is simple, you just take the programming formulas that create avatar reaction to an object and reverse them.

Level design becomes key at this point, but upgrades to game engines should also stay on your radar.

What you do with object to character interaction is anything but simple. It gives you a tool to measure reaction- instead of just action. As the avatar approaches an object a threshold is reached which starts triggering flags- stored in the object, not the avatar. In turn the avatar reacts to the object. It's almost unheard of, but incredible for creating user experiences.

If you're wondering why your favorite games- Detroit Become Human, Dragon Age, Miitopia - didn't originally dominate the gaming scene, this is part of it. They promise a fully emotional immersive experience, but fail to deliver because the avatar doesn't let you know how it feels about its environment. It's an area where TellTale excels- because they substitute cut scenes.

Will we hit the point where developers create an avatar experience? No one knows. They stuck their toes in the water with Bioshock III and Dreamfall, but no one has really tapped into the idea fully. For now we're stuck in story mode- which isn't entirely unpleasant. We get bonus chapters of popular media like Game of Thrones as a trade off. Total win.

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