Archive for the ‘Serious Games’ Category

Serious Games Portfolio Showcase – New site section opened

Tuesday, March 19th, 2013

Maybe you know about us because of hit mobile games such as :shift:, IndestructoTank, Paf Le Chien, After Burner Climax or Slash Monsters. Maybe you came to this blog because you’re a long-time Creatures fan and you’re dying for updates about upcoming Creatures 4 on PC, MAC, iOS and Android. What you might not know is that behind the scenes, for the last three years already, more and more companies have turned to Fishing Cactus for research and development on lots of Serious Gaming projects that have an impact either on resource management and staff training or on very important society sectors, such as health for example.

If you’re interested in leveraging video games for the greater good, we invite you to take a tour of our Serious Cactus site, where you’ll find our biggest past projects presented in great detail, with videos, screenshots and explanations. There you’ll also find information about the reputable clients who have trusted us with their plans so far, as well as our philosophy when approaching to Serious Games and our scope of technological expertise.

Fishing Cactus talking Serious Games and Creatures 4 on Belgian national TV channel, RTL-TVi. Click on the Closed Captions icon at the bottom edge of the frame to activate English subtitles.

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Posted in Announcement, Serious Games | 4 Comments »

Algo-Bot – How does a robot think?

Monday, January 7th, 2013

So we’ve established that Algo-Bot is a game that will teach you the logic of programming. How are we going to do that without being dull and boring? That’s a very good question, and one that we actually asked ourselves when we took on the project. Luckily enough, we think we found the answer.

In Algo-Bot, you’re given control of a little robot dude. You don’t control him directly, you don’t make him jump on mushrooms by pressing a single button either. Instead, you set up a sequence of orders for him: go straight, turn left, go straight again, turn right, etc … . When you’re done creating your little sequence, you pass it onto the robot: it will go around the power plant, following your orders. In a nutshell, the player manipulates sequential commands to order Algo-Bot around in an attempt to reach the given goal of the level.

Of course, your little robot can’t just roam freely, it has a job to perform. It must carry around toxic containers, sort them out and re-arrange them, and call on smaller robots to help him when he has too much. And you have to provide him with orders for every step that he takes.

Imagine the following situation: you have to get your robot around a specific arranged path, and you can see that this path is repeated a few times along a mission. What you have to do thus is to create a separate sequence of orders that you call each time you want the robot to go through that path. Exactly like how functions work in real programming! By solving small problems in the game, you’re learning the logic behind it all. You’ll be able to play with programming concepts such as variables, functions, conditions and groups.

So that’s our Algo-Bot for you. We’re currently in finalization stage with this Serious Game and we hope to deliver it by the end of the month. Be sure to check it out when it comes out! We’ll of course keep you abreast when it does.

 

 

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Posted in Algo-Bot, Game Design, Presentations, Programming, Serious Games, Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

Algo-Bot – The Game About Coding a Game

Thursday, January 3rd, 2013

Have you ever wanted to learn programming, but were too intimidated to give it a try? Were you turned off by the logic intricacies that programming requires? Well, here at Fishing Cactus, we are currently working on a Serious Game that will help you with that. The game is about Algo-bot, a cool little robot that’s here to teach you the basics of coding. So, grab your cup of coffee, here the story begins.

A few months ago, Technobel tasked us with making a game that would be used at their training center. So we set out to create a game that will help people grasp the essential skills of logic that the programming craft requires. And that’s how our little Algo-bot was born. 

 

 

The Algo-bot world is one of leaking toxic containers, industrial crates and stubborn little robots. It takes place inside an unspecified power plant, in an unspecified future, with an unspecified number of hazardous things waiting for you. Fortunately, there is one thing that is specified: the gameplay!

We know how hard it can sometimes be to wrap one’s head around some of the concepts of programming (been there, done that, bought the t-shirt), so we made sure that you were appropriately supervised.

There are two characters in Algo-bot that will help you throughout the game: Tina, and the Director. Tina is the mechanical engineer of the power plant. She’s not afraid of getting her hands dirty, works hard, and likes to crack a good joke once in awhile. She’s there to help you learn the basics of the game and give you some tips when you get overwhelmed.

The director, as his name suggests, is the big boss of the power plant. He’s not funny. He’s stubborn and only concerned about one thing: efficiency in programming. He will remind you of that fact whenever an opportunity for optimization presents itself.

Next post, our designer will take you through the gameplay mechanics of Algo-bot right in this column. Come back for more later ;-)

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Posted in Algo-Bot, Presentations, Programming, Serious Games | 1 Comment »

Best Wishes For 2013 and Happy Holidays

Wednesday, December 26th, 2012

 

Time has come to thank every single person who supported Fishing Cactus during this smashing year. Last year, we were in a hurry for sharing our wishes but this time, and because it’s beginning to look a lot like 2013 (and because we survived the 21st of December of course!), it seems like it’s the right time to have a look at what we have done this year and what’s coming for the new year.

 

Walking on a Cactus Wonderland

The time when we’ll put our spiky foot on the floor of the Fishing Cactus brand new building is approaching. Santa signed our loans and validated our plans. All we have to do now is to place the first concrete block. Planned for early 2013, we’ll of course celebrate it accordingly!

Fishing Cactus goes to China in 2013

Fishing Cactus just signed for a video games training in China from the 4th to the 15th of March. For the occasion, one Artist and one Game Designer will fly to Asia to represent us there and coordinate small art teams (think GameJam).

Tales From the gaming trenches

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when at the glow of their screens, the cacti asked themselves: “what have we done this year?”

First of all, we worked for a very well-known publisher (soon to be announced). The work we have been delivering opens us doors to other collaborations. You’ll learn more about the game by the end of January.

We collaborated with Reak-Lab and White Laser Games on a web browser game called Thormae. It should reach beta stage just before February. The team in charge of the game has spoiled their baby and it is now time to see all pieces come together for the final polishing phase.

Next, we are quite glad to say that Creatures 4 which we have been developing with Big Ben Interactive for more than a year is finally on a roll. After quite long wait, we are on the verge of signing a distribution deal with a big player in the online games industry who will be responsible for the distribution of C4.

Then, as many of you already know, Fishing Cactus has been working for a while on Serious Gaming. Our passion and our faculty to simply turn serious things into awesome games, gave us the opportunity to work on many different projects this year.

One of those projects that makes us very proud is called Algo-bot. The game aims to teach you, in a very Fishing Cactus fun way, the basics of programming logic. But we’ll tell you more about it on a next post :-)

 

 

Last word

As you can guess, it has been a very interesting year and from the team point of view, things have been rockin’ around the Christmas Tree! Best wishes for 2013 and have a happy holiday!

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Posted in Christmas, Company Life, Creatures 4, Serious Games, Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

Serious Game Conference Belgium May 26

Monday, May 9th, 2011

Hi all,

For those who don’t know about this Event, the Second Belgian Serious Game conference will happen on May 26th in Louvain la Neuve @ Aula Magna.

This edition promises to be grant, lots of talks, partners and different interactions, even though almost everything will be in French.

Fishing Cactus will do a live Demo of R.O.G.E.R and will have a stand with demos of our latest Serious games so don’t hesitate to come say hi!

Posted in Announcement, Events, Presentations, Serious Games | No Comments »

Fishing Cactus will Present R.O.G.E.R at Games for Health in Boston!

Tuesday, April 19th, 2011

Great news! We’ve been invited to present our Kinect Serious game, R.O.G.E.R at the cognitive and emotional health track at the Games beyond entertainment week 2011 in Boston on May 19th!

It will be the occasion to share our experience on the project, talk about our relationship with the therapists and the Microsoft Innovation Center, and why not, find investors to support the rest of the project!

Posted in Announcement, Events, R.O.G.E.R., Serious Games, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Safety Measures, how to learn about Safety and Security in a Serious game

Monday, February 28th, 2011

Hi There,

We have this crazy idea that learning about your safety and the of the ones who surround you on your place of work should be fun.

What we don’t like:

- 2 hour video on VHS from the 80′s with an awful voice telling you what to do when the building is on fire

- Super 8 hour boring traning were you have to listen to the same guy from 10 years ago with his powerpoint 98 slides

- Text Quizzes that test your safety skills and give your good grades because you studied well

What we Love

-Video Games

-Natural interfaces (Kinect, PS Move, sound recognition)…

-Serious games that use the latest technology to make your life safer

-Active experience in which you play with your friends, gain points, get better

-A game in which you are the center of the experience, a place where you can make mistake and see the result of them

 

That’s why we are working on Safety Measures, the most Unique Security and safety Serious game, letting you play with your colleagues to make your workplace safer whilst having fun doing it.

 

We are looking for industrial partners who want to join the adventure and be the first in the world to integrate the most innovative Safety Serious game to date.

Are you the one? Drop us an email: contact@fishingcactus.com

Posted in Announcement, Game Design, Programming, Safety Measures, Serious Games | No Comments »

R.O.G.E.R In Game Demo

Tuesday, December 28th, 2010

Hi there,

As you all know, our Kinect Serious game R.O.G.E.R has made quite a name for itself, we thought it would be a nice idea to show you a little bit how it looks inside the game.

It’s quite simple, patients are asked to fill their luggage for a specific destination (Sun, mountain,…). The Therapists are able to follow their moves and actions in the environment and try to get a feeling of any problem that may arise (spatial awareness, logic, rationality,…)

We hope this will give a good enough feedback to the therapists so they may not have to take patients to “test” appartments to see if their mental abilities are still accurate enough to let them live by themselves.

Posted in Announcement, R.O.G.E.R., Serious Games | 2 Comments »

Kinect for Medical and Healthcare Apps

Monday, November 22nd, 2010

Just to confirm what Fishing Cactus started with R.O.G.E.R project using Kinect. Here is an interesting discussion on PublicSector.com.

In discussions with researchers, developers, and customers, they report at least four broad areas of health/medicine within which technologies like Kinect can be applied:

(1) Physical therapy and rehabilitation: As described above, your device can verify who you are, measure what you’re doing, and connect you to your doctor(s) in various ways. There are probably positive effects of this technology on medical conditions that we can’t quite envision yet; One early “success story” in this regard involves Kinect and child autism.

(2) Telemedicine: There are many ways in which medicine can be performed remotely using something like Kinect. Features like the ability to interface with other video chat platforms like Windows Live Messenger allow general hands-free communications while walking around a room – or even the outdoors.

(3) Medical training and education: Everyone knows that doctors go through lots of instruction before they become “doctors.” Technology like Xbox and Kinect can be used not just for remote learning, but also to display virtual human patients that are interacted with through motion-sensing. Virtual teachers can take students through a digital gross anatomy course (no formaldahyde, either).

(4) Neurocogitive and psychological practices: Whether it’s the ability to visualize and analyze brain images taken through Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), or to perform group psychological therapy with some people with the counselor in person and some remote, there are immense possibilities here.

Full article can be found at the following URL: http://sectorpublic.com/2010/11/xbox-kinect-applications-to-health-and-medicine/

Posted in R.O.G.E.R., Serious Games, Uncategorized | No Comments »