XR Projects
July-August. 2023
The following are a series of prototypes, prefabs, and interactive game objects intended originally as a series of micro assignments for the XR Bootcamp. The primary focus was to better understand C#, Unity, the XR Interaction Toolkit and how to build unique interactable objects; however, I took the opportunity to go a step further and model the objects with their programmed components in mind.
Each interactable asset was modeled using a style that combines organic fluid modeling, minimalism, and inspiration from gaming styles that leverages the LED/RGB aesthetic in a functional way by programming colors to signal events and affordances for the user.
Tools
Unity 2022.3f1
Rhino 3D
C#
XR Interaction Toolkit
VFX Graph
Figma
Meta Quest Pro
Download from Meta App Lab
Process
The foundation series of the XR Bootcamp provided a follow-along project to build a stealth Maze Game accompanied by a series of interaction-based assignments along the way where these interactive elements were built around.
In addition to the Planet-Z interaction showcase, the Stealth Maze project includes a handful of custom elements and branded elements including music, the Planet-Z Signature Mood Ring, Proximity Mine Model & UI Color Activation Programming, Dissolve Shader and automation for the Mood Ring Keys and more.
Gravity Arms
These interactables can manipulate the gravity of a list of objects to pull or push them towards sphere colliders fixed to the ends of both plungers. Gravity strength can be adjusted in the inspector
Neon Cleaver
A cleaver that can be thrown and recalled back to your hand when pressing down on the grip after release.
Laser Pistol
A laser pistol with grab and activate actions to fire using hand controllers. Bullet prefabs instantiated from the chamber can be swapped out and bullet speed & force can be adjusted as well.
Drone Target Hunt Booth
A simple shooting target booth complete with moving drone targets that can be destroyed via laser pistol. Score is kept with a simple UI and can be reset using the rig's ray interactor.
Dragonfly Drone
A drone that can move across a NavMesh, has hovering, obstacle detection & avoidance parameters, can follow a set patrol route and self-correction if knocked off course by an externality
Black Hole Grenade Launcher
Grenade launcher with a socket interactable to load, UI indicator when empty, Debug ray visual. When launched; will pull a list of objects towards the grenade and after a set time, will burst and randomly distribute the objects.
Further Development
As XR grows in popularity, I think many companies, brands and studios will find themselves designing their own XR-Design Systems, assets and customized prefabs that have specific focus and function across the extended reality ecosystems.
These XR Prefab assets have potential to replace or augment existing hardware or physical products in ways that wouldn't be possible or scalable and have the added benefit of being "Updateable".
For this reason, I'd like to continue to use this Interaction Showcase application in the future as an iterative space to test, demonstrate, train, and continue to innovate and deploy a unique class of "Metaverse"-related products produced by Planet-Z.
Known Issues
Frame rate is slow on lower-end devices
BH Grenade Launcher projectile's initial gravity too low
BH Grenade Launcher crank charge Interaction not set up
Gravity Pull Arm physics aren't strong enough on standalone to lift pull objects
Neon Cleaver collides early and freezes mid-air sometimes
Neon Cleaver throw physics are rigid & need more rotation
Laser Pistol Bullets aren't destroyed immediately on collision
Reset UI Canvas for games are duplicated
Dial-Interactable Vault isn't complete
Not compatible with hand-tracking
Ring Toss Throw Physics too strong
Ring Toss point system not set up
Tracklist UI doesn't appear, only loops Mahattan Beach
Credits
Drone Hunt Explosion VFX: Jean Moreno
Starfield Skybox Texture: Dilapidated Meow
Glassmorphic UI Graphics: Apple visionOS Design Resources
SFX: Splice Sounds, XRB
Maze Podiums Objects: Creepy Cat
Music: Zahid Planet
3D Modeling: Zahid Pasha
Maze Robot: XRB
Cover Image: Dall-E