Motion Sensor Football
A football game you steer by stepping left and right.
Built for live events and exhibitions. A camera follows the player in front of the screen, so there is nothing to hold and nothing to touch.
Overview
An endless runner on a football pitch, played with your whole body.
The player stands in front of a large screen and controls a footballer running down a 3D stadium pitch, kicking the ball as he goes. Step left and he changes lane to the left. Step right and he goes right. Obstacles come down all three lanes, and trophies give bonus points.
The run speeds up the longer you last. That keeps each turn short, and it gives the people waiting in line something to watch.
How it plays
Three steps, no instructions needed.
- 01Step upThe camera picks up whoever is standing in front of the screen. No controller, no sign-up.
- 02MoveWhere you stand, left, centre or right, is the lane the runner takes.
- 03Keep goingThe pitch speeds up until you hit an obstacle. Then it resets for the next player.
How it's built
A webcam, a tracking program and the game, on one machine.
A standard webcam watches the player. A Python program reads each frame, finds the player's body and shoulders, and decides whether they're standing left, centre or right. It sends that to the game as a single word.
The game is built in Unity. It moves the footballer into the lane it was told, keeps the kicking animation running, and spawns obstacles and trophies at random in each lane.
- Unity (C#)
- Python + OpenCV
- Standard webcam
- Local socket link
What was hard
Three things that made it hard.
- 01Only a webcamThere's no depth sensor, so position had to be read from an ordinary camera image, in whatever lighting the hall has.
- 02Moving or just swayingA small wobble could flip the runner between lanes, so a real step had to be told apart from noise.
- 03Keeping it in syncThe tracker and the game run at different speeds, and any delay between them is felt straight away.
Setup
What a stand needs.
- A large screen or LED wall
- A standard webcam facing the player
- One PC running the game and the tracking
- A clear patch of floor wide enough for three lanes
Bring your own screens and we build for them, or we source and build the hardware as part of the project. Graphics, characters, language and branding are all redone for each client.
Start a project
Have an exhibition or a launch coming up?
Send the date, the venue and what you want visitors to do or remember. We'll come back with an idea for your stand and what it would take to build.