‘The Knights Neo and Nato’ is a game developed for the brothers and sisters of hospitalised newborns, to provide them with information and at the same time increase their wellbeing and involvement. Secondly, I want to encourage them to visit the baby, prepare them for this and ensure that the visit has a positive impact.
It is part of the bigger project ‘Neoparent’ of Odisee University College, in collaboration with Luca School of Arts, the Ghent University Hospital and the Brussels University Hospital. It is a project about Neonatology, with which we want to help the family – parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters – of hospitalised newborns. As designer of the team - I already designed the app for the parents - I was asked by the project leader to make something for the brothers and sisters. Eventually, the game will be used at the Neonatology Departments of Flemish hospitals.
Level 4: Play the game yourself!
This is developed for the Ipad generation 6. The game isn't properly responsive yet.
How does it work
To appeal to the children’s imagination, I created a game world that exists out of a mix between reality and fantasy, by using children’s drawings. The player travels as a knight through the hospital and choose what subjects they want to learn about. The game informs them about the situation and what they can do to help.
Screens from the game
Promotion
As a way of promotion I made the advertising video you can see above and a postcard on which you can find some information and an augmented reality link. When you surf to the link with a tablet or phone and point your camera at the image on the back of the postcard, you will see the two main characters of the game in 3D. I presented the game on the Graduation Show of LUCA School of Arts, on which I handed out a variation of the postcard (in English and more of a business card).
Business card on Graduation Show with AR
Postcard in Dutch (also with AR if you use a device)
Graduation Show LUCA
Research
Evy Vervaet, Midwifery student, conducted the literature study, we interviewed experts and we held a classroom discussion with 7-year-olds. I used their drawings in the game. I combined my educational knowledge from my previous job as a teacher, with my graphical knowledge about storytelling, animation and 3D. I also learned a lot of new things, e.g. programming in Javascript.
The first version was tested by a few children (some of them tested the game on the Graduation Show of LUCA):
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