Herbert: a motion-controlled mobile game

Abstract

Smartphone games lack the hardware interface afforded by other gaming media like controllers for consoles, keyboard and mouse for PCs, joysticks and buttons on arcade cabinets, etc. As such, many popular games focus on puzzle mechanics using the touch screen interface, such as Angry Birds[1] or Cut the Rope[2]. We focused on skill-based, reactionary gameplay with an intuitive and unique control scheme in Herbert, where the player moves the character around the world by tilting the device and free oneself from traps by shaking the device. We did this in order to minimize on-screen GUI clutter found in other games such as OMG Pirates![3], Street Fighter IV[4] and Zombieville, USA[5] while retaining the challenge enjoyment, and intuitiveness of skill based gaming. The web version of the game can be played at: https://www.cs.drexel.edu/~amd435/Herbert_Web.html