Austin Batsy VR Project

Our VR game aims at creating insights into the lives of bats and the vital role they play in ensuring ecological balance along with the dangers to their survival.

Through this game, we hope to understand the nature of the impact of a VR game and that of gamifying experiences for pedagogy, as opposed to the non-use of any game or the use of a standard 2D or 3D game. The goal is also to specifically study the immediate emotional impact, empathy, and the willingness to adhere to implicit and explicit calls for climate justice and the protection of bats in a VR game.

The ideal version of this game would be curated to teach more about bats while maintaining the fun of the VR experience. We would like to incorporate more interactions with turbines, flowers, insects, and humans. There would also be a mode called the ‘Texas Freeze’ which, when launched, would slow down the game and make it harder for the player to find food and warm shelter, as has been the case for long stretches recently due to increasingly colder and prolonged winters. These elements would help the player gain a better understanding of the complex experience of a bat exposed to “bat-phobia” and a changing climate.