Delphi - a touchscreen video game art installation for galleries and museums.
Viewers can explore a contemporary interpretation of the ancient Greek site of Delphi, home of a mythical oracle.
The Delphi gallery installation, designed for museums and cultural centers, gives each visitor about ten minutes to explore Delphi and visit the oracle to get a personalized message. The installation is easy to use, and accessible for general audiences of all ages and degrees of experience.
Two cubes (or a cube and a chair) are placed on a 7cm high, 2m square plinth stage; the large cube is a ventilated cabinet and tabletop for a touchscreen, the other cube is a seat. As players step up onto the plinth to interact with the touchscreen to explore the virtual world, they enter the installation observed by the other gallery visitors who watch the interaction on large video screens around them, displaying the virtual environment of Delphi onto the gallery walls, with soft, ambient sound of the Greek countryside and occasional interactive events.
Delphi requires controlled lighting and electricity, between 50-500 sq meters, large video displays, audio, plinth, and two cubes (or cube and chair) as above. An area of about 500 square meters is optimal, although smaller is possible. A CAVE version of Delphi is currently being researched.
Visitors can explore the environment in and around the hills and monuments of Delphi. By artificial intelligence, Delphi responds by AI to each visitors style of play, actions, responses, and behavior, choosing a classic Delphic maxim (150 Delphic maxims drawn from historical and literary sources) for each player in turn.
Unzip Delphi_Oracle_install.zip into a Windows folder to create a folder called Delphi_Oracle and its contents.
Change directories to browse into the Delphi_Oracle folder, and double-click on Delphi_Oracle.exe to play Delphi. If Microsoft Smartscreen asks to prevent an unrecognized app, click More info, and click Run anyway.
With mouse or touchscreen you can move and interact onscreen;
Slow or stop, left mouse button or touch the center of the screen
Move forward, mouse button or touch center top of screen (higher = faster)
Move backward, mouse button or touch center bottom of screen (lower = faster)
Turn right, mouse or touch right side of screen
Turn left, mouse or touch left side of screen
Look up and down, left and right mouse buttons together (or two fingers)
A touchscreen makes it feel very immersive, and a mouse also works just fine too.
Currently working to run Delphi in the CAVE software for CAVE systems.
Delphi is first and foremost a work of contemporary art and an interpretive reconstruction of a cultural treasure for everyone. Looking for a contemporary art gallery where I can premiere it.
-benb
copyright 2022 Benjamin Britton
June 14, 2022
all rights reserved
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