Jom and Terry
Inspired by the classic animated show Tom and Jerry, we created a one-dimensional game with customized controllers that plays with the well-known dynamic of cat and mouse. We substitute the roles of chasing or being chased in a one-dimensional setting, which shapes our representations of familiar objects.
Jom and Terry
2022
Annie Dong, Quincy Kuang
Tools: VS Code, 3D Printer
Game Elements:
1) The gray object is Jom, the cat. His goal is to catch Terry, the brown pixel. He is bigger and moves much faster.
2) The brown pixel is Terry, the mouse. His goal is to get to the cheese, which is the yellow pixel. Terry is smaller and covers less ground than Jom when he moves, but...
3) Terry can use the mouseholes (the black pixels), which the cat is too big to fit in. These mouseholes will teleport the mouse to another mousehole using a key/button press.
4) Catching the cheese is how Terry wins. The yellow pixel will teleport every few seconds to a random location to prevent the cat from camping at the cheese.
5) Finally, every time the game starts a new round, it completely randomizes the location of the players, the mousehole portals, and the cheese. Sometimes this leads to very lucky (or unfair) starting places for players - and this unpredictability is part of the fun!
How we started:
Our goal was to create a one-dimensional video game. We brainstormed many ideas, but settled on a cat and mouse game because we wanted a competitive two-player game. We began by coding the game using Javascript.
Then, we thought about our controllers. We wanted a symbiotic representation of the codependency of Tom and Jerry. Without one, the other loses purpose. We wanted our controllers to fit together, so that in order to interact with them, you either had to separate them or put them back together. We also wanted the controllers to reflect the characteristics of the characters, and also affect gameplay through size, awkwardness and buttons/joysticks.
Here is some of our initial brainstorming:
We played around with different representations of a 1D interface, as well as literal/abstract controller designs
Part 1:
The first portion of our project was spent coding all the elements - the controllers, portals, cheese, etc. Without physical controllers yet, players controlled the characters using keyboard letters. Final touches were made by adding sound effects, and a "floor" for the characters to run on.
Part 2:
We knew that we wanted controllers that fit together and also affected gameplay in a way that reflected the characteristics of a cat or a mouse. We decided that cat's controller should be large with a joystick, and the mouse's controller should be small with small buttons. Both controllers are intentionally strange to use, to make the game competitive and amusingly reminiscent of their real life counterparts.
We found a design that allowed both controllers to comfortably fit together and modeled initial prototypes.
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Our technical prototype: styrofoam with buttons and joystick
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Our artistic prototype: clay
Inspired by Méret Oppenheim, we decided to make our design more visually interesting - and a bit unsettling - by adding fur.
Meret Oppenheim
Object
Paris, 1936
We 3D printed the controllers, and did a bit of coding to translate key presses to button presses and joystick clicks. Magnets are embedded in each controller so Jom and Terry can stick together. Then, we added fur!
The fur patterns
Exploded view of the controllers
Jom and Terry in action!
(other people playing our game at the end)
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