Robin Hunicke, the CEO of Funomena and a well-known game designer, unveiled a demo of a planting game called Luna: Moondust Garden on the Magic Leap One Creator Edition augmented reality glasses.
I tried out the demo at the Magic Leap L.E.A.P. event in Los Angeles. It used the same characters and art style of Luna, Funomena’s virtual reality game that came out on platforms like the Oculus Rift VR headset. In a recent interview, Hunicke said she enjoys being on the cutting edge of design and working with emerging platform makers.
With this demo, Magic Leap has the gardening genre of video games covered. The company showed off Luna: Moondust Garden and Insomniac’s The Seedling. In both games, you have to plant seeds, nurture and water your plants, and watch them grow.
Hunicke said new platforms like Magic Leap One and spatial computing represent an opportunity to explore diverse ideas and concepts for all audiences, not just hardcore early adopters.
“This is one of the juiciest design problems on the planet,” Hunicke said.
In the demo, you can draw out a shy fox by creating a friendly environment. While looking into the AR glasses, you can plant a seed in the ground or on surfaces in the real world, like tables or chairs. I plopped a little farming plot on the carpet.
Then using the hand controller, I poured water on the seedling and watched it grow. I grew objects such as plants, full gardens, a cartoon version of the Golden Gate Bridge, and eventually a little lighthouse. I had to sweep up water droplets and distribute them to the seedlings. It was all very magical, with animations overlaid on the real world, so that my cute little garden was distributed across a table, chairs, and the carpet in the real world.