Nostalgia for parents, fresh and fun for kids. This was the ask from LittleBits at the beginning of our design sprint. They wanted a kit that would open up the creative world of 8-Bit games and connect the parent's nostalgia with the kid’s love of gaming and making. We were asked to envision the physical components of the kit, the programming interface, as well as a social platform surrounding the games.
This became the slogan for our concept and the most important design principle we recommended to the littleBits team. When we started working with their team, the vision for the product was akin to a build-your-own-Gameboy. Over the course of the project, we immersed ourselves in the LittleBits universe and in the world of gaming. In the end, we designed a kit that gives kids and their parents the power to free the 8-bit games of yesteryear from screens and bring them into the physical world where they can become something completely new.
One of the biggest insights from our team research trip to a local retro arcade was noticing that many of the games were slight tweaks of each other. By changing a few small things about the game or controller you could have an entirely new experience.
We ran a co-creation session with four 10-13 year-olds. We brought a hacked-together LittleBits-controlled video game and some vintage handheld games. We used these to spark answers to questions like: If you could build your ultimate controller for your favorite game what would it be?
Littlebits’ products take something very complex and distill it down into understandable blocks. They are abstracted away from concepts like resistance, current, analog, digital, etc. and presented simply as what they “do”. The same approach can be applied to video game elements.
Littlebits are about enabling new experiences and one-of-a-kind creations. The gameplay of the kit should not mimic an existing product such as a gameboy. It should give kids the tools to create new games that play out in-between the real world and what’s on the screen.
Learning to code often starts by learning to modify existing code. The same can be done with games. Use tweaking things like sprites, speeds, and game-boards as a gateway to more complex game building. Allow kids to see how their changes affect the gameplay in real time.
The Atari-style game format and 128 x 96 pixel screen requested by the client had major implications for how we designed the game-building environment. The pixel density and complexity of the games meant that, for simplicity's sake, we needed to add an additional layer of abstraction on top of the traditional object-oriented programming norms. We called this layer “Game Blocks” and built the interface around this concept.
Just as the physical LittleBits blocks are ingredients in a recipe for circuits, Game Blocks are ingredients in a recipe for games. They fall into the categories of Characters, Elements, Environments, and Information. Each block is self-contained with its own behavior and visual style. This means you can drop any block into your recipe and see how it behaves.
The Enemy Spawning Tube allows a second player to introduce new enemies into the gameplay happening on the screen. A Motion Trigger block is placed at the top of a paper towel roll. When player 2 wants to spawn a new boss enemy into the game they drop an object into the tube setting off the trigger and telling the game to create the new enemy.
The Gum-ball prize machine project brings the arcade experience into the home or classroom. Pair a littleBits servo block with a jar, cardboard box, and some candy and you've created a tasty reward for any game. Tweak the game to trigger a reward at a high score or at the completion of a level. This project introduces the idea of physical outputs. If a servo can trigger a piece of candy what else can it do?
