With this research, I will explain how video games could be useful in the field of rehabilitation, what application the video games can have to cure or to help to cure the different cases and the pros and outcome of such therapies.

 A SMALL JUMP IN THE PAST TO UNDERSTAND BETTER THE FUTURE

The use of video games as a rehabilitation tool started to be used in the late 1990s but the technology wasn’t really developed enough to create the games more interactive and at the beginning result weren’t as good as expected, it was only in the late 2000s that the technology progress helped a lot this idea of using games as a therapeutic tool, also with the help of common console brands such as the Wii and the Kinect technologies the researchers and therapists were able to conduct more tests on a big number of patients in a cheaper and easier way.

From there on technologies evolved and made possible that a larger of patients were able to access this kind of therapy, in 2012 a study was published that collect over 963 articles, studies, text regarding the use of those technologies from 1996 to 2010, the study clearly showed the difference of research, article and studies across the different years.

For example in 1997 less than 10 studies in all year and more than 40 in 2008, this was as I said before with the help of technologies becoming more available to everyone.

VR (Virtual Reality)

During the last years new technologies were developed and of those is Virtual Reality or commonly known in the video game world VR, this technology is mainly composed of 2 main and important part the “headset” and the “sensors”.

The headset is a special pair of big glasses but is not needed to see better, it’s used to see what you are going to do in your VR experience, is something in between a screen and a pair of glasses and you have to wear it of course on your head.

Meanwhile, the second part of the VR set is the sensors they are usually not on the person but on the ground connected with a pc, they detect the movement of the user and transmit them in the game or program.

I wanted to mention this technologies because I think this could be really useful to help to treat some type of rehabilitation problem such as neck problem or to recover better from accidents with such exercise, games, where you need to look around or do certain movement to complete task, could be used in the future to help recover from this trauma.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN VIDEO GAMES REHABILITATION AND NORMAL METHODS OF REHABILITATION

A lot of people can understand the difference between using video games as the main focus of the therapy instead of using normal methods in a doctor office, for example, in my opinion, there is 3 main difference between using video games and using conventional methods and those are :

-Patients engagement and enjoyment

–Therapy stress and length

–Accessibility

PATIENTS ENGAGEMENT AND ENJOYMENT

Video games can help a lot to create a more interactive experience for the patient, by using this type of machines the researchers are able to create more personal and all-days life experience that could relate with the patient, that is a really good thing because it helps the patient to get more engaged with the activity he is doing.

It’s considered important to keep the users engage with the therapy because usually, the activities use in the rehabilitation are really long and repetitive because they are aimed to train the muscles or the brain to get back the function it lost before the therapy, therefore it’s a good thing to help the patient to make feel those activities less “heavy” and unfortunately that’s something conventional methods aren’t good at.

THERAPY STRESS AND LENGTH

Another major difference between the 2 different methods of rehabilitation is to consider stress and time from my point of view, quite a bit of patients use digital therapy methods to regain functionality of their body because they may find conventional methods of therapies to stressful or just because they don’t have the possibility to go to the doctor office to perform the therapy exercises for a couple of different reasons, and that’s not good at all for the patient himself because that could cause even worst result if the patient doesn’t practice the exercises at all actually that could cause the opposite effect of the wanted result instead of making progress the patient will need to attend even more sessions and this could change the mode of the patient making him stressed out and less involved with the activities.

Also, the good thing about video games therapy is that patients will feel less the time they spent doing the activities because for the fact that the user enjoys more the activity and that will help a lot for the fact that the patient will spend less time in total for completing the therapy.

ACCESSIBILITY

The last difference from games and normal therapy is that therapy made with a console like a Wii or the Kinect sensor is that that the activity can be done at home and there isn’t any fixed time to do it, and that’s really good for the patient because like that patient is more about what he can do exercises and when he wants to ongoing with his exercises.

This video in less than 2 minutes gives an example of how even simple games could be life-changing for some people.

SOLUTION

The video game therapy solution is also for both the 2 types of rehabilitation, both the neurological but also the physical, they are both rehabilitation that takes a bit to completely heal and unfortunately sometimes they never fully heal and some marks can always stay.

The physical therapy is consider but some expert “easier” to make excesses about and to regain, a university in the USA use programs and application in combination with a Wii during a time period of 7 weeks to help patients and to improve rehabilitation method and improve the efficiency, on the other hand unfortunately neurological trauma could be a little bit harder that trauma can be distinct as stroke, after a stroke attack a victim could lose the movement of a part or parts of the body but with the help of our news technologies it became easier to try and solve this problem that afflicts people around all the world and make it easier and more accessible for everyone.

USER INTERACTION WITH THE GAME AND THE COMPUTER

It was important for the player to  understand what was supposed to do and for him to recognise what was what therefore we made the models of the key card and the code pad as close as reality as possible with a little futuristic twist, the key card produce 2 different sounds, one if  the player doesn’t have the key card with him and the second sound is played when the player has the key card after the sound is played the door open up.

The video of the key card in Terminal 404.

While the code pad have the code inside once you clicked the player is tasked in to understand which numbers are displayed on the screen and the numbers change every time he played so there is always a bit of a challenge, also when the code is wrong the code pad light in red while if the code is correct the code pad light up in green to make understand the player he inserted the right code all these choices were made to help the player in a more enjoyable and understandable experience.

 This is the video of the code pad from Terminal 404.