Story immersion in a gesture-based audio-only game

Abstract

We report on the results of a study on immersion in an audio-only game with touch-less gesture interaction. A structured design approach to audio feedback that considers the story-context leads to different design approaches: explicit instructions on the one hand and diegetic environmental feedback on the other. Further, we distinguish audio feedback before, during, and after gestures as part of the approach. Two corresponding versions of a gesture-based audio-only story have been implemented and evaluated regarding immersion using a questionnaire study. The findings indicate that replacing explicit audio instructions for hand positions and movements with responsive audio feedback for suggesting interaction methods using environmental story-related audio cues leads to measurably higher story immersion.