Game Design

Hotel Plastisse is a mini-game compilation of different cognitive training exercises, developed for a long-term study at the University of Zurich. The purpose of the study was to investigate the impacts of a range of cognitive exercises on neuroplasticity in seniors.

In the first research projects, 65–75-year-olds, in 50 training units over a period of ten weeks, undertook training in the key skills required for a wide range of everyday situations: spatial orientation, the inhibition of unwanted reactions, and hand-eye coordination. In contrast to other training programmes of this type, Hotel Plastisse is in the form of a computer game. After passing through the hotel doors, the user is asked to complete a large number of exercises, with plenty of variety to sustain interest and motivation. After each training unit, participants received feedback on their performance during the day, and their achievement trend over all units completed to date. The game also includes increasing or decreasing levels of difficulty, adaptively applied according to the user’s learning curve.

Hotel Plastisse provides an attractive visual and auditory environment designed to motivate the user, by placing the exercises in a gaming and narrative context. The narrative is used to link the mini-games together, and also to provide the required player feedback.

The project was founded by the Velux Stiftung foundation.