2022 / Game

Dancing Pavilion

A VR experience about art education, coercion, and losing oneself into a puppet-like state.

Role: Unity Programmer, Art Designer
Tools: Unity, Oculus Quest, VR, Interaction Design, 2D Art

Overview

Dancing Pavilion is a collaborative VR experience created for Oculus Quest 2. It was provoked by a socially sensational issue in September 2022, when a well-known tutor was charged with threatening female high-school art examinees into sexual relationships in the name of tutoring them.

The project simulates the journey of a girl who grows up with enthusiasm for art, but after suffering from the tutor’s sexual harassment, loses herself into a puppet. The tragedy is presented not as an isolated accident, but as part of a broader phenomenon of corruption and abusive power in art school agencies.

By comparing the girl to a puppet dancer on a music box, the project depicts a common dilemma of art examinees: they appear free to pursue their dream, but can end up trapped in threats and harassment.

My Role

I participated in brainstorming the concept and designing details of the scenes. I provided style and color references inspired by games such as Little Nightmares. I designed and built the final scene of the rotating dancer trapped in the pavilion, where the metaphor of becoming a puppet is presented through threads gradually appearing on her body and through unsettling background music.

Because the Oculus playthrough of this scene had bugs, I recorded it in Unity to present the intended version. I was also responsible for Oculus setup, upload, testing, and recording. I drew the 2D pink dancing figures in the first scene and helped debug programming issues with other group members.

Team Responsibility

Me: made the end scene with shadow projection and animation, drew dancing figures, imported/exported/cast/recorded with Oculus, and helped debug the project
Amanda: constructed the intro scene with ballet shoes, made dancing figure animation and music visualization, programmed and debugged XR interaction, and programmed text-sound effects
Fan: designed and edited sound, incorporated sound design into the project, drew dancing figures, and helped with testing and recording
Yier: designed, built, and found appropriate 3D models, constructed the main pavilion scene and text maze, made the text maze animation, and helped with XR interaction and debugging

Platform

Platform: Oculus Quest 2. The right controller turns, the left controller moves, and controller rays interact with objects.

Project video.

End scene and Unity recording.