Ivan’s Parallel Reality is a demo of a narrative game exploring an art making factory in a hypothetical future. Ivan, the main character, stumbled upon a peculiar art-making factory. In an attempt to escape, he explores the factory, finds artifacts, clues and memories of the owner of the factory and eventually reveals the identity of the owner. This game was intended to experiment with new methods of world building, as well as stir up an conversation about whether art is an exclusive privilege of humans, or can AI's and robots of the future make "real" art too. Is "art" about the production of objects or the reception of the objects created? 
At this stage, the game is still a brief demo as a test of the unique process. This game uses photogrammetry to translate handmade puppets and models into 3D assets, a process that preserves the unique imperfections of hand crafted objects. The factory scene in this game was a “parallel reality” of the factory models built by hand in reality, and the main character Ivan also exists simultaneously in the game and in reality. This project uses Reality Capture for photogrammetry, and Zbrush for cleaning models. The process was inspired by indie game Harold Halibut.
This project is a collaboration between Jumo Yang and Jingjie Chen, as residents of the UCLA Game Lab.
Back to Top