Virtual Garden

Players interacting in the greenhouse at sunset.
Nighttime in the greenhouse.
The passthrough window in the greenhouse.
UI to indicate the resources of the plant.
Alert UI for the plant.
UI to summon objects.

Inspiration

First we thought of an innovating idea that isn't exactly a game, but still has the art style and appeal of an enjoying, interactive multiplayer experience. Then we thought of simulating experiences that could be less than ideal to experience in the real world depending on your location. Finally, we decided a plant growing simulator, if done right, could be a fun and enjoyable experience that's practical for learning and exploring a new hobby.

What it does

Essentially the app teaches you about plant growth and the fundamentals of plant care. It can use your location to set weather conditions such as day, sunset, and night, as well as rain, sun, storms, cloudy, and so on. It applies these environmental conditions and uses them to simulate growth of plants that you choose. You can choose three seed packets and three soil types to start with, and water/tend for the plant accordingly until its fully grown. Once fully grown you can enable pass through and put it in your living room, or wherever you choose. Also the multiplayer aspect allows other players to join your greenhouse and care for your plant when you are away, enabling co-operation and learning of other growing technics certain plants use.

How we built it

We built it using Unity and Normcore for the multiplayer aspect. We also used the Meta Building Blocks for the VR capabilities.

Challenges we ran into

The main challenges we ran into was making sure plant growth was synced across multiple platforms as well as maintaining a high frame rate.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are proud of the final product and the seamless UI that's integrated really well into the plants. Also, we are really excited for the passthrough window of plants when they are finished growing and the time skip feature allowing developers to speed up time and grow plants faster for testing.

What we learned

We learned an unbelievable amount of stuff about Unity and VR development, while I (Cameron) was slightly familiar with Unity before this project, the rest of my team wasn't and they stepped up a lot to create an amazing application. The knowledge we gained from this project is invaluable and it was a blast to work on.

What's next for Virtual Garden

If given the opportunity, there is always room for improvement. We can always add new plants, new methods to take care of plants such as solar charged lights, sprinkler systems, and of course cosmetics. Also individual players being offered different plants and implementing a trading system would be nice and encourage more interaction between different botanists. Overall, there is a lot we could do with this and I believe it has a bright future.