Development and usability testing of simulated wind in a racing video game

We present a development and a user study on simulated wind in a racing video game. Our research question asked whether low-cost technology could be effective for making simulated wind, and how it could affect the racing game´s usability. Two computer fans were operated by a microcontroller that was connected to a PC running a racing video game. The fans´ speed changed according to the car acceleration in the game. We conducted a Concurrent Think Aloud Protocol usability test, where 16 participants played the video game. At the end of the usability test, participants filled out a System Usability Scale (SUS) questionnaire. Results indicate that all the participants felt the simulated wind usable for the game. Results also indicated that the game usability was not affected by the simulated wind, and the software/hardware configuration can be a cost-effective solution for simulating wind. Further work include experimenting with more powerful fans.