Interactive Eating Design: A Programmatic Exploration of Food as Design Material Through Games

Sammanfattning: This thesis project focuses on the practices of eating and play as I explore using food as a material for interaction design through the context of an analog game. Using the action of eating as the main mechanic, participants of my research project are subject to sensations that can only be explored by eating such as taste, hunger, and satiation. The goal is to create a game where food and its consumption can not be substituted with any other action, sense, or material. Through design based research and a playcentric design process I playtest three experiments of which include two mods. Following that I create an original puzzle game and its iteration with two groups in efforts to demonstrate the affordances of different food materials in games. Finally, I assess my process and games through game studies principles such as the MDA framework, the criteria of design based research, and finally propose a program in design research called Interactive Eating Design.