Another Brick in the (Fifth) Wall: Reflections on Creating a Co-located Multiplayer Game for a Large Display

The game Limelight was developed for co-located play in an exhibition space with a large display. Although intended for a larger audience and designed to accommodate multiple player roles, its first public demonstrations have revealed a few unexpected design issues that inhibit cooperative co-located play in conjunction with the large projection surface. In particular, observation and video analysis indicate that player movement and positioning not only significantly affect gameplay performance, but can also severely limit the awareness of individual players and thus impede cooperation. The authors utilize the concept of the fifth wall to designate the game design dependencies that separate the experience of individual players.