Dylan Viale
Playing video game is the best way for many to have fun, a mode of escaping and to pretend to be somebody which you are not. But for fifth grader Dylan Viale, video games are more than just to satisfy your craving for killing zombie and destroying robots, it is a way of sharing himself with her beloved grandmother.
Dylan is a 10-year-old fifth grade student at Martinez-based Hidden Valley Elementary in California. He is lover of video games and he finds a way to create his own unlike other children of his age.Dylan utilized the starter version of the application GameMaker for designing video games, where he learned programming, designing and creates rudimentary prototypes to build his computer game.
The video game that Dylan created was the fruit of his labor and love for his blind grandmother Sherry. The special bond between grandson and grandmother has deeply rooted from the times that they spend together like watching movies, walking dogs, and barbecue with their family. But one thing that Dylan cannot share with his grandmother is his love for video games due to his grandmother’s condition. Due to this, Dylan had decided to make his own video game just for her beloved grandmother.
His eagerness of building a video game for his grandmother make him download the GameMaker application and read about the fundamental design concepts and learning about sprites and objects.After all the learning process, Dylan came to think about the Quacky’s Quest video game where a disproportioned duck is the protagonist. Quacky is a running joke inside the Viale family and it has originated from the cartoon created by Dylan’s father during his elementary days.
The Quacky’s Quest video game involves a lot of mazes which you have to weave through in order to find the Golden Egg. Maze crawling was the concept that Dylan has decided to create in his video game as the challenges in it will not overwhelm blind people. The impeccable sound design of the video game is the key factor that helps Dylan’s grandmother to navigate throughout the game.
The main flaw of Dylan’s video game during the testing phase is the lack of reference once the diamonds are collected. Her grandmother has no idea where of knowing on which direction she is going once lost. In order to solve this problem, Dylan browsed blogs and FAQs where he finally got a solution. He provided a negative sound like hitting a wall or a boulder once you backtrack accidentally.
After a month-long labor and rigorous testing of the video game, Dylan entered it on the science fair of his school where he won first place. The best part of this video game is that it provides a mode of entertainment for those blind people. And even after the science fair, still, many people wanted to play Dylan’s creation and asking for copies of Quacky’s Quest. What makes this video game very especial is that anyone can enjoy it the same manner that blind people can.
