This project was completed as part of a semester-long capstone collaboration with The Strong National Museum of Play. Our team was tasked with designing a physical-digital game installation for Beyond the Buzzer: Game Shows in America, an upcoming exhibit celebrating the history and energy of American game shows.

The final experience blended projected visuals, touch interaction, and real-time feedback, creating a fast-paced, family-friendly activity that felt at home alongside iconic game-show moments.

The installation needed to:

• Capture the excitement and fast-paced energy of game shows
• Encourage playful physical movement
• Onboard players of all ages within seconds
• Support multiple difficulty levels
• Communicate clearly across projection, kiosk screens, and physical space
• Log times and trivia scores through the museum’s RFID wristbands

Our research phase focused on understanding how visitors of all ages engage with interactive exhibits at The Strong Museum of Play, as well as identifying the core elements that make game shows exciting, intuitive, and easy to follow. To ground our design decisions, we analyzed:

• Existing interactive exhibits at The Strong to understand flow, signage, pacing, and accessibility needs.
• Classic and contemporary game show formats, studying how they use color, feedback, countdowns, and anticipation to guide players.
• User behavior in family-oriented environments, focusing on quick onboarding, minimal reading, and strong visual cues.
• Accessibility requirements, including touch target sizing, color contrast, and information hierarchy suitable for children, adults, and guests with mobility or sensory needs.

We also met with museum representatives to clarify educational goals and constraints. Their insights helped us balance entertainment value with interpretive content, ensuring the experience supported the exhibit’s storytelling instead of competing with it.

With our research complete, we moved into ideation—exploring how physical movement, digital feedback, and game-show energy could come together in a way that felt intuitive for visitors of all ages. Our team sketched dozens of concepts, mapped user flows, and tested out early ideas for how players would interact with the projected tiles and the onboarding kiosk. We created low-fidelity prototypes to quickly iterate on different interaction models, focusing on how players would understand the rules, receive feedback, and stay engaged throughout the game.

• Fast-paced stepping mechanics inspired by buzzer-style game show challenges.
• An onboarding kiosk for RFID wristband registration and guided instructions.
• Multiple difficulty modes that scale the experience for both children and adults.
• Visual themes referencing countdown timers, scoreboards, and classic game show set design.