WHAT IS THE KEY MESSAGE TO COMMUNICATE?

Reinvigoured and armed with new insights I asked myself what the key message to communicate through a designed game would be.

Going through the Energy and Sustainability Centre IoM’s online resources, I saw that they had posted two new videos. The message of these videos was that of an “enjoyable net zero journey” (see above). This message resonated with me, and I saw potential to design something around this.

The other message I had in mind was based on Dave Quirk’s thought that “wind is the island’s future.” This seemed more limited to me than the “enjoyable journey” message, but is something that I would keep mind going forward.

With two potential messages and two potential audiences I needed to narrow things down. Audience-wise, I asked myself how I could communicate with the CEOs of government departments?

I managed to find the names of each CEO via the Isle of Man Government’s website, but I had difficulty pinpointing a means of distribution that would catch their attention and have meaningful impact.

While I agreed with Dr Quirk that these gatekeepers need to be persuaded to do the right thing, reaching them could be an enormous undertaking.

The second potential audience I had to explore was related to the “everyone” angle. This was obviously too broad, but I wondered if it could be narrowed in a meaningful way.

A solution I came up was focused on family activities that could reach children, parents, and teachers. I reasoned that by using a family- and/or school-oriented message, my communication could be as pervasive as possible.

At this stage, I decided to redefine my problem as a need to communicate the pros and cons of renewable energy with adult-child groups. Through doing so, I could allow them to establish self-generated opinions informed by objective truth.

As I began to think about family activities, my mind went to exploratory trails used frequently by museum groups and other not-for-profit organisations. There have been many such trails in the Isle of Man of varying quality. The one thing they have in common is that they are always popular.

I envisaged that my audience would consist of parents looking for activities to take their children to on the weekend and during school holidays. Teachers in both primary and secondary schools might also wish to take part due to a constant need to find material that meets the requirements of the Manx Curriculum.

I initially thought of a trail that families or school groups could do using their own vehicles (school buses in the case of classes). They would be directed to an online application that would allow them to interact with various sites in terms of their renewable energy potential. However, this presented the obvious issue of encouraging people to use petrol or diesel to move around the island in pursuit of various goals.

I moved my thoughts to a now more speculative EV hire car system that would include an inbuilt device (a tablet of some kind) that groups could sign up for. Logistically, though, this could prove tricky and somewhat limiting in terms of numbers (unless there was a fleet of EVs).

A simple solution, based on a model used in the Isle of Man for a number of years to provide IT education, was a bus that could travel to bookings or have people meet it at a starting point somewhere on the island. The model is also similar to the Life Education Bus, internationally known with offshoots in many countries. I remember fondly going into the bus and meeting "Healthy Harold" when it came to visit my primary school.

The bus would need to be a specially built or converted electric bus, and would be replete with fun, interesting exterior and interior graphics, and interactives provided through tablets or AR equipment. This, inevitably, would open me to three types of converging design: graphic design, interior design, and UX design.

The mobility of this design solution means that it can be taken anywhere on the island and used by anyone. Audiences could come to the bus at a pre-defined starting point, or the bus could go to them and move them to various points on the trail.

A booking system would be hosted through a website that would allocate times and ensure group sizes were manageable. A small fee would be charged to groups.

Accessibility would be a focus throughout, both in terms of access to the space (e.g., wheelchair accessibility to the bus) and accessibility to graphical content (e.g., the presentation of the accompanying interactive application).

The popularity of adventure trails on the Isle of Man is testament to a need for parents to find activities to engage their children when they aren’t at school. For example, the Wallabies Gone Wild trail (pictured above) was a huge success, For this reason, I am certain that motivation exists within families to use a facility like this.

I was able to speak with the Manx Museums Education Officer, who believed that the idea had potential. She has over 17 year’s experience designing exploratory trails for children, as well as educational workshops and exhibitions. She has remained open to me using her as a sounding board for the design solution as it develops.

My own design will be an integration of digital, spatial, and graphic design. The key to achieving this design is balance. I will need to ensure that the same visual language is carried through from the bus to the game.