Simulated Locomotion with VIPLE and Unity Game Engine

The instruction of students in computer science concepts can be enhanced by creating programmable simulations and games. ASU VIPLE, which is a framework used to control simulations, robots, and for IoT applications, can be used as an educational tool. Further, the Unity engine allows the creation of 2D and 3D games. The development of basic minigames in Unity can provide simulations for students to program. One can run the Unity minigame and their corresponding VIPLE script to control them over a network connection as well as locally. The minigames conform to the robot output and robot input interfaces supported by VIPLE. With this goal in mind, a snake game, a space shooter game, and a runner game have been created as Unity simulations, which can be controlled by scripts made using VIPLE. These games represent simulated environments that, with movement output and sensor input, students can program simply and externally from VIPLE to help learn robotics and computer science principles.