The new and
improved
virtual pet

A virtual pet that increases physical activity in children

Pawly is a virtual pet application where younger user will be able to create and take care of their own virtual pet. By disguising the exercise as taking strolls with the virtual dog, the child will experience exercising in a fun way. By progressing in the game and caring for the dog, the child will develop emotional bonds to the virtual dog, just like having a real-life companion.

Design goal

Create an application that indirect encourages kids to increase their level of physical activity through leveraging the feeling of taking care of a dog

Take care of your dog just as you
would as a real one

Walk with your new buddy

The augmented reality lets the use walk with a virtual dog, making the mundane task of strolling around in the nature to new heights. By walking the dog, the child will collect coins and gather achievements, which they’ll be able to use later.

Feed your new buddy

Just as a real pet, the virtual dog gets hungry. The user will need to properly make sure that the virtual dog is fed and happy. The feature further increases the feeling of having a real-life companion.

Play with your new buddy

What puppy does not like to play? The virtual dog is no exception. By different swipe gestures on the screen the child can learn the dog new tricks. The child can also unlock new trick from the store with the coins they gathered from their walks.

The store is filled with both tricks and accessories

The child can use their collected coins from their walks to buy things from the store. The store includes both tricks and different kind of accessories and clothes.
Some example accessories are scattered around this webpage.

Stay Safe

Pawly takes measures to keep your kid safe. By utilizing picture recognition the app recognizes signs of walking near a road. It alarms the users and ask them to pay extra attention to their surroundings.

Encourage long term habits

Pawly strives to encourage long term habits that lasts beyond the use of Pawly. This is done by promote consitent use by rewards and streaks to create the habit of moving.

Connect with your friends

Connect your device with your friends to see their virtual dog and their progress. By connecting with friends the child can play together with their friends.

Design process

Literature Study

A literature study was conducted to get a deeper understanding of virtual animals, exercise habits and motivation.

Competitive Analysis

By researching relevant topics and similar products we gained insight about appropriate features and competitors' execution.

Ideation

Brainstorming methods such as Crazy 8 and MoSCoW were used in the ideation process.

Designing the interface

Figma was used as a prototyping tool to design the interface. The interface was tailored to children, e.g. using bright colors.

Implementation

The Augmented Reality and User Interface was implemented using Unity.

Evaluation

Due to time constraints an evaluation during the exhibition was conducted to determine if the concept would be appreciated by children.