Pulse

In a world of ruins shrouded in darkness, you are an autonomous vehicle on a vital mission: to recover a lost sample deep within a hostile territory. Using your sensors, scan the environment, avoid traps, and navigate through the remnants of a fallen civilization. Alone in the darkness, every shadow could be the final obstacle between you and your goal.

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CONTEXT

Pulse is a 3D exploration game made in 48H for the Strasbourg Scientific Game Jam 2025. It is inspired by real-world research on autonomous vehicle navigation in unstructured environments.

YOUR MISSION

As Rowie, a small autonomous rover, your mission is to traverse a ruined, hostile landscape and recover a mysterious sample. Equipped with different scanning modes, you must analyze the terrain, detect obstacles, and find safe paths while carefully managing your limited energy.

Navigating through unstable ground, hidden hazards, and unknown obstacles, your ability to perceive and adapt will determine your success. But be careful—Rowie is fragile, and too many collisions will end your mission. Will you uncover the secrets of this desolate world before it’s too late?

THE SCIENCE

Florian Philippe’s PhD project focuses on enabling autonomous vehicles to navigate unstructured terrains like forests and fields. These environments pose many challenges: unstable ground, obstacles to assess, and hidden objects to detect.

In our game, you take on the role of the onboard AI of a terrestrial autonomous robot. Your mission is to explore a post-apocalyptic world and retrieve a crucial sample. Using various sensors, you must scan the terrain to find a safe path while avoiding obstacles.

Our goal is to showcase the challenges of autonomous navigation in complex environments. Perception is key—identifying obstacles, assessing their nature, and determining if they are truly impassable requires multiple measurement modalities, such as depth sensing and different imaging techniques.

CONTROLS

[Z]    forward
[Q]   left
[S]    backward
[D]   right
[1]    lidar scanner
[2]    objective scan
[3]    multispectral scanner

CREDITS :

• Audric Wasmer - Programmer 
• Béatrice Urbah - Sound Designer 
• Brieuc Inisan - UI artist 
• Florian Philippe - PhD Student, IRIMAS / Dpt ASI - MIAM team 
• Mélissa Ceccoci - 3D artist 
• Morgane - Mac Gyver 
• Thomas Frick - Game artist