This is how the Virtual Reality game Ingeborg was created
Ingeborg is a virtual reality game made for the National Museum of Finland. It takes you to Häme Castle during the 16th century, where the player meets the forgotten warlord Ingeborg Åkesdotter Tott. The game concept won the Embrace Impact Hack-Art-On event, which was organized in the autumn 2021 by Aalto Studios and Helsinki XR Center. The XR-focused hackathon was sponsored by Varjo, MAGICS, and the National Museum of Finland. The winning concept was created by Alma Hoque, Pauliina Lahti, Isra Rab, and Lotta Veromaa.
The idea of Ingeborg as the star of the game fascinated the whole team: the powerful, feared military commander was a rich, independent woman and a civilized lover of science and religion. However, there is little information available about this interesting character which caused some headaches for the team, but on the other hand, freed up creative ideas.
The game takes place in Häme Castle’s Guards' Room, the Artillery Room, and the King's Hall. The premises were built based on 3D point cloud scans of Häme Castle collected during a previous renovation of the castle.
These days the medieval era appears in our imaginations mainly as gray stone walls, but in reality, the walls were decorated with colorful paintings. For the wall paintings seen in the game, the team sought inspiration from the Holy Cross Church in Hattula, which Ingeborg Tott is also said to have visited. A few of the paintings are adaptations of the Turku Castle wall paintings and some of the objects are medieval objects found in Häme Castle even today.
The guard's character is an armor belonging to the National Museum, which the team scanned for the game. Carl Alm provided the voice for the guard.
Ingeborg’s performance by Alma Pöysti was captured using motion capture technology. The player's success in the missions determines whether the awakened warlord is pleased or enraged.
The sheet music upon which the game’s music, composed by Alexandra Shkodrova, was based, can be seen in the final scene of the game in the royal hall.
Building the Ingeborg game from concept to finished product took eight months.
Ingeborg is a fictional VR game inspired by true events.
