FIRST AID TRAINING

The aim of the First Aid Training app is to teach how to react in case of emergency. Usually, when we think of first aid skills, we only think of the gestures (CPR, recovery position, etc.), but it’s more than that. First aid skills include analyzing the situation, knowing how to react properly, preventing the source of danger, etc. And these skills can be taught using a serious game. Teaching the basics of first aid using a game, in schools, on the workplace, could save lives.

The First Aid Training is a 3D game using high-end graphic quality to put the trainee in the most immersive realistic virtual world. Using point and click interaction, the trainee can interact with the environment objects (unplug a socket, open a door, turn light on, move scraps, etc.) or the persons (ask them how they feel, check if they are breathing, move them in recovery position, do a CPR, etc.).

If you totally don’t know how to react in emergency situation, the First Aid Training app will teach you using a glossary and training scenarios. Once you feel ready, try to achieve evaluation scenarios and watch your efficiency reports.

• Realistic scenes: we want to create the most realistic scenes possible to immerse you in this simulation.
•  Realistic scenarios: scenarios are written by a professional rescuer based on his experience and the situations he has encountered during his career.
•  Randomly generated scenarios: some random changes are made if you play the same scenario multiple times. Once the victim will be unconscious, once the victim will have a heart failure, once the victim will be just stressed. You can’t simply memorize actions to do, you have to understand the situation to react properly.
•  Realistic first aid gestures: all gestures shown in the First Aid Training app are perfectly correct and verified by professional health workers.
•  Glossary: all information needed to complete scenarios are available in the glossary. You can read it at any time.
•  Evaluation: at the end of each scenario, reports will be generated, thus you can follow your learning progression and know what are your strengths and your weaknesses.
• Entertainment learning: you are not in a boring classroom where you listen an instructor. You act and understand all the actions you perform, that is the most effective way to learn.

First Aid knowledge is invaluable for both you as the individual and for your community. It enables you to assist persons who become injured in the event of an accident or an emergency situation until help arrives. First Aid skills can be useful at home, at the workplace or in public locations, therefore the more First Aid there are certified people in a community, the safer that community becomes.

As unpleasant as it is to talk about accidents and emergency situations, there are not completely preventable or avoidable. If an accident happens in the workplace, in your home or in a public space, being a helpless witness to an emergency situation can potentially worsen the situation. Becoming First Aid certified not only benefits you as an individual but it extends to your family, friends, co-workers and even the community as a whole. 

This is why it is very important for as many people as possible to have at least a basic knowledge of First Aid.

In its most basic form, First Aid is the initial assistance given to a victim of injury or illness. Basic First Aid knowledge is comprised of relatively simple techniques and procedures that can be performed with limited equipment and is typically carried out until professional medical assistance arrives.

 The importance of First Aid must not be underestimated.

 The largest benefits of First Aid are:

•  It allows those trained with the potentially life saving ability to assist an injured or ill person during a variety of emergency situations In situations such as someone ingesting a harmful substance, suffering from a heart attack, a seizure or stroke, involved in a motor vehicle accident or caught in a natural disaster, a person trained with the very basics of First Aid can be of extreme importance in assisting the injured person(s) until emergency responders arrive.
• Knowledge in First Aid benefits to the individuals themselves regardless of whether an emergency affects them directly or involves people they live and work with. First Aid often lessens the severity of an emergency in a given time and place.
• While everyone can benefit from First Aid knowledge and training, it is an even greater benefit to those working or living with individuals who require ongoing special attention or treatment such as children, persons with physical or mental disabilities, persons with chronic illness, persons with disorders such as epilepsy, the elderly, persons involved in recreational activities such as swimming or people working in dangerous environments such as a factory or construction site.

We use the power of a game to teach: this is serious gaming. It’s a lot more funny than a classroom with an annoying teacher. You can learn at any time: 10 minutes during the lunch break, on the couch with your laptop, or in the plane. Enjoy your learning and you will learn better and quicker.

With our system of scenario randomization, no chance of boring situation: you always have to understand and apply your knowledge to save the casualty’s life.

In a specific case, you hesitate and don’t know how to react? Simply run the training mode and choose by yourself the scene. Messages will be displayed to guide you step by step to fully complete this scenario. Then switch to evaluation mode and exercise your knowledge.

The great side of using a virtual world and virtual casualties to create scenes and scenario is to switch easily from one to another. Actual first aid training courses are in a classroom. If the training organization is important and wealthy, you can expect specific training equipment, maybe a training car, but no more. 

The First Aid Training app regroups dozens scenes, dozens different casualties and dozens different pathologies (and more with stretch goals). The game will mix all the available data to create a random and unique scenario.

Some examples:

You hear a big noise in the room next you. When you come in, you can see your friend body, laying on the floor, next to a plugged fan where you can see sparks coming out. 

• He has been electrocuted and is his heart stopped.

You walk in the street, and a young man fall down off his skateboard in front of you. The fall was really brutal and now he is complaining about his leg.

• He broke his leg.

You are in your car and and a pedestrian has just been hit by a car next to you. The pedestrian is laying on the floor and doesn’t seems to react.

• When his head hit the car, he lost consciousness. Few minutes later, he wakes up and says everything is fine. But he has an head trauma and must be rescued.

 The glossary will contain all the knowledge you need to react adequately to an emergency situation, including the behavior to adopt and the plan of action to follow. It will be written by a professional rescuer to ensure everything is correct, up-to-date and easily understandable.

Like any good book, it compiles all needed informations about each subject. You don’t know what to say to 911 operator? Don’t panic, it’s a training, you can read the glossary. 

The glossary will be improved and completed during all the development and using your feedback. Our way to explain how to react in front of an epileptic crisis is not comprehensive enough? We will change it quickly.

Different situation requires different reactions. A car accident and a domestic accident are not managed the same way. The first step in any intervention is to analyse the environment to ensure everything is safe.

With our random scenario generation, a body laying on the floor in a bedroom can be caused by many different factors. Maybe this man has been electrocuted? Maybe he had an heart failure? Maybe he tried to commit suicide by gas? Maybe an anaphylactic reaction? We don’t know and we have to be sure the place is safe for us.

Evaluating the scene accurately is one of the most important factors in the management of an incident. You should stay calm. Identify any safety risks and assess the resources available.

Remember, if the danger is still present, you could be hurt too and two casualties instead of one is not a good thing…

The point and click system is the good compromise between comprehensive choices and focusing on what to do instead of how to do.

Using a classic first person interface, the player is able to interact with the world using its mouse. Left mouse click is used for moving and interacting with objects and characters and the right mouse click is used to move your point of view to examine the environment.

The first person interface will immerse yourself into a stressful situation. You are in the eyes of the witness of an accident and you have to react. Have a look at the situation, click on highlighted objects and characters: you can interact with them.

An interaction with something will open a circle of actions, choose one of them and the simulation will react. The circle of action can have submenus, allowing many choices for a single object. Be careful, sometimes, a lot of choice are available, but you need to choose the good one to perfectly achieve the scenario: don’t apply a bandage if there is no blood visible, that is a waste of time.

You can do anything you want, the game will react properly: what happens if you call 911 and you don’t know what is the issue? what happens if you put yourself in danger? what happens if you do rescue breath and the victim is already breathing? The game will let you do any action you want, but the scenario will be adapted and the end will change. 

We are not in a linear scenario system. We are working with a graph, able to link every action to another and managing every possible flow of process.

Our philosophy is to keep the trainee immersed in the virtual course. What is more frustrating than “you can’t execute this action at this time”? Instead of this annoying sentence, we think the trainee must continue the scenario, and finally learn by its mistakes: you put the victim in recovery position and it needs a CPR? Don’t worry, put it back on its back and start CPR. You will see by yourself what this waste of time will imply.

We are using Unreal Engine to power our game. It’s a powerful, out-of-the-box toolset that runs on all major platforms and allows us to concentrate on the game instead of the technology.

Unreal Engine affords us with unparalleled macro and micro details, including unlimited viewing distance, HD textures on all objects, and a lot of environment realistic details.

Allegorithmic Substance and Quixel Megascans are used to create breathtaking realistic assets such as rooms, cities, cars, characters, etc.

We plan to release the game on all major platforms: PC, Mac and Linux. You will be free to choose any platform when the game will be released on as your reward. Regarding Early Access to the game, at the moment we can guarantee it only on PC, however we will do our best to make it available on as many other platforms as possible.

The First Aid Training project is an Epic Mega Grants recipient.

The First Aid Training demo application can be downloaded here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/146UfijnRqn9zWSY09ZpAzMRwHdJzcJEE/view?usp=sharing