A mobile escape room brings interactive media education to Brandenburg
This summer has seen a bright red truck coming to places like Oranienburg, Perleberg or Wittenberge. Because that’s where the ‘AI.CUBE on tour’ has been making its stops. It’s part of the ‘#talk #play #test – der Medienparcours der mabb vor Ort’ project, offering visitors of all ages the opportunity to embark on an interactive journey into the world of AI.
The Medieninnovationszentrum Babelsberg (MIZ) launched the innovative and exciting project back in 2020 and developed it together with Bachelor students of European Media Studies (EMW), a cooperative study programme at the University of Potsdam and Potsdam’s University of Applied Sciences.
An escape game focused on AI
“How can the topic of media and AI be communicated in a playful way?”, was the initial question. The project team quickly came up with the idea of a temporary escape game. The popular live games have visitors being presented with tricky tasks and puzzles to solve in specially designed rooms. The AI.CUBE could initially be visited at the MIZ from 2021 and then a year later at the university branch office in Luckenwalde.
“The AI.CUBE is designed for people who haven’t yet had much contact with or experience of artificial intelligence. These stations enable them to familiarise themselves for the first time with AI and its various impacts on everyday or working life, both the opportunities as well as the risks,” says Volker Bach, Managing Director of MIZ and Head of ALEX Berlin, in conversation.
Immersive knowledge transfer
Anyone visiting the AI.Cube will be welcomed by team members. Up to two people can enjoy the escape room experience which is set up like a science lab. A fictitious head of a research facility welcomes you via video link and sets the scene for the story. The players are then faced with various challenges – including a password-protected laptop, a locked safe and a knowledge puzzle – until the story reaches an unexpected and dramatic climax: it’s about nothing less than saving mankind. What happens next in the game will not be revealed here. Anyone interested can find this out by actually taking part.
Those already familiar with the escape room dynamic will find it easier to quickly find their way around. But a quick start is also possible for children accompanied by adults or senior citizens. An AI voice accompanies the process. You should allow about an hour to complete the experience. You’ll then leave a lot wiser about AI and having had an entertaining experience. “Ideally, the visitors will have learnt some new things, but also experienced emotions thanks to the exciting story,” Volker Bach says. ‘Something that is exciting and also has an element of fun can offer a greater learning effect than just knowledge transfer. And this is where the mabb steps in with the Medienparcours which is targeted at people who are not super media savvy or connected with this in their professional work.”
Stations in Brandenburg
The mobile AI.CUBE was thus created with the idea of taking the subject of AI to other places in Brandenburg and to members of the public. How do you condense the big game into a small space and make it transportable? It turned out during the planning phase that the best form of transport would be a typical yellow post truck which was then converted by a project and design workshop. “The game concept is what works and it does this in both large and small spaces – just like a board game functions on both large and small surface,” Bach explains.
In August, the AI.CUBE will make stops in Dahnsorf, Königs Wusterhausen, Wittenberge, Perleberg and Potsdam as part of the mabb Medienparcours. In addition, the tour will include the ALEX Talkbox, a video booth where members of the public can record interviews about current social issues. A selection of the collected material will then be edited for broadcasting by ALEX Berlin. The mabb’s ‘Disinfopoint’ is also interactive, with a quiz inviting people to test their handling of misinformation in an analogue and playful way.
The exact locations and dates can be found on the MIZ website: https://www.miz-babelsberg.de/ai.cube.html
More about the MTH Blog
The media technologies of the future are already being used today – not only in the entertainment sector but in a wide variety of industries. For our MediaTech Hub Potsdam blog, we talk to tech enthusiasts, entrepreneurs and researchers once a month and tell the stories behind their innovative business models, ideas, projects and collaborations.
