Pissing on the Competition

When I was told to cover a new “wee” game, I naturally assumed I was heading to a Nintendo event. Then I received the press release, and after realising my misinterpretation, was both astounded and intrigued.

London’s first “hands-free”, pee-controlled videogames have been installed in The Exhibit Bar in South London. Now before you get over-excited, hands-free means that you don’t need a controller to play the game. It doesn’t hold Mr Johnson for you while you wee. At first I thought they were taking the piss (I’m so sorry), but soon discovered that this is real deal. It seems that finally men have something to do at a urinal other than whistle and look awkwardly at the wall.

Players move their stream from left to right at the green, circular aiming-reticules in the bowl to control the actions on a small screen above the urinal. As well as the two green targets, there is also a “Start” button in the bowl, presumably for two main reasons: 1) to show newcomers that they are actually controlling the events on-screen; and 2) to stop drunken punters from thinking it’s a touch-screen and smearing kebab and booze all over it.

Captive-Media have developed urinals which encourage punters to test their aim in a selection of different challenges. The system has three different games built-in: Clever Dick, a true-or-false quiz game; On the Piste, where players ski down the slopes, guiding their avatar into the path of as many penguins as possible; and the arcade classic Breakout.

Trying the games out for myself (using my hands, not my wee – I was wearing new shoes) the games were simple but fun. On The Piste is an endurance game where you hit the slopes and hit penguins along the way, avoiding barriers which slow down your avatar. Clever Dick is a fun quiz game which provides simple true/false questions and you have to answer as many questions as possible in 30 seconds. The developers noted that the questions in Clever Dick are deliberately easy. It takes an average 55 seconds to use the loo, so one can’t spend much time deliberating over a tricky answer in the limited flow-time.

Now of course, men have been playing pee-based games for years, chasing urinal cakes up and down the trough, or writing your name in the snow, but this is the first attempt to build an intuitive videogame around men’s bathroom visits.

There will be local and online leaderboards, and players will be able to post their scores to social media sites using their smart phones. The units can also be installed in women’s loos too. Don’t panic, women won’t be required to stand while they urinate in order to play. The monitors also work by moving your hands across the sensors [Why women would want to do this, I have no idea – Ed]. Naturally, there is the possibility for high-score hunters to use this and cheat, as shown by two absurdly high scores obtained by the bar staff at On The Piste.

The developers even discussed the possibility in the future for multiplayer (not in the same bowl, of course) with players able to compete across multiple urinals. The classic rule applies: never cross the streams. That would just be weird.

Captive Media have also opened up the possibility for consumers to suggest and develop new games. Any games which people would like to develop for the technology can enter their ideas on the company’s website.

It seems that slot machines, darts, cards and other pub games were simply insufficient; now men will be able to play even with their waste without being called childish or disgusting. Look for Captive Media’s quirky games in a bar near you some time in 2012.

If you’re interested in more pee-related shenanigans, MIT did some urine-controlled games back in 2002 (thanks for the link, Matt Boch) and during January this year, SEGA temporarily installed similar games into urinals in Japan. You can also see a video of the games I tried at The Exhibit on the BBC website.