(IN)TANGIBLE HERITAGE(S)

Abstract

Within the scope of the project ActiVatoR, which reconstructed some major events in Ancient Greek history, the collaboration of CERTH\ITI and Noesis Museum of Ancient technology reconstructed the settlement of Akrotiri in Thira. The final product is a Virtual Reality serious game, which depicts the Akrotiri settlement during the bronze age of Greece and specifically 1613BC. This was the year of the famous Thira volcano eruption which devastated the Akrotiri settlement alongside the Minoan Civilization in Crete. The representation of the settlement focuses on the buildings of this era, the people’s clothing, their everyday activities and finally the tools and household goods of that particular age. In order to achieve historical accuracy and realism the development team followed a research approach conducted by the project partners which was based on data provided by various older research on the matter ([1],[2] and [3]). In conclusion, this serious game aims to immerse the player and deliver the atmosphere in Akrotiri moments before the volcanic eruption alongside with the event of the actual eruption, the terror of being in such a place and the way the people of that age dealt with such a horrific event. This paper describes the methodological approach that we followed in order to represent as accurately as possible the various cultural assets that are depicted in the VR scene. It also provides preliminary evaluation results on the computational performance required for rendering the various virtual assets in various runtime settings.