A child who has taken a painkiller cannot see what it does. Pain Terminator puts that child inside the process.
I built it in 2019, during my MFA at Parsons, as a VR game designed to run as a museum installation. The subject was nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, NSAIDs. What they do inside the body is invisible, and I wanted to close that gap through play.
In the game, you become the painkiller. You navigate the bloodstream and block enzyme openings, which is how NSAIDs actually work: inhibiting the enzymes that drive the inflammatory response. The mechanic is the biology, made physical and navigable.
Putting a child in the first-person view of the medicine they might take makes an abstract process tangible and memorable. The aim was to reduce fear around medication and build foundational health literacy through embodied play.
The build went through storyboards, a first prototype, a second prototype, laser cutting for the physical installation setup, and user tests with real players. It was made in Unity3D, with Illustrator and Photoshop.
The demo video and the design document are both on this page.
