Demoing Spectral Warrior: A Virtual Reality Gamification of Radio Frequency Concepts

Without extensive formal education in radio frequency and wireless communication concepts, the inherent lack of visual cues in the real world makes understanding these concepts invisible to the naked eye a unique challenge. The Virginia Tech National Security Institute’s Spectral Warrior project, a work-in-progress state-of-the-art virtual reality software and hardware framework being developed in collaboration with Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren, aims to overcome this issue by providing the framework to showcase these concepts visually through a gamified escape room concept. More specifically, Spectral Warrior users solve puzzles emphasizing RF concepts using modeled real-world equipment (antennas, transmitters, tuners, etc.) and visualizations of radio frequency propagation. Ultimately, Spectral Warrior aims to reduce the entry barrier to advanced wireless communication concepts to support the education of students, government employees, and military service members. The goal of this demonstration is two-fold. First, to showcase the current state of the project and elicit feedback from conference attendees on the usefulness of this tool through a hands-on trial. Second, we hope to demonstrate that virtual reality tools have the potential to improve military readiness and recruitment through hands-on gamification concepts.