Fireflies: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy in VR

Fireflies is a 3 DoF VR game for practicing cognitive behavioral therapy. It existed in several BehaVR products, but the first version was created in 2019 for RecoVRy—an addiction recovery augmentation program developed in collaboration with Bradford Health. Before playing the game for the first time, players watch a 2D animated short which illustrates some basic CBT concepts.

At the start of the game, players are presented with a hypothetical triggering situation. The core gameplay then involves catching “fireflies” which represent the thoughts, emotions, and behaviors someone might have in response to that situation. There are three jars, each repenting a corner of the cognitive triangle. Players have to catch three fireflies in each jar in order to win the game. A bug gun is used to select words which manifest as fireflies in the jars; it has a “vacuum” mode for pulling words toward the player, and a “blower” mode for pushing undesired words out of the way. Fireflies can only be captured if the player focuses on healthy and empowering thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Choosing words rooted in anxiety or self-destruction results in fireflies escaping and increases the difficulty of the game by showing a larger percentage of negative words.

Role: Designer, Artist

Responsibilities: Concept development, gameplay design, modeling, texturing, animation, lighting, menu UI, 2D animated shorts

Target Platform: Oculus Go

Copyright © BehaVR, Inc.