Jekyll and Hyde thrills new generation

  Visitors to the Cheltenham Literature Festival in October will be among the first to experience a cult horror story in a completely new way thanks to a creative project that builds on the latest bio-sensing technology. Dr Anthony Mandal, Reader in Print and Digital Cultures at the School of English, Communication and Philosophy, is an expert on Robert Louis Stevenson's gothic novel Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Since 2013 he has been the academic lead on the ground-breaking Jekyll 2.0 project, which he developed in collaboration with Bristol games company Slingshot. The company are now releasing the project commercially in a horror-maze game called Hyde . The project uses players' bodies as game controllers, transforming the novel into a maze of rooms, each representing a level of the game inspired by key points in the original story. The technology of Hyde is driven by participants' bio-data (for example heart-rate, depth of breathing and posture) to shape the experience. At the Festival, the team will discuss the artistic and technical background of the project, the game's new film trailer will be premiered and one audience member will be wired up to measure their live reaction to the spine-chilling story.