5. Robots and Play Activities

How play activities could be structured when a robot is involved and why? What is working and what it is not in a robotic playing activity, not only for persons with disabilities but also for normally developed people? The accent is on physical games, where autonomous robots can move, act autonomously, and become effective game companions. We present issues related to the type of movement, and in general the use of actuators, which should be carefully designed to engage the specific player in an interesting activity. In free play, the robot should be interesting and propose activities that could match the abilities of the player, while in structured games, it should also be able to comply with the game rules, and to adapt abilities to produce behaviours that could keep any player in the state of flow. We analyze the role of robots in the type of play and the contexts related to the different disabilities introduced in Chap. 3, providing a conceptual framework that could be used to analyze the examples that will be presented in the third part of this book. We discuss how it is possible to obtain a playful robot at a cost compatible with the market, overcoming the intrinsic limitations that may come from imperfect sensors and actuators. Robot and game design should interact to originate play situations that can be perceived as appropriate and engaging, also when the available technology cannot achieve the performance that we may like to have.