Tactical Decision Games

Inspiration

In the last decade, wildfires have grown in frequency and intensity, leaving devastating marks on our planet. The 2023 Maui wildfires, the Amazon rainforest fires, and the recent California wildfires are chilling reminders of the destruction they cause—loss of lives, ecosystems, and billions in damages.

Watching the chaos unfold, we realized the immense pressure firefighters and first responders face, often making life-or-death decisions with limited preparation for unpredictable scenarios. Traditional training lacks the realism and adaptability needed to prepare them for these evolving threats.

That’s why we built our Tactical Decision Game—a solution that integrates realistic fire behavior, real-time weather and terrain data, and immersive mixed reality to simulate wildfire scenarios. By providing a safe, dynamic environment to train, we aim to empower firefighters with the skills and confidence to make critical decisions faster and more effectively.

Our vision is simple: train smarter, save lives, and protect what matters. Together, let’s turn devastating lessons into actionable change.

What it does

Tactical Decision Games is an immersive training tool that simulates wildfire scenarios using mixed reality. It enables firefighters, first responders, police, teams to strategize, adapt, and respond to unpredictable situations with real-time data integration. By combining AI-driven fire behavior, weather data, and interactive simulations, it prepares teams for real-world challenges.

How we will build it

We will use Unreal Engine to design realistic wildfire simulations, integrating GIS data for terrain accuracy and AI models for fire behavior. Mixed reality powered by devices like Quest 3 Pro, Apple vision pro, with IoT sensors feeding real-time weather and environmental data. Collaborative tools enabled multi-user interaction for team training.

Challenges we ran into

Iterating on the Designs and making it more user-friendly for the users. As this is a concept stage currently, as we delve further into this, we will encounter more challenges for sure which we will overcome with our creativity and problem-solving skills.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We have ironed out a full concept for an MR app, which will not only help train folks in wildfires but also help them get better in decision-making skills, and with genAI integrations they will have 100s of possible scenarios to train on.

What we learned

We learned the importance of combining interdisciplinary expertise—from game design to environmental science—for impactful solutions. Building with real-time data taught us the power of IoT and GIS integration, and we gained insights into how MR can revolutionize training for critical scenarios.

What's next for Tactical Decision Games

We plan to enhance the AI for more realistic fire dynamics and expand scenarios to include urban fires and multi-disaster events. Collaborating with fire departments, we aim to refine the tool for practical use. We also envision expanding to global markets with localized training data integration.