serious games
Can "Gaming 2.0" Help Design "Serious Games"? - A Comparative Study
Tue, 03/08/2010 - 17:07 | 
ludoscience
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
The "Serious Games" field raises a specific need. People without professional game design skills, such as teachers, corporate trainers, therapists and advertising professionals, request tools that could allow them to create or modify such games. This article will analyze "Gaming 2.0" examples in order to identify tools that could help fulfill this need. Indeed, "Gaming 2.0" is a way for players to create videogame content without skills from the entertainment videogame industry. Can these tools be also used to create "Serious Games"? To answer this question, we will first define a simple theoretical model of videogames. This model outlines four "game parts" that players can create through "Gaming 2.0"-related tools, and it will be used to provide a comparative analysis of fifteen "Gaming 2.0" examples. From this analysis, insights on the relevance of "Gaming 2.0" for the "Serious Games" field will be drawn.
User-experience game research?
Mon, 14/06/2010 - 15:41 | sharritt
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Situated Research offers in-depth video game analysis, accomplished by recording and analyzing player interaction within situated gaming environments. Techniques will be presented which uncover user practices and behaviors, aimed at uncovering a balance between aesthetics and functionality while maximizing interactive experiences. Research will be presented that outlines how to unpack gameplay experiences, so designers can design situations that yield intended, meaningful outcomes with lasting results. The cutting-edge research approach described draws from a multi-disciplinary background to construct a very detailed picture of actual use, which informs the design process. Existing literature supports the idea that games can communicate complex ideas through exploration and play-testing, using constant feedback and assessment, by observing players’ behavior through interaction with other related objects in an environment. The design of specific visualizations, rules, and behaviors will be discussed, with impacts on human interaction and game play. By studying relationships among game interfaces and player behavior, patterns can be found that help to maximize motivation and flow, a feeling where one loses track of time and their surroundings (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). In addition, research outlining the importance of role specialization and complimentary virtual identities in games like MMORPGs is presented, highlighting the importance of role-specialization, where group participation is required for success: such as guild formation, where characters of different ability work together towards mutual goals. Research methods addressing group activities and specialization (assuming roles) will be described, with effects on engagement: e.g., social ties to play games. A blended method drawing from ethnomethodology (Garfinkel, 1967; Clayman & Maynard, 1995) and grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Charmaz, 2005) will describe how to go about finding patterns in gameplay, helping to design situations that yield intended, meaningful outcomes with lasting results. This open-ended approach allows observation of game players while they act in their natural environment, “in-situ”, obtaining information that is highly relevant to the players themselves. Applying these results to game design can yield more effective, fun and playable games.
185 reads | 
Tags: Affordances, Analysis, Clan, Cognition, Education, Educational psychology, Ethnomethodology, Experience, Flow, flow, Game design, Gameplay, gameplay, Games, learning, Madison, method, Michel A.
Source, motivation, Play, player, player experience, Psychology, research, serious games, sharritt, situated, situated learning, situated research, Technology, Technology, United States, usability, User experience, user-experience, ux, Video game, Video Games
A mixed method approach to studying collaborative video game play
Mon, 14/06/2010 - 15:37 | sharritt
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Activity Theory supports the idea that human activity is hierarchically organized. Our research follows a qualitative case study that highlights the use of affordances, or potentials for action, during video game player interaction among peers and the game interface. Activity Theory’s meditational triangle will shed light on motivated activity itself, the tools available to complete the activity, and peer relationships (such as role specialization and rules of interaction) to evaluate game designs and their ability to fulfill serious purposes with meaningful outcomes. This presentation will focus on Activity Theory and how the meditational triangle can be used to evaluate peer relationships within game play. A blended approach incorporating features of Ethnomethodology and grounded theory will be used to construct an open-ended, bottom-up approach to studying collaborative game play. A true Ethnomethodological approach would reject the top-down, theory-driven approach required by Activity Theory, Activity Theory can highlight particular relationships during game player interactions to provide a frame for game player activity. Activity theory, when applied in conjunction with an emergent approach, can both broaden our concept of affordances and remind us to look for action potentials on the various levels of activity, and does not necessarily have to constrain findings by introducing preconceptions. While bound to the specific situation being studied and not seeking of patterns in observations, Ethnomethodology can be a very useful starting point for the analysis of game player activity in order to reveal underlying, and commonly overlooked, social assumptions. Activity theory can be incorporated following an initially open-ended, emergent Ethnomethodological approach to highlight relationships and game player motivations that might have been initially overlooked. While this process becomes partially theory-driven in the end, it also allows us to obtain some of the benefits of initially using an open-ended ethnomethodologically inspired approach. This approach can help construct a context-dependent, bottom-up, indexical and descriptive representation of game player activity, which is crucial to understanding interactions within Serious Games and their associated meaningful outcomes.
152 reads | Tags: activity, Activity theory, Activity Theory, Affordances, approach, Collaboration, collaboration, collaborative learning, Education, Educational psychology, Ethnomethodology, Game design, game player, gameplay, Games, Human behavior, learning, Madison, mediation, method, Michel A.
Source, mixed method, player, Psychology, qualitative, research, serious games, Technology, Technology, United States, Video game, Video Games
An Open-Ended, Emergent Approach for Studying Serious Games
Mon, 14/06/2010 - 15:23 | sharritt
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
In a recent survey of over 319,223 students, 25,544 teachers, 19,726 parents and 3,263 school leaders in the United States, Project Tomorrow (2008) reports that more than half of students in grades 3 through 12 believe games would help them learn, and average 8-10 hours per week playing games. Only 3% of elementary school students say they do not play games of any kind. While only 11% of teachers reported that they already were using video games in class, many teachers feel that games could increase student engagement, address different learning styles, and teach critical thinking skills. Over half of the teachers surveyed were interested in learning more about integrating gaming technologies, with only 6% of teachers saying that they saw no value in exploring games within education (Project Tomorrow, 2008, p. 4). These figured indicate a huge potential for Serious Games in educational contexts. Games can create a rich user experience (UX) for game players while presenting opportunities to use meta-cognitive skills. Research suggests that video games can provide a rich experience while providing game players the ability to navigate a virtual world, in which complex decision making and the management of complex issues might resemble the cognitive processes that they would employ in the real world (Ducheneaut, Yee, Nickell, & Moore, 2006; FAS, 2006; Squire, 2005; Stokes, 2005). Games are engaging, because they: “give us enjoyment and pleasure; give us intense and passionate involvement; give us structure; give us motivation; give us doing; give us flow; give us learning; give us ego gratification; give us adrenaline; they spark our creativity; give us social groups; and give us emotion” (Prensky, 2001, p. 144). Much of the existing research on Serious Games focuses on general introductions to gaming and their application in a classroom, broad case studies, and learning outcomes associated with using games in the classroom. There exists an opportunity for a thorough investigation into the actual uses of games in an educational setting, focusing on the collaborative learning process and how students make use of both cognitive and social affordances of gaming. Affordances can be used to focus on what opportunities are offered (afforded) to an actor by the environment (use of games in educational contexts) being studied. The term cognitive affordance is used to discuss a potential for cognitive action; and social affordance to describe a potential for social action. In this paper both the use of the video game interface and peer group cultures (Kirriemuir & McFarlane, 2004) are foci of analysis. This descriptive analysis presented in this chapter can inform game design by improving game content and the game interface, as well as aiding in the design of content to achieve meaningful, serious outcomes. An open-ended, emergent approach drawing from ethnomethodology and grounded theory will be presented. The descriptive analysis to be described will enable game researchers to conduct qualitative, inductive case studies of game play, digging into actual uses of games in Serious contexts. An emphasis on conducting open-ended, inductive experiments is extremely useful for investigating new situations where a theory-driven approach (deductive hypothesis testing) may not be appropriate, as the method is open-ended and allows participants to describe what they feel is most relevant, rather than the researcher (and his hypotheses) predetermining what is most important. Several influences are described, drawing from the fields of ethnomethodology, grounded theory, and usability research. While strict adherence to these fields of study is not followed, many features of these fields provide inspiration for investigating what occurs during collaborative gameplay. The hybrid method presented can assist researchers in discovering what is happening on a moment-by-moment basis as video games are played, and will guide researchers in finding patterns during game play to abstract patterns in gamer behavior. These inductively-generated hypotheses can be used to test highly relevant aspects such as a video game's usability or ability to create an engaging learning experience. Following, influential theory will be presented that helps to form the basis for the later described hybrid, qualitative, inductive methodology. Samples of collected data will be presented, in the form of transcriptions of video recorded collaborative game play. The presented transcripts are from a study within an educational context, where analysis focused on learning; however, the method presented could be applicable to other 'serious' contexts where meaningful outcomes are expected.
197 reads | Tags: Affordance, Affordances, approach, Assessment, Collaborative learning, E-Learning, Education, EDUCATION, Educational game, Educational psychology, elementary school, Game studies, Games, learning, Matthew J.
Source, method, Psychology, research, Rotterdam, Serious game, serious games, Situated cognition, Technology, Technology, United States, Video game, Video Games
Evaluating Video Game Design and Interactivity
Mon, 14/06/2010 - 15:19 | sharritt
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
An emergent, bottom-up construction of video game interaction is presented, drawing from influences in ethnomethodology (Garfinkel, 1967), grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), and activity theory (Vygotsky, 1978; Cole & Engeström, 1993; Kaptelinin & Nardi, 2006). Following, a qualitative case study highlights the use of affordances, or potentials for action, during video game player interaction among peers and the game interface. Relationships among affordances and levels of activity are presented, which broaden the concept of affordances to include motivations. Additionally, activity theory will complement analysis by introducing the mediational triangle (Cole & Engeström, 1993), providing a guide with which to analyze game player interactions and motives. The mediational triangle sheds light on the motivated activity itself, the tools available to complete the activity, and peer relationships (such as role specialization and rules of interaction) to evaluate game designs and their ability to fulfill serious purposes with meaningful outcomes.
206 reads | Tags: activity, Activity theory, Activity Theory, Affordance, Affordances, collaboration, collaborative learning, Document, Education, EDUCATION, Educational psychology, Ethnomethodology, Game design, gameplay, Games, Hershey, interaction, learning, Matthew J.
Source, Play, player, Psychology, Science, serious games, sharritt, situated learning, Technology, Technology, usability, Video game, Video Games
Educational Fantasy
Fri, 04/06/2010 - 11:18 | LGrace
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
I was reading Chris Crawford's book Art of Computer Game Design, and I came to his point about games and fantasy. In short, he reminds us that part of the appeal in games is their relationship to fantasy. It is not so much that every game needs to involve some mystical orb or sacred sword, but that games appeal to us when they release us from the ordinary experiences of everyday life.
92 reads | Tags: Chris Crawford, Document, educational games, Game design, Game design research, Lindsay Grace
Source, meaningful play, serious games
From Edutainment to Serious Games: A Change in the Use of Game Characteristics
Tue, 09/03/2010 - 10:24 | Jason Rutter
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Serious games use instructional and video game elements for nonentertainment purposes. Serious games attempt to create instructionally sound and relevant learning experiences for a wide variety of audiences and industries. The author contends that for serious games to be effective, instructional designers and video game designers need to understand how the game characteristics, competition and goals, rules, challenges, choices, and fantasy, used in both edutainment and serious games, can influence motivation and facilitate learning.
274 reads | Tags: Advergaming, Anticipatory thinking, author, Communication design, Dennis
Source, Education, Edutainment, Edutainment, game characteristics, Games, Pedagogy, Serious game, serious games, Simulation, Simulations
Newsgames: Theory and Design
Wed, 10/02/2010 - 14:33 | Jason Rutter
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Computer games have a long history as entertainment media, but their use for educational or political communication is relatively recent. This paper explores the use of computer games as news media. Newsgames are computer games used to participate in the public sphere with the intention of explaining or commenting on current news. The paper provides a set of concepts for analyzing newsgames, based on public service theory. The paper expands this analytical approach with a reflection on game design methodologies for creating newsgames.
Add new comment | 114 reads | Tags: newsgames, political games, procedural rhetorics, public service theory, public-service, serious games
Gamers against All Odds
Tue, 26/01/2010 - 16:42 | Jason Rutter
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
The goal of the project presented in this paper is to enable motor rehabilitation to stroke patients in their home environment and to utilise game enjoyment to achieve frequent training. Stroke patients have an average age above 70 years, which implies that they typically do not belong to a gaming generation. In addition, these patients suffer from motor, and many times cognitive impairments, which make traditional games extremely difficult to use. Nearly all work in this area has been conducted in a clinic environment where it is possible to overcome some of these difficulties by letting professionals assist and guide patients.In this paper, we present the challenges faced, the system itself and the result from a study where five patients were equipped with a game console in their homes for five weeks. The focus of this paper is on analysing the gaming behaviour of patients, which includes the amount of time they spent, the type of games they selected and their comments on the gaming experience. The conclusion from this analysis is that their behaviour resembles that of gamers. They spent significant voluntary time, and it has been possible for patients, with no prior experience of computer games, to enjoy gaming in their homes where they had no professional assistance.
Add new comment | 93 reads | Tags: AMP Energy, games as motivation, games for elderly, serious games, Technology, Technology, virtual stroke rehabilitation
Diabetes City: How Urban Game Design Strategies Can Help Diabetics
Mon, 18/01/2010 - 14:27 | Jason Rutter
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Computer Games are about to leave their "electronic shells" and enter the city. So-called Serious Pervasive Games (SPGs) [1] allow for hybrid simultaneously physical and virtual - experiences, applying technologies of ubiquitous computing, communication and "intelligent" interfaces. They begin to focus on non-entertaining purposes. The following article a) presents game design strategies as a missing link between pervasive computing, Ambient Intelligence and user's everyday life. Therefore it spurs a discussion how Pervasive Healthcare focusing on the therapy and prevention of chronic diseases can benefit from urban game design strategies. b) Moreover the article presents the development and work in progress of "DiabetesCity" - an educational game prototype for young diabetics.
Digiplay Bibliography Updates
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- Serious Video Games for Health: How Behavioral Science Guided the Development of a Serious Video Game
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