Why Games Aren’t Evil Jon A Preston, Wasim Barham, James Werner Southern Polytechnic State University COHEP, February 8, 2012

Not All Games are Created Equal • Why are these games so “bad”?

From “Do most educational games suck?” - http://dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2009/07/do-most-educational-games-suck.html

What about commercial games? • • • •

Donkey Kong Jr. Math Worst-selling game for the NES Major critique: it wasn’t fun Why not?

Success: Oregon Trail (“You have died from dysentery”)

• Developed in 1971 – Teach history

• The ability to hunt • Party members could die (epitaphs) • Score was based on – Survivors/health – Cash, possessions…

Success: Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? • Created in 1985 – Geography – Culture

• Goal: arrest Carmen and her villains in time – Collect clues (puns) – 30 countries

Success: Math Blaster • Created in 1987 • Goal: to save Spot • Actions: – Variety of action math drills – Blast garbage (for fuel) – Dodge things Check out “Timez Attack”!

Why the Success? • Better graphics? Maybe. • Still had “drill” • However, in these games… – there was a story to tell – players had an active role in that story – there were elements of action

• The players were deeply engaged!

Importance of Story

http://www.mystworlds.com/us/screenshots_myst.php

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1499/the_history_of_zork.php

Enter Minecraft

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4063/5120036810_a48a709e18.jpg

http://www.flickr.com/photos/qhstone/5603715597/

http://h.imagehost.org/0044/bigben1.png

http://www.bengodby.com/2011/03/writer-beware-minecraft.html

http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTiG7e6P8vnSM0ZsJinVBL8wAKGZoweaQKZrF1qjSfcZE HYQZ2E

Remember when you had time?

So whether we know it or not…

http://asherald.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/minecraft-4.jpeg

…our students are engaged…

http://i.imgur.com/gVf54.jpg

… in gaming.

http://i.imgur.com/kIrmC.jpg

Online Game Learning I feel the real educational value comes from the community-building aspects. I structure things so they MUST work together to succeed. Share resources, help each other, communicate. All basic second grade core content. And when kids act inappropriately, I come down hard on them… just as if they had done the act in real life. Common infractions are: being destructive with another’s’ work, hoarding objects, not following directions. Hopefully, they will begin to realize that their actions in games (and online, in general) reflect upon them as people and have real consequences. Maybe they’ll remember some of these lessons when they finally get on Facebook! – Minecraft Teacher Joel

Second Life • But this isn’t new… • Remember Second Life? • The virtual space affords creativity and critical thinking

Foldit – Serious Gaming

A Framework for Game Design

Foundations of Games • Terminology – Mechanics: rules - what you can do – Dynamics: strategies players use – Aesthetics: emotional aspects of the game • • • • •

Fellowship Challenge Submission (pass the time) Discovery Narrative

Different Views of the Game

“The Design, Play, and Experience Framework” (Winn, 2009)

DPE Framework (Winn, 2009)

Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment • If the player is doing well, the game gets more difficult • If the player is struggling, the game gets easier • Similar to how a good teacher knows the class’ ability

Non-digital Dynamic Adjustment

Mapping to Education • Learner-centered – Difficulty and rewards

Course Content

• Knowledge-centered – Focus on doing – Inhibit advancement

• Assessment-centered Pedagogy

Game Design

– Monitor with immediate feedback

• Contextual – Use gaming interface

Virtual Engineering Lab

Using “Quests” within the Simulation Clamping Material into Machine

Placing Material

Collecting Data in a Virtual Lab

Strength of Materials Project • Save hundreds of thousands of dollars • Free and accessible via the browser • Currently in final development and moving into user studies (in and out of classroom) • ASEE workshop in June 2012 (travel stipends available)

Game Development Weekends

Academic Performance of Jammers Overall Academic GPA

4 3.5 3

Programming 1

Programming 2

2.5

Data Structures Game Design

2 1.5 NONE 1 2 3+ Number of Game Weekends Attended

Micro Games for Learning

OceanQuest

Teaching Color Theory

Teaching Gravity

Dissipation

Shape Corrector - Geometry

Sky Lighthouse – Basic Math

Wodu – Biology and Eco-Regions

Snapshot - Economics

Space Farm - Economics

Dragonomics – Dragon Economics

Was this Successful?

Challenges and Advice • Design your game on paper first – Think about your objectives, but also – Think about the story and action

• Collect education materials – Homework assignments – Handouts – Manipulatives

• Plan before the semester starts

80-20 Principle (More Advice) • Getting initial prototypes of games designed collaboratively with schools works very well • Installing them on school PCs is nearly impossible – Develop for Web

• Have funds to pay college students the following semester (to finish games up) – It’s OK to get a B on a course, but a B for the game won’t work! 

Resources for Digital Games • We focus on cheap/free • Do you need to be a programmer? • Depends on what you want to do • Look to your CS department!

For Audio… • Audacity – Recording/Playback – Voice – Splicing audio – Mixing audio – Adding effects

• Works for Linux, Windows and Mac • http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

For Audio…

For Audio… • Sony’s ACID Xpress – Create/edit sound tracks for your game – Great for non-musicians! – Loop-based – Concept of painting “tracks” over time

• Free, 10-track version • Windows only… • http://www.acidplanet.com/downloads/xpress/

For Audio…

For Audio… • Sound effects – Try www.freesound.org – Thousands of sounds…

3D Modeling • Blender – Free – Windows, Linux, FreeBSD and Mac OSX – Used for character modeling and animation – Compact (23MB) – Lots of tutorials • www.blender3d.org www.bigbuckbunny.org/index.php/download/

Blender (3D Modeling)

3D Modeling • Maya – Free* for college students – Professional – Large download

• http://students.autodesk.com/

*Requires registration and verification

3D Models • TurboSquid • Use the Googles! • Be careful…

Programming • Scratch – Free – Very visual programming! – Windows, Linux and Mac OSX – Tons of resources/tutorials

• http://scratch.mit.edu/

Programming • Alice – – – – –

Free Visual programming Good for “telling a story” Nice object gallery Windows and Mac OSX

• http://www.alice.org/

Programming GameMaker – http://www.yoyogames.com/make – LITE edition is free, $40 – Windows and Mac – Quick prototyping

Programming • XNA – Free – Windows only – Deploys to Xbox, PC and Web (Silverlight) – Requires C# programming

• http://create.msdn.com/en-US/

3D Game Engines • There are a ton of them – – – – – – – – –

3dvia Studio Aurora C4 CryEngine Gamebryo GECK (comes with Fallout) Ogre UDK Unity

Unity • Environment for developing 3D virtual worlds • Built-in – Physics – Terrain editors – Graphics engine – Assets Store – Scripting

• Free, but restricted

Live Demo (Yikes!)

Questions? • Jon Preston [email protected] ([email protected]) http://games.spsu.edu