Author name: davidtheaussie

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Persuasive Games: Exploitationware

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Persuasive Games: Exploitationware

Ian Bogost’s vitriolic attack on gamification, in my opinion, is somewhat scathing and unwarranted. His premise is that gamification focuses too much on the game layer of points and systems used to attract and motivate – rather than focusing on the actual game itself. Bogost’s contention is how gamification is able to be used by advertising and companies to manipulate people. He refers to gamification as ‘exploitationware’ in an attempt to use rhetoric and word-smithing to position gamification as, well, evil. 

My contention with Bogost’s view is that he’s looking for reasons to hate gamification and the tenets it supports. While a game layer over the real world may not be everyone’s cup of tea, there’s definitely merit to the idea – as well as historical precedent to justify it.

Let’s talk about classroom learning for a moment. A teacher decides that she needs to motivate students to learn more. This is every teacher’s desire. So the teacher decides to use sticker systems, stamps and candy. The teacher also offers rewards to students who perform well … this is gamification! The idea of giving students stickers (10 stickers and you get a reward) is no different to frequent flyer miles, no different to 10+1 coffee coupons. Stamps and points are the same. Giving prizes for reading 10 books in a semester is another reward system. Adding a game layer to the real world has been a trend for over 50 years. It’s a method to motivate participants and provide incentive to play the game. Often, that game is for profit (fly the same airline, rather than their competitors, and you get benefits).

When we look at the history of using games in education, the game itself is rarely the motivation – the reward of winning, prizes, status and other symbols are the reason we play. Numerous studies have shown that education based computer games are a failure because they don’t motivate students to keep playing. This is something “dark lord” Game Zichermann has stated on numerous occasions; the best games are not games made by educators. 

Now, I concede that Bogost is concerned with how gamification is used to monetize (and profit from) participants. It’s a somewhat persuasive methodology. However it’s inevitable that private industries will jump on the gamification bandwagon. Business, and advertisers, are always early adopters of new ideas. If you want to know what works, look at what private companies are doing!

Rather than investing in positioning “serious games” and “persuasive games” and “gamification” against each other, I wish that Bogost would consider that games and game methodologies (including gamification) can all be applied to education with considerable benefits. All of us who are pushing for change in education are on the same team.

I’d rather we spent our time focusing on what’s good for kids in schools. It doesn’t matter if you hate the word ‘gamification’. What matters is that the ideas can be applied to learning. 

Dedicating a few thousand words to rhetoric is a waste of words.

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The Curiosity Cube

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The Curiosity Cube

Sometimes the simple things are the most interesting. An ongoing social experiment called the Curiosity Cube is a social gaming project where players are faced with a giant cube which is made up of billions of smaller cubelets. Breaking cubelets accrues points and bonuses which can be spent on tools to make ‘digging’ through to the centre of the main cube more efficient.

The purpose of the game, simply, is to get to the centre and find out what’s inside. Interestingly, the developer has recently added the ability to actually add more cubelets (by paying money) to prevent the centre of the cube being accessed (http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/190865/Peter_Molyneux_may_have_just_monetized_trolling.php) … this has been described as monetized trolling and may be a genius move that pits players against each other in a virtual war over accessing the cube. It’s a war which the developer will win, raking in money from a free game!

I’ve started playing on my iPhone and it’s fun. More importantly it will be interesting to observe what direction the game takes in the future.

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Why gamers don’t learn more – Jonas Linderoth

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*Apologies for this article not having a PDF link. The link was removed (or is broken). If readers would like a copy of the paper, please add a comment and I’ll make a copy available.

Linderoth writes a critique focusing on James Gee’s book “What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy” and concludes that good games do not necessarily facilitate good learning. This critique draws heavily on the Ecological approach developed by J. & E. Gibson. The ecological approach focuses on the idea of learning being a process of differentiation and distinction, not enrichment (as other learning theories would suggest).

As such, Linderoth positions games as a “perception-action” cycle. In a game, the player explores the environment and develops a perception of that environment. Based on that, the player takes action and then returns to perceiving changes and acting again. The player makes an exploratory act (to yield knowledge) and the performatory act (an action with expected results). 

Since, Linderoth states, that games have built in markers and that the game’s design facilitates the perception-action style. The game has numerous affordances which guide the player and don’t require learning how to differentiate. The case study used to prove this theory is observation of two players (a boy and a woman) playing LEGO Indiana Jones on a Playstation 3 console.

While I agree, to an extent, that there is some exploratory and performatory action within many game models, not all games fit within the rigid boundaries he has described. Many games, to my reasoning, are experimental. Games such as Minecraft (minecraft.net) are both experimental and exploratory.

Where Linderoth’s ideas fall short are the supposition that learning isn’t necessary. He claims that a player can easily distinguish between the pale background of a game facade and the shiny items that the player can interact with. However this is a very specific style of game which, Linderoth should have noted, is aimed at a young audience (one of the participants in his study was 8 years old). This kind of guided differentiation is essential for younger learners. These rules can be applied to more mature games, but as many other experts note that if a game’s obstacles are too simple, the game is not challenging and, thus, boring to play. Obvious affordances such as shiny objects are too overt for most games.

Rather than focusing on differentiation, it’s important to apply experiential learning and tacit knowledge to games. Players learn by trial and error, doing so gives them experience related to that game (which can sometimes be applied to other games). Through repetition the player acquires tacit knowledge of the game mechanics (how to play) and game world (information). They apply that knowledge to new situations (experimentation) to see if the learning they’ve already acquired can be applied to new situations. If not, they adapt and experiment further.

While Linderoth raises some good points, I can’t agree with the conclusion (especially based on such a limited observation) that gamers don’t learn through games. Gee, Ito, boyd, Seely Brown (and numerous other academics) have provided enormous data supporting learning within games.

Try applying Linderoth’s theories to World of Warcraft or even Minecraft … the results would be far from compelling. Besides, the contributors to WoW’s 95,000 page wiki might disagree that gamers don’t learn.

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“This Game Sucks”: How to Improve the Gamification of Education

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“This Game Sucks”: How to Improve the Gamification of Education

Sarah Smith-Robbins looks at the idea of gamification and how it’s being applied to education.

Gamification is the application of game mechanics such as points, badges, and levels to non-game processes. Through the use of gamification techniques businesses (and potentially education) can motivate people to participate in the games that are being devised. This idea isn’t new. Education has been using points, status and achievements for a century. Private industry has used elements of gamification as well. Mileage cards, shopping stamps and coupon systems are all a form of gamification.

The problem, according to Smith-Robbins, is that that education is not very good at using game systems to motivate students. Part of the problem is that the game isn’t fully understood by those who are playing (ie students).

A game has three elements – a goal, obstacles, and is either collaborative or competitive. A goal is the win condition – the outcomes required to end the game. The obstacles are challenges of various difficulty the participant needs to overcome. Obstacles are a good thing because, as we all know, a game that’s too easy is no fun. Finally games are  cooperative (beating the game by working together) or competitive (beating the other players). 

Education, if it’s a game, isn’t using these elements very well. Is the goal “learning” or is the goal “getting a job”? What are the obstacles: critical thinking skills or getting past assessment (by any means necessary, including cheating)? Is education collaborative (working together to acquire knowledge) or competitive (fighting for better jobs and more money)?

If the game of education can’t be changed, then it can be improved by making the game clearer to the players (students). To quote the article:

  • Make goals clear, and explain how the course, major, or degree prepares learners to achieve those goals. Ensure that students align on the goals and want to achieve them.
    • Spend as much time in class and on the syllabus covering the importance of the learning goals as is spent explaining the grading system of the class.
    • When writing assignment descriptions, include a “How you can use this in the future” section.
  • Make progress transparent to each learner. Grades and assignment completion are not the only ways to measure progress toward achieving the goals.
    • Give students a way to track their progress on each learning goal of the class. An online checklist that students fill out on their own can help them stay on track.
    • Create commodities for desired behavior. For example, hand out poker chips to students who contribute in class; a student who cashes in ten poker chips earns a “Top Contributor” badge.
    • Add peer voting to class activities such as discussions and online forums. Allowing students to identify the contributions that they see as valuable will highlight good models for other students to follow, as well as provide positive feedback to the contributing student.
  • Think about your own game play. Reflection can reveal insights into innovations that can be leveraged in education.
    • Consider the game apps on your phone or iPad. How do you decide which to play and which to ditch? What makes a game “fun” to play?
    • Ask students which games they play and how they learned to play them. Talking about how we learn can help students improve their own techniques.
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A New Culture Of Learning

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A New Culture Of Learning

John Seely Brown is quickly becoming a bit of an academic rolemodel for me. The ideas he presents are in step with my own thinking. My research is going to look closely at his works and apply some of his theories directly to gaming – particularly Minecraft. Brown and Thomas’ book is an exploration on learning in the digital environment. Arc-of-LIfe Learning – Brown begins his exploration by looking at some examples of learning. A few case studies are used as an illustration of how learning has been achieved beyond educational institutes. Kids and adults have shown that they are learning through interaction, discovery and having fun.

Briefly, A New Culture Of Learning begins with some discussion about culture and how culture shifts due to technology’s influence. Traditional ideas (such as the classroom) are a mechanist approach where learning is a series of steps to be mastered. The focus is on the end result, the product, not the process of learning. This view is obsolete and, according to the book, a more environmental view (including digital networks) should be taken. These learning environments promote a more organic learning process. The crux of this book is the very idea that technology has created an avenue for a new culture of learning to develop; a more environmental, holistic learning approach with technology as an ingrained part of that learning.

To achieve this goal, there must be change. The infrastructure of the internet has grown exponentially faster than any technology advances before it. The biggest realisation is that culture has changed from static (information as a one way street) to a participatory medium. Information shifts and changes as we interact with it, share it and remix it across the internet. We participate and interact with knowledge in a way that has never been possible before.

The result is a new way of learning. Through play and imagination we can change how we think of the learning process. No more memorising. Instead, information absorption through the process of engaging with information and the world around us. Playing is a powerful learning tool.

Enter here the collective. I like this word … collective. It’s not community, it’s not collaboration. It’s more like bees in a hive. There’s a certain busy buzziness and “many as one” feeling to the word. The collective is a way to describe how we interact as online groups. The focus is on original content. Through peer-to-peer learning we can share and compare information and learn from each other. Skills and talents are unleashed as a kind of peer amplifier. From this emerges a collective in which we share knowledge and produce original content.  Creating and moulding information.

There’s no middle or core in a collective, and collectives improve with size and diversity (they scale well). participation doesn’t mean contribution but can be as simple as following a conversation, liking a blog post or “lurking” in a group that is creating something interesting. Collectives are innovative.

Indwelling

When a gamer plays a game hundreds of times they become familiar with the practices and ideas and processes of the game. It becomes engrained. The same happens with any form of action that is repeated continuously. This is referred to as indwelling – where a practice or idea becomes second nature. It’s an adaptive process, meaning that the habits learned are flexible and responsive to change. This relates to the notion of tacit knowledge, which comes from a lifetime of experience doing something which has become second nature. It’s knowledge that wasn’t explicitly learned, but has been acquired.

People who play games or spend time online are indwellers. They develop vast amounts of knowledge an information.

Gamer Disposition

As well as indwelling, gamers have a “gamer disposition”. This disposition is using resources and experimenting to find solutions to problems inside a game – such as a way to complete a task. However gamer disposition isn’t always about the most efficient way of completing a task. Sometimes gamers look for the most unique way, or elaborate way. Having solved the task already, they might repeat the task to complete it differently.  Sophisticated solutions are often preferred over routine ones.

Gamer disposition characteristics are

  • Keep an eye on the bottom line – gamers like to improve. They like to be evaluated and compared to other gamers. 
  • Understand the power of diversity – games require teamwork, so teams have a mix of talents and abilities. Gamers don’t think about how good they are but think about how good the group is and their role as part of that group.
  • Thrive on change – games aren’t static. If they were, gamers would lose interest quickly. The seek out change.
  • See learning as fun – this is a key characteristic. Games require learning and gamers love to learn the rules or systems involved in a game. As well, they love to solve puzzles and overcome obstacles (a core tenet of gaming). They convert knowledge into action.
  • Live on the edge –  gamers seek out alternative methods or strategies for completing tasks. They aren’t satisfied with mundane solutions, but try to find elaborate ways of finishing tasks. They desire to push the boundaries in order to discover something that deepens their understanding of the game.

Finally, Seely Brown and Thomas put together their thoughts in the form of knowing, making and playing. Experts know everything about their given topic. The understand the ‘what’ their topic is about. They don’t just know information, but they have a deep understanding (often through practice) of their area of knowledge. By doing something, such as hands-on activities, people are making. Building, creating content and making connections gives meaning to content and information. They are learning by doing. Finally, is the importance of play. The idea of ‘playing’ is a recurring theme in Seely Brown’s work. Through play we are able to discover and experiment, fail and test outcomes. It’s problem solving, or as Seely Brown explains it, riddling one’s way through a problem.

The world, they say, is constantly changing. This represents a state of flux which is a good thing. Flux inspires the challenge to learn and acquire knowledge. Through the many ideas brought together in the book (indwelling, playing to learn, collectives and imagination) the internet – and gaming – creates a space where new culture emerges. It’s a culture of collective inquiry that harnesses information and transforms it into something we can play and experiment with. This environment is a place which demands imagination because “where imaginations play, learning happens”.

Note: Due to time constrains, this is an abridged review and doesn’t encompass the entirety of the book.

Addendum: Apologies to readers of this blog who might have been mislead by any statements in this blog that have been poorly attributed; particularly the last comment “where imaginations play, learning happens”. When I wrote this book review, I didn’t use quotation marks around this statement, which implied that I had said it myself. This is not the case. I had simply forgotten to attribute it correctly. I have quoted other points from the book itself, but failed to quote this one (and also mis-quoted the authors by saying ‘imagination plays’ instead of ‘imaginations play’). This was unintentional. For a full reading of the twitter discussion that followed from a failure to correctly attribute a quote, see the pingback in comments below.

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Three Papers by Jesper Juul

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Three Papers by Jesper Juul – A brief synopsis of his recent works relating to computer game design.

*Note, all of the papers below are available for free from the Jesper Juul’s website (linked above).

Paper 1 – Zero-Player Games

Juul’s analysis of gaming looks closely at the players themselves and how player is defined. Importantly, the paper shows that there’s a distinction between games and gamers, and also, that games do not require a player (the player-centric model).

Zero-player games are games which require no significant human interaction for the game to be played. These are divided into four categories:

  1. Setup only games – games where the player starts the game and observes (without interaction) the remainder of the game.
  2. Games played by AIs – simply, games where the computer (AI) assumes the role of the player.
  3. Solved games – Games played by computers with the purpose of solving it – such as figuring out guaranteed winning moves, etc.
  4. Hypothetical games – non implemented games designed to describe or examine a question.

By understanding how games can be played without a player, paradoxically, the player can be more easily understood. Juul concludes with five distinct player traits:

  1. Players have continued agency
  2. Players as humans
  3. Players as temporal beings
  4. Players as having intentionality
  5. Players as having aesthetic preferences

Juul’s paper shows that a distinction can be made between game (artifact) and games (the activity). As well, it gives a strong rebuttal to the dominance of the player-centric model, since it doesn’t actually centre on players and overlooks their aesthetic preferences.

Paper 2 – Easy to use and incredibly difficult: On the mythical border between interface and gameplay

Interface and game play are seen, by many as Juul suggests, as vastly different. He argues that there’s no distinct border between the two. Interface is the tools (software and hardware) used to affect the game state. Gameplay is the core activity of the game.

The analysis focuses on defining the two elements and understanding how they have been used in game design. Importantly, Juul looks closely at the relationship between interface and gameplay, then compares their realisation in various games.

He concludes that gameplay is usually a simple premise or idea made challenging by the interface. The purpose of games is to be fun. Doing so often requires challenging the user. There’s a lot of fluidity between interface and gameplay. Because games are entertaining they are not always designed to be efficient. Intentionally adding inefficient elements to the gameplay or interface increases difficulty. This is a desired effect.

Most importantly, games provide an opportunity for the gamer to improve certain skills.

Blizzard uses the term skill differentiation to describe how requiring a range of skills allows a player to grow: a real time strategy game can have “twitch” skills, multitasking, strategic thinking, understanding of economy, knowledge of a map, and so on, as skill differentiators.

This means that difficulties of interface or gameplay simply become a skills hurdle for players to jump. The gameplay and interface in games is often blurred and, as games become more innovating, is redefined.

Paper 3 – The Fear of Failing? The many meanings of difficulty in video games

The role of failure in games is interesting and important to consider. Juul explores two important questions regarding failure.

  • What is the role of failure in games?
  • Do players prefer games where they do not feel responsible for failing?

There are two approaches to looking at “winning” in games.

  • Goal oriented – where the focus is on winning, which should be made as easy as possible
  • Aesthetic perspective – where there should be a reasonable combination of challenge and variation

Added to that are the methods of punishing players for failure.

  • Energy punishment – loss of energy, usually leading to life punishment
  • Life punishment – losing a “life”, usually bringing the player closer to game termination
  • Game termination – ending the game, forcing the player to start from the beginning
  • Setback punishment – making the player “replay” the game from a certain point

When a player fails, they might attribute the failure to three possible causes.

  • Personal – personal traits, skills or disposition (eg. I didn’t move fast enough)
  • Entity – the characteristics such as the game elements (eg. The enemy in game is too powerful)
  • Circumstance – luck, chance or other transient causes (eg. My fingers slipped off the controller)

Juul developed an empirical study, based on an earlier study by Malone in 1982, to test how players responded to different punishments (energy punishment and life punishment). The study concluded that players prefer to feel personally responsible for failure when they play a game. When players failed, then succeeded, they gave a higher rating for the game, reflecting that they felt more satisfied. This is in comparison to players who didn’t fail at all and players who failed too often (both groups gave less positive reviews of the game).

From the overall analysis, four observations were made about games and failure.

  1. The player does not want to fail (feels sad, inadequate)
  2. Failing makes the player reconsider their strategy (making the game more interesting)
  3. Winning provides gratification
  4. Winning without failing leads to dissatisfaction

This is an interesting outcome. Gamers want games to be difficult. While they hope to win, gamers will fail and feel personally responsible. Once they’ve reviewed their strategy and tried again, they will eventually win. The gamer feels gratification and is satisfied with the game.

Failure in games creates a sense of depth. Failure forces the player to re-evaluate strategies and practice their skills. Doing so reflects improvement and success (overcoming adversity).

A game should be neither too easy, nor too hard. Failure adds content!

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Why I Blog

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Why I Blog

Lupton’s short explanation of why she blogs is worth a read. Not only is blogging immediate and personal, but it breaks down academic walls which act to keep society and academia apart. I like the notion that academic though need not always be so formal, which is an attitude many academics (but few academic institutions) are embracing.

Mostly I agree with her assertion that it’s important to keep our writing away from academic paywalls. This is very high on the list of my pet-peeves – paying for scholarly works. While google scholar, academia.edu and other sites are helping to remove paywalls, too many sites are still profiteering from paid access to academic writing. 

I own my writing. It’s mine. As I progress through my studies towards completing my doctorate, I intend to make all my work free for anyone to read and share. This is the way the internet works and academia needs to get with the program

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High Score Education – Games, not school, are teaching kids to think.

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High Score Education – Games, not school, are teaching kids to think.

Although somewhat dated, this short article by James Gee touches on some important elements of gaming and learning. The education system still pushes a “memorize and test” philosophy. Gee laments that children are not learning to think, they’re learning to memorise … and good students aren’t good at thinking they’re just good at “doing school”.

This is a very valid concern. Gee believes that games are an agent of mental training. That children aren’t meant to be memorising.

Learning isn’t about memorizing isolated facts. It’s about connecting and manipulating them.

I like that. It’s a very succinct way of describing what should be our relationship with information. This is exactly what the internet can do – provide an environment where we manipulate information by mixing, sharing and remixing between collectives online.

Gee states that the secret of video gaming’s success isn’t the games themselves or the 3D graphics, but the underlying architecture of the game. Each level is incrementally more difficult, pushing the gamer further and further beyond their abilities. This is the ‘regime of competence principal’. The game is just difficult enough to simultaneously provide pleasure and frustration for the player. It’s hard enough to be challenging, but through effort the player can be rewarded by winning the game.

Games also incorporate expertise. Gamers become masters of a game, but are then forced to adapt and evolve as the game becomes more complex.

As Gee notes, kids often say that playing games doesn’t feel like learning. They’re focused on playing. Again and again, educational experts push this point. Learning must become a secondary objective to having fun. When students are focused on having fun they forget that they’re also learning.

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Assessing Higher Order Thinking in Video Games

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Assessing Higher Order Thinking in Video Games

In his paper Assessing Higher Order Thinking In Video Games, John Rice draws the conclusion that educational computer games, such as Revolution, which was developed by MIT’s Media Lab (the game itself will be discussed in a future post).

With the increased global interest in gaming, educators are looking more closely at how computer games can be used in the classroom. Teachers seem to prefer edutainment style games which offer a “drill and kill” style of repetition practice. There is a wide spectrum of games being used (some ostensibly educational, some commercial but with educational potential) and amongst those games levels of “thinking skill” are required. Some games require only lower order thinking (drill and kill) while other games are more immersive, offering the ability for players to use higher order thinking skills. Rice refers to these as cognitive virtual interactive environments (VIEs).

The benefit of cognitive VIEs is to address the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy – particularly application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. VIEs are virtual (three dimensional) environments which require extensive interaction (reading, clicking, manipulating the environment). Most often, MMORPGs are the best representation of VIEs. Games such as World of Warcraft, Sims, Civilization can be considered examples which fit the genre.

While still being ‘edutainment’ Rice has developed a series of qualifiers, in the form of a rubric, which ascertain whether a game has the elements required to challenge higher order thinking skills.

Screen Shot 2013-04-04 at 8.57.59 PM

The qualifiers, 20 in total, are scored and graded according to a viability scale.

Screen Shot 2013-04-04 at 9.00.03 PM

Rice concludes that a game which scores 15 or more is “highly probable” to encourage higher order thinking skills in users. He concludes that VIEs are a viable as educational tools as long as they can be judged as having the ability to challenge higher order thinking skills. He is particularly impressed with “Revolution” and asserts it to be a high quality educational tool.

In reading this paper I’ve drawn some interesting conclusions myself. First is a criticism of Rice’s approach. While I agree that interactive gaming (particularly virtual environments) show enormous potential as learning tools, I cannot help but be alarmed that Rice’s approach to assessing such games is too prescriptive. The rubric is neither practical nor logical within the context of gaming. Computer games, and the culture created by them, shift constantly and are subject to trends which cannot be predicted. A game like Minecraft, arguably a teaching tool with enormous potential, scores poorly on such a rubric.

The generic codes and conventions of computer games are not static. They fluctuate and with each technology leap, there will be a noticeable shift in computer game standards. The games of today were inconceivable just 5 years ago. Computer games 5 years from now are equally difficult to predict.

While it’s important to recognise the value of gaming in modern culture and education, we must resist the temptation to rigidly define game boundaries.

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