The thesis that I read, called Digital game-based learning: Towards an experiential gaming model, introduced a model to represent the way that we learn through educational games. Do not that this model and paper doesn’t explain the whole game design.
Using this model a game designer can pinpoint the parts of his game that still need more work. At the heart of the model we find the challenges (problems) without those we don’t have an educational game, we don’t even have a game.
The model suggests that we don’t learn a lot from answering multiple choice questions, but stresses the importance of a player being able to experiment with the objects in the world. For example, a game where a user needs to build a bridge with limited resources through AutoCAD to get to the other side of a canyon shouldn’t have one single solution. The player’s first three tries could fail, but the game would give feedback on where it went wrong. (where did the bridge collapse) The player would then use this information to create a bridge that is a bit stronger.
So where should an educational game designer put his attention on?
- Creating a real engaging challenging game. (without the educational part yet)
- Allow users to experiment with the objects in the world.
- Give enough feedback so that the player knows where he went wrong, or where he was right.
- Make the challenges balanced. (too challenging gives frustration, on the other hand not enough challenge leads to boredom)
- Provide clear goals.
The other part of the cycle (the upper part) is idea generation, which is something that happens mostly asynchronous from the game.
You can find a copy of the paper here.
Writen byKristian Kiili, Tampere University of Technology, Pori, Pohjoisranta 11, P.O. Box 300, FIN-28101 Pori, Finland
Accepted on 1 December 2004
The paper I read is Fundamental Components of the Gameplay Experience: Analysing Immersion ,written by Laura Ermi and Frans Mäyrä from the University of Tampere (Finland) (2005). The paper can be found here.
In this paper the author starts by explaining why people enjoy playing games. To create a fun game there must be a equal balance between the level of challenge and the skill-level op the player. If the game is too hard it gets frustrated and if it’s too easy, it gets boring. The author creates a 3-level model to express why people enjoy playing computer-games.
- interactive input-output loop
- cyclic feelings of suspense and relief
- fascination of a temporary escape into another world
In the second part of the paper the author gives his view on ‘immersion‘. When a player immerses with a game he becomes physically or virtually a part of the experience itself. The author tries to link immersion while playing video-games with immersion while reading a books or watching a movie. He does this with an enquiry for gaming Finnish children and their parents. The results learn that immersion or gameplay-experience are multidimensional concepts.
- sensory immersion
- challenge-based immersion
- imaginative immersion
The first one is related to the audiovisual execution of games. The second one relates to the cyclic feelings of suspense and relief. The last one is related to the chanche that the game gives the player for using his imagination to identify with the game character/the plot.
I learned from the paper that game-balance is very important. The game can’t be too hard nor too easy. Some good visual graphics and soundtrack are a necessity if you want to maximize a player’s immersion. To stimulate his imaginative immersion you’ll need a strong storyline so the player has the feeling he’s temporary escaping into another world.
Starcraft 2 is not really a single player game but is focused on multiplayer.It is a real-time strategy game. There is a whole competition online and each player gets assigned to a level. (Bronze/silver/gold…/master)This system is developed for letting players compete with other opponents of the same skill-level. There are 3 ingame races which you can play and these are all very well balanced. What I like the most in the game? The online competition for sure. It’s a very competitive game and the level of play is very high. (even for starters) It’s also a game that is well known for its LAN-competition with cash-prices and some people even organize so called ‘barcrafts’. Barcrafts is just watching the online competition together with other people in a bar or pub.This shows the popularity of the game:D
The paper I chose to read is: Karl Bergström. 2010. The implicit rules of board games: on the particulars of the lusory agreement. In Proceedings of the 14th International Academic MindTrek Conference: Envisioning Future Media Environments (MindTrek ’10). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 86-93. It can be found here: click!
In this paper, the author explores the implicit rules that surround the playing of board games, in order to better understand gamers and gaming, as well as facilitate design. The paper describes the result of interviews with 11 experienced gamers. It describes a set of implicit rules commonly used, as well as possible points of discussion concerning these rules and how the players handle these.
Implicit rules are not part of the game itself, but of the social agreement between its players. They are often ambiguous, not shared by all players, often taken for granted and only verbalized when they are broken. The implicit rules in this paper are divided into three categories:
- Game-focused rules: closest to the game and directly related to the explicit rules. Don’t cause the most friction between gamers. Examples: taking back a move, always play to win/do your best, adhering to the spirit of the game, …
- Group-focused rules: these are more focused on the group of people playing and proper behavior while playing. These elicit more friction between players than the previous category. Examples: no early exit, no unacceptable whining on your position on the quality of the game during play, …
- Rules in between: these fall in between the group and the explicit rules and often concern the boundary of the magic circle (the social agreement between players when playing). These cause the most friction when they are broken. Examples: no taking revenge for outcome of previous game, no metagaming (e.g. threatening players with off-game consequences, favoritism, …), can rules be discussed during games or only afterwards, …
Depending on the category of the implicit rules, the consequences of breaking a rule can differ greatly. Game-focused rule breaches are generally solved by finding an agreement. Group-focused rules tend to more quickly lead to discussions, since some people tend to think that they are more “right” than others, which can lead to hard feelings. Finally, breaching the rules in between is seen as the worst transgressions, since this can lead to serious problems for the further enjoyment of the game. “Punishment” can vary from verbal remarks during/after the game, excluding players from future games or even outright termination of the current game.
I’ve learned from this paper that the implicit rules of a game should not be neglected compared to the explicit rules, when judging whether a game is fun to play. While explicit rules are generally not up for discussion, implicit rules often are. And the discussion that could ensue because of this, could have a great impact on the enjoyability of the game. Gaming is a social activity, so the human factor should also be taken into account during evaluation. It also follows that, knowing about these implicit rules, one should take them into account when designing a game and try to eliminate all ambiguities in the explicit rules that could lead to conflicts over implicit rules. Finally, the author made the interesting remark that digital games, especially now they are focussing more and more on multiplayer, also come with implicit rules, that if not followed, can spoil the experience. Examples of this are spawn camping in shooters or ganking and griefing in MMORPGs.
One of my favourite games is Super Smash Bros. It’s usually played as a multiplayer beat’em-up game with friends controlling the other characters. Instead of making famous characters because of the game (f.e: Yoshimitsu of the Tekken series) this game turns it around and makes a game famous because of it’s characters. Almost each character has a completely different set of moves which gives the game an exploration factor. Initially the option to play as Pikachu versus Mario drew me to play this game, but the fun gameplay and unlocks kept me addicted.
One of the funnest aspects of the multiplayer mode is that next to the official rules we are able to make up some new rules. For example:
- You can’t select the same character twice. Which almost assures that even the best player at one point has to select a character which he isn’t familiar with.
- Pokémon mode: Everybody selects a Pokémon character and the only items turned on are Pokéballs. Of course we also pick the Pokémon Stadium level to play in.
Total War is actually not a single game, but a series of strategy games for the PC. Up to now, the games have all been set in a certain period in history. The first game, Shogun: Total War, was set in feudal Japan during the Sengoku period, the Japanese civil war between the various samurai clans. This was followed by Medieval: Total War, which as its name suggests, focusses on Europe and the Middle-East during the Middle Ages. Next in line is Rome: Total War, now portraying the known world during the time of the Romans. They revisited the Middle Ages in Medieval 2: Total War. In Empire: Total War, the focus is on the Napoleonic times, while in the most recent incarnation, Shogun 2: Total War, Japan is the theatre of war once again.
The game is a mix of a turn-based strategy game and a real-time strategy game. The turn-based game is reminiscent of board games like Risk and Axis & Allies. Each player controls a certain empire/nation and tries to maintain/expand his territory. This involves managing the cities in the provinces under his control, constructing buildings and recruiting arming. Players engage in diplomacy with each other, or take it to the next step on the field of battle. The real-time aspect of the game comes into play during these battles. Players have the option to change from the strategic map view, to the tactical battle view. Here they can lead their troops into combat in glorious 3D, showing thousands of soldiers on the screen at once.
I like this game because of this combination of turn-based board game like play and the real-time action of the battlefield. These games involve a fair deal of decision making, without becoming overly complex. They also take some time to complete. And I’m rather fond of some depth and layers in a game, and that give you a real sense of accomplishment when you’ve finally conquered your enemies.
To discuss in class, I’ve read the paper “Balancing Skills to Optimize Fun in Interactive Board Games” by Eva Kraaijenbrink , Frank Van Gils , Quan Cheng , Robert Van Herk , Elise Van Den Hoven. The paper can be found here.
The paper researches the effect that balancing skills has on the user experience. The main experiment was done with a stratego-like setup. The board was replaced by an electronic device, so that a computer could calculate the currently winning and losing player. The balancing was done by displaying bonuses whenever a piece was taken from a player. In a balanced game, the bonus would appear closer to the losing player, in an unbalanced game, the bonus would appear randomly on the board.
The game was tested on pairs of two, and each pair played 2 times. One of the times, the players where informed about the balancing, the other time, they did not know. Results showed that players in a balanced game felt more successful. Also, the players preferred to know in advance whether the game was balanced or not. They saw the balanced game as more challenging, and if they know it in advance, other tactics can be used. This creates a new aspect to the stratego gameplay where the better user might sacrifice his bad pawns to be able to get the bonuses.
I’ve learned from this paper that rules change gameplay. Although this was a research to see if balancing the skills would improve the gameplay, it’s clear to me that if the users are aware, this balancing becomes a new rule, and this changes the tactics of the game. When creating a game, the influence of every rule must be taken into consideration, because adding one rule to much may drastically cripple the game or make it a great one.
Games@KULeuven 