Interactive Storytelling & Computer Games

I did recall if there were any learning methods or cases can be explained by gamification and found actually during all our academic life, from kindergarten to college, there are a bunch of the examples we can find.

The class I am an AI is about promotions and marketing in telecommunications. In class, more than 70 students are divided into 11 groups, respectively representing different medium, like WFIU, NBC Sports, etc. It’s just like the popular game SimCity in which people simulate a life in city, they live there and try to live better. In our class, students simulate that they are the CEOs, CFOs, Directors of Creative, Directors of Public Affairs… They do budget for their medium, design business strategies and marketing plans, and they even come up with new print ad or video ad for their promotions. Their after class would be just like a meeting of all those big figures in a company. 

Back in college, I remember taking part in events such as MUN where kids behaved like crazy to achieve their “political goals”. They get mingle, they talk, they argue, they pass each other paper notes to make a deal… It’s just like the real diplomacy. And another even was held by the Foreign Ministry of China. It was for college students to simulate that they were the real spokesperson of FM and answer questions to smart reporters in front of cameras.

I don’t have much to say so this will be very short, but Michael brought up single player games as a means of bridging social gaps amongst your friends. I found this to be particularly relevant as I just lectured on a similar topic today. Even when we play games by ourselves, we are still connected to many other people. Whether it’s an MMO likeWorld of Warcraft, or a first-person shooter likeCounter-Strike. Playing single-player, though, provides a different sort of connection (presuming you’re not in the same room as your fellows). While you can certainly share in the experience with others—particularly given that Steam lets you share achievements and such—what’s really important is the bridge they open up between developers and players.

When playing single player, you are engaging in and experiencing the story the developer has created; you are in a dialogue. As such, even though you’re the only player-character on  the screen, you are never alone.

I am supposed to do a RR this week but I have an interesting story I would like to share…
Yesterday’s class was really interesting to me because I had a first hand experience with gamification and the video we watched made me think about something that has happened to me in the past. Years ago I was part of this “flight simulator” club in Italy and we had a trip to one of the flight schools that uses real simulators to train their pilots. They split us into pairs and they let us try to land a Boeing 737 from inside a real cockpit. My companion was a 55 years old guy and he was also the president of the club. He had so much experience with flight simulator despite his “videogame” career only starting when he was around 40. I was an 18 year old who had just started to “virtually fly” a few years earlier. I ended up landing the jet without too many problems while this guy crashed the plane and killed hundreds of virtual people. It was like my brain had no problem at all adapting to a new situation and a new technological configuration while this guy had to learn everything again, from the beginning. Even the pilot instructor noticed this difference and the first thing he said was “these kids! Give them a computer and they can literally do everything. I wish it was that easy for me when I was learning to fly”.
I still don’t know today if I was actually flying a 100% accurate simulation of a plane but I was really surprised myself of how easily I was able to pick up the mechanics and how much the other people were strug with it.
I don’t know if this is the real meaning of “gamification” but since we watched that video I really couldn’t resist and I wanted to write this story because, after all, I landed a 737!!!!

Games are a strongly social and eusocial technology. Just like the Uno game mentioned before, they halp bridge gaps in understanding and communication. In the world of video games, even single player games can help build a feeling of cameradery as you pass the controller around and tease and cheer each other for your successes and failures. One of my favorite authors has a brief essay collection entitled “Games Matter” where the discusses how games got him through childhood, gave him a stronger bond with his wife. How they have helped him become part of a community of geeks and nerds and gave him the change to meet wonderful people. How they helped him connect with his teenaged stepson to the point that he eventually asked to be adopted. Play is rooted in our social instincts.

While game play in gamification does not have to be related to the thing you are teaching, if you can do so in a way that doesn’t feel artificial, it is a much stronger tool. But adding a real time sense of fiero, adding a feel of accomplishment through feed back.

Gamification is an interesting idea that I have been looking into over the last few months.  Gamification is when aspects of a game such as a point system or level bar, are put into none game applications.  This can be used as a method of motivation or to make a menial chore more entertaining.  More and more gamification is being used in applications in order to help motivate people.  In class, we talked about the app “Zombies run.”  Where a person uses a zombie survival game as a reason to work out and run.  This is a great example of gamification in action.  The reason I am so interested in applications like these, is because recently I have been doing research into slow change design.

Slow change is when a design is made in order to create a gradual change in a user’s behavior or mindset.  This is still a new field in interaction design, so it is still in its infancy and as such, doesn’t have much research backing it.  A common way slow change is approached is by using games to entice a user to change.  This has had some mild success, which is why I am considering it for my Capstone.  The “Zombies Run” app successfully uses the idea of gamification to encourage the user to work out and get in shape.

Slow change and gamification…what a beautiful combination!

This chapter theorizes the action and idea of game play. She does abstractify a very practical thing like games. But I did fasten on the idea of game-playing as synchronized companionship. I’m not quite sure what she means by that, but I started thinking of last week when I was playing the card game Uno with the 7-year old grandson of a friend. It was hard to communicate with him, since he thought older strange people were boring, and I wasn’t very good myself in drawing in 7 year-olds. But I asked him to teach me Uno, since I had never played it before, and he was always carrying around a pack of Uno cards. And so, during the game, that was our closest kind of contact, synchronized contact, that we had come across. After that, it sort of relieved a little bit of the tension. But that is one thing that games are good for – to provide a way of interacting with people – an easy way to break the ice, and the best way I could think of to interact with this 7 year-old kid, or anybody of any age.

 

Yesterday there was discussion on games and teaching, and that play is a great way to perk interest in learning and teaching. I’m wondering how related the game has to be to the subject matter. I mean, one could make up a game that maybe just infuses some element of play in the middle of the material, but doesn’t necessarily teach the material per se. But just the element of play as such perhaps help to perk up the element of fun in learning. That is, the by-product of play is the interest in learning. Another thing I was thinking is that I am naturally timid in trying out things dealing with software. I’m timid in clicking on things, pressing buttons, etc. So the talk about some people needing a “course” to teach me something is very relevant to me. I am shy about clicking and pressing in order to learn, because I’m afraid it will mess everything up and I won’t be able to find myself out of the mess.

Here is an interesting example of gamification that I saw recently in one of my classes.  I thought it fit with the talk of gamification.

http://www.egmnow.com/video/german-street-crossing-lets-you-play-pong-while-waiting-to-cross/

While discussing how much Michael loves his Roomba, I got to think about the phenomenon of humanization of machinery. This is a subject that I have always been interested in, particularly concerning mental exercises in pieces of literature. Specifically, I am referring to Mary Shelley’s Frankensteinand Phillip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Both of these books are excellent thought exercises, as they question what it is that really makes us human, and whether or not we are any more or less human than our machines. In Dick’s novel, most people regulate their emotions not through any natural process but through a machine that lets them pick pre-set emotions to feel throughout the day. For example, one might wish to use the confidence or aggressive setting when going in for an interview. As such, many of the humans in the book act much less “human” than do the androids, who often struggle to come to terms with how they feel in a world that does not accept their existence.

Perhaps most relevant to our discussion, however, is the fact that people inDo Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?often own mechanical pets. Most species on the planet have gone extinct, and those that are left are extremely expensive. Yet owning a pet and caring for it is one of the only remaining acts of humanity left to these individuals. I believe one reason we often humanize our machines is because it provides an easy, comfortable outlet for our emotions. When can feel anger without retribution, happiness without mockery, etc.

Frankensteinsimilarly sought to address what it is that makes us human, showing the same themes of created having a broader range of emotions than the creator, of creatures trying to find peace and solitude in a world that will not leave them alone. What makes our creations any different than us? I posit that we’ll eventually be able to replicate any physical facet of humanity, so they only thing left to us will be our concept of consciousness.

-Ryan