The “Serious Games”
Landscape
An overview of why we’re here…
All Games Are Serious!
(applause)
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Why we’re here?
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We love games!
We know we’ve got a better solution
Killing time until Half-Life 2
We need new markets for our skills
We scammed a free press pass
We have questions about this area
Woot! free day off from work!
Face it the PC games market sucks
We want to reach for bigger things
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Call to Arms!
> We can hit a tipping point
We’re a fad until we aren’t
> A rising tide can lift all boats
We need a flood not an arc
> This is studio-centric market
Publishers not needed
> Lots of roles to play
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Searching for a Definition
What are serious games?
Problems…
> Solving problems is what humans do
> Entertainment is a solved problem
> There are other problems…
Teaching People
Figuring out the Right Policies
Putting Robots on Mars, Venus and Mercury
Overthrowing Dictators
Responding to Threats
> Problem solving is a big business!
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Games are Solutions
> Play has been used since dawn of mankind
> Playing is problem solving
> At times we’ve even been very deliberate in
what and why we play
Chess, Checkers, Go
The Olympics
War Games
Roleplaying
Simulations
Game Theory
> And now… computer games
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So What are Serious Games?
1. Serious Games are Solutions to Problems
2. Serious Games =
“Any computerized game whose chief mission is not
entertainment – (K-12 + advertising games) + all
entertainment games which can be reapplied to a different
mission other then entertainment.”
Why “not” K-12?
The market is a mess and K-12 is a partial stigma
Why “not” Advertising?
Derivative market and “placement” is not a game
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Why is Computerized important?
> We gain a lot of comparative advantage
We can do things we couldn’t before
Allows us to make complex single player experiences
Distribution can happen via the Internet
Modifications and customization
Ability to do automated assessment
How else to fit into e-learning revolution?
Where the people are…
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User Map
Federal
State
Local
Military
Government
Games for Health
Higher Ed
Hobbyist/Mods
Serious Games
Eduware
Individuals
Prep/K-12
Political
Statements
Corporate
Foundations
NGO
Non Profits
Trade Associations
Advergaming
Home School
Analytics
Training
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Past & Present Perspective
From games to serious games
We’re just getting started!
A History of Games
SimCity
Balance of Power
Energy Czar & Scram
Atari
Pong
Space War
Monopoly
Chess
Olympics
Go
Backgammon
Senet
"Bocce"
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Then & Now: Oregon Trail
1985
2004
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Then and Now: Flight Simulator
1987
Evans & Sutherland
2004
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Then and Now: Half-Life
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Created So Far?
> SimHealth
> Close Combat:
Marines
> America’s Army
> Battle Site Zero
> Virtual U
> Environmental
Detectives
> Hungry Red Planet
> Catch the Sperm
> Virtual Leader
> Under Ash
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Hidden Agenda
Balance of Power
SimCity
Other Sim Series
Flight Simulator
Rollercoaster Tycoon
Capitalism
Surgeon
Civilization
Railroad Tycoon
President Elect
Korsun Pocket
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What has this gotten us?
> Mostly one-off titles sponsored by
enlightened third parties
Foundations, Non-profits, Military, Higher-Ed
> Majority developed in the last five years
> A plethora of traditional games which
can be repurposed by savvy teachers
> The K-12 eduware ghetto
> Few commercial pioneers past & present
Most focused on traditional training markets
> No sense of defined industry
But some emergence we can build on this week
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Current Position
> A project history to build from
> Incredible technology looming
Graphics tech faster then Moore’s Law
New consoles by 2006
Portable market hypergrowth
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More academics & programs contributing
Increased industry cooperation
Invigorated press; highly interested
Bracing for the assessment explosion
Poor PC games market
An opportunity to accelerate growth
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Broadbased Industry Support
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IGDA
ESA
GDC
E3Expo
ELSPA
NASAGA
DiGRA
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A Closer Look
Space by Space
Government
> “A democratic society depends upon
an informed and educated citizenry”
- Jefferson
MassBalance & BudgetUtah, Waterbusters
> Fed, state and local
Different degrees of funds and accessibility
> International: More activist governments
> The “CYA” factor and controversy
Escape from Woomera
> Could play a role of generalized
industry support in some cases
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Edutainment/K-12
> Established retail market
Riverdeep, Infogrames, Leapfrog
> Lots of online stuff
PBS Kids, Scholastic
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Is there an independent business model?
Crossover games used periodically
School districts are “broke”
Home schooling shouldn’t be discounted
1999: Home Schooling 850,000 (experts 2M)
New York Times: Not just religious conservatives
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Higher Education
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Less constricted by standards
Able to take more risks
Better technology infrastructures
Better budgets
Seen the price of textbooks lately?
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Struggling with “E-instruction”
Academic Contributions & Research
Will build lots of stuff themselves
Great potential partners
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Health Care
> Games for Health: Documented Uses
Game as Carrot Model
Health Education & Media
Patient Treatment
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Asthma, ADD, Motor Skills, Psychological,
measurement, Biofeedback
Create/instill/measure conditions in research
Administrative/Professional Training
Technology Transfer
> Medical issues w/games
Clinical Trials and protocols
Violence? Repetitive Stress Injuries, Eyes, Seizures,
Obesity?
> Market Possibilities
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Corporate
> Larger Pen & Paper contingent
> Fractured vendor community
Number of mom & pop shops is staggering
> Uses
Training (not just for workers)
Analytics
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Breakaway
Advergaming
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YaYa Games
> What will be the effect from LMSes and E-learning?
> Big companies plan budgets far in advance
> The “near mythical” ROI issue
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Military I
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Huge e-learning commitment
Obvious crossover opportunities
Training & advergaming
Contracting process
Examples:
Close Combat Marines
Full Spectrum Command
Full Spectrum Warrior
Spearhead II
Army Game Project
DarWars
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Military II
> More Examples:
Guard Force (National Guard)
Joint Force Employment
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Crossover into Real War commercial release
SIMSar2
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Coast Guard Search and Rescue
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Non Government Organizations
> Fundables and funders
> Dollar Per Impact
> Examples:
Markle Foundation
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SimHealth
Leimondt Foundation
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Hidden Agenda
Global Kids
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Policy Slam
Sloan Foundation
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Virtual U
NAHB
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Building Homes of Our Own
> Risk Takers!
> Transition the funding axis
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Other
> Journalism
> Artistic
Trigger: Game Art
> Editorial
Newsgaming
Fix Your Commute
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Smashing Ideas
> Propaganda &
> Political statements
Eyewitness
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A Serious Games Network
Who’s doing what and where?
Growth of Serious Games
> Timeline
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2/18/2004
1/18/2004
12/18/2003
11/18/2003
10/18/2003
9/18/2003
8/18/2003
7/18/2003
6/18/2003
5/18/2003
4/18/2003
3/18/2003
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2/18/2003
Membership
Started 2002
First meetings spring 2003
Listserv founded February 2003
Lounsbery Funding July 2003
Currently over 240 members
Games For Health 2003
250
Time
Serious Games
ERTS
> Goals
Help policymakers and administrators
Organize greater serious games community
Support other projects and independent efforts
> Results
Lots of press and growing network
Useful resource for government agencies
Contributing to legitimacy of space
Serious Games Summit 2003!
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Who’s Else is Out There?
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Games to TeachEducation Arcade
ETC @ Carnegie Melon
IC2 @ Austin
ICT @ USC
Moves Institute
Army Game Project
DARPA
Microsoft Research
Academic Co-Lab
MediaX (Stanford)
Variety of Independent Evangelists
Lots of new projects incubating
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The Broader Marketplace
This stuff doesn’t grow on trees
Lots of Potential Markets
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U.S. Textbook Market$3 Billion
Corporate Learning
$66 Billion
Government Training
$40 Billion
IBM Training Budget
$700 Million
U.S. Army Training
$7 Billion+
E-Learning
$10 Billion+
Government Simulations $3 Billion
Leapfrog
$680 Million
Foundation payouts
$20 Billion+
Business Analytics
$5 Billion+
1% of all of this?
Priceless…
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A competitive environment
> Other major media
Books
Film
TV
Music
> Other forms of teaching
Lectures
Textbook
Multimedia
E-Learning
“Pen & Paper” Games
Outward Bound
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We have some hurdles to jump
> Structural
“game developer” isn’t in the yellow pages
There is no sense of standard practices
Emergent community means it’s fractured
Education institutions are mixed bag
> Antipathy
Games are “kids stuff”
Costs are “expensive”
Timeframe is “too slow”
> Inexperience
Not everyone speaks “game”
Production management is not the forte of most potential
clients
Many developers unable to stomach the bizdev
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More hurdles…
> Published reports and Perception
Games didn’t help science test scores (2001)
> We haven’t defended ourselves well
This is just a military thing
Let me see those games!
What other influences were there?
> Yet another fad…
We are until we aren’t
> We’re in the midst of a generational shift…
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Average Age of a…
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U.S. Representative
U.S. Senator
U.S. Governor
U.S. Teacher
School Principal
Corporate CEO
College Dean
Military Colonel
General/Admiral
Physician
Gamer
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A Typical Colonel
A Typical CEO
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A Typical Gamer
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Who else wants a piece of this?
> Traditional simulation companies
Evans & Sutherland, Booz Allen Hamilton
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Anyone got a spare SGI 32 Processor System?
> Major consultants
Deloitte & Touche
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Cannon fodder approach.
> Military Industrial Complex
Grumman, General Dynamics, Etc.
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We’re in charge around here.
> E-Learning Industry
Apollo Group, Brainbench, Click2Learn
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More text and Java Applets Anyone?
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Why have previous efforts failed?
> They went to the wrong people!
EA and Activision are great GAME publishers
Commercial market growing too fast – no incentive
> Tech wasn’t mature enough
Many times ideas often outpace the platform needed
No way to do cool team and multiplayer
> Market wasn’t ready
You think the antipathy is bad today?!??
> Sales strategy hard to work
How to recoup expensive unfunded development?
Money is in projects vs. products
No Internet, no easy marketing system
> Hard to raise capital for game companies
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What’s our story now?
> Things have matured
> We have many things others don’t
“You don’t ask a landscaper to build you a house”
We have a unique audience share
Cutting edge visuals and interface design
Great AI and storytelling capabilities
We make stuff ubiquitous
Best a online communities
A history of world building
> Games are becoming mainstream
Entertainment & culture
Sheer numbers of devices staggers the uniformed
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What about crossovers?
> True Crossover
Full Spectrum Warrior
> Crossover for Distribution Help
America’s Army
> SimHealth
Sold about 35,000 copies
> Co-publish/Self Publish
Virtual U sold about 1000 copies
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Stories from the Front
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“That’s what we spend on toilet paper!”
We can run a contest!
Lets make it massive-multiplayer!
This is Phil from the Mailroom
Put more programmers on it
My beta report: You spelled thas wrong…
How do I print?
What’s DirectX?
Will this run on my Mac?
We don’t have sports in Australia
We’ll build this stuff with students
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Building a Project
From games to serious games
Typical Serious Game Project
> Mission is to effect some change or insight
> Combination of developer and subject
matter experts
> Often requires many disciplines to work
together
> Funded by client; third-party funds; or as a
b2b sale. Not retail!
> Commonly avoids SOTA target platforms
> The market may not be in the software itself
> Has unique engineering needs
> Long (and arduous) run-up to go-decision
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Typical Project Stages
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“The Meeting”:
Pre-sell process:
Ramp up:
The snag:
Go ahead:
First Playable:
Alpha:
Beta:
Gold Master:
Project Launch:
Post Mortem:
2.0?
AKA the Braindump
Fundamentals, Plan A
Committees, Experts, Funding
Jump through proverbial hoop
Someone sent a check!
Can they get it?
Can they augment and test?
TEST! TEST! TEST!
Is everything else done?
What’s everyone’s role?
Can we show it worked?
If we only had more time!
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Everyone but the Developer
> Education Experts
Implementors (teachers, trainers, tutors, evangelists)
Instructional designers
> Content Assistance
Subject Matter Experts (SMEs)
Testers & Steering Committee
> Internal
Internal Production & Management
Steering Committee & Advisory Board
The person who writes the check
Marketing & PR
> Others
Third Party Consultants
Co-marketing & Distribution
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Different Deal
> Most projects are work-for-hire
> IP ownership is about continuation and
product support not “sequelitus
valuation” for publishers
> Deals take much longer to incubate
> Handholding client is critical – you
manage them as much as they manage
you
> Budgets are (for now) much lower
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Construction Issues
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Design for the instructor
Adaptability & Modding
Distribution
Educational Standards
Commercial Game
Player
All over the map!
Federal & State
Doesn’t 100% translate to curriculum
Have to constantly keep referencing them
Serious Game
> Assessment tools & LCMS
> Transparency
> How important Cross Platform?
Facilitator
Player
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Targeting the audience
> We should look at
consecutive levels of
impact
> Our ability to make
complex situations
accessible is key
> Your best users may
not come from your
highest target
> How you implement
usage will determine
success at each point
University Presidents
Faculty Chairs
All Faculty
All Students
All stakeholders
including general public
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A Small Note on Platforms
> Windows Dominates (duh!)
Government especially
Older PC architecture still a concern
> Macintosh still prevalent in education
A Typical Governor
16% marketshare in “education market”
All 7th & 8th graders in Maine have Powerbooks
Virginia's Henrico County (All Students)
30% of portable market in education
Virtual PC for Mac does a great job (but for how long?)
> Accessibility & 508 Standards
> Educators “under using” the technology
> Portable market too fragmented
Interesting work by MIT’s TEP with PDAs
Companies not standardizing (yet)
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Developer Recommendations
> Don’t wait for the mountain to come to
you
Contact local elected officials
Get out in your business community
Learn these markets
> Prepare for a long haul
> Spend time helping with fundamentals
> Work with outside experts
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Customer Recommendations
> Use professionals
How to evaluate them…
Learn how to augment and enhance them
> How much game for your $$
Not how much $$ for your game
> Protect your ability to maintain the
product but be flexible on IP
> Don’t forget about the meta-project
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Building A Case
Don’t take no for an answer
What to sell?
> Sell the game last!
1. Sell the space
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Comparative advantages
2. Sell the technology
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Comparative advantages
3. Sell your skills
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Exclusivity
4. Sell your approach
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Comparative advantages
> Then sell your solution
> Leave room to maneuver if plans change.
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Keep Hammering on Comparative
Advantages
> Dominant media form
of a new generation
> Can be played alone
> Asynchronous
multiplayer groups
> Instantly transferable
(i.e. digital distribution)
> Potentially modifiable
and adaptable
> Best Visualization
> Able to juggle more
factors at one time
> When was the last
time you saw a
boardgame for 1
person?
> How often can people
meet at the same
location for extended
period?
> How often can
roleplaying take into
account 50 factors?
> What does a textbook
bring to life?
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Managing Fisheries Fighting Fires
Undefined
Blowing up Aliens
Content & subject critical
Demographically Diverse
Not captured
in a bottle!
Will it be Fun?
Game players?
I know it when I see it!
Fun to whom?
Subject fans?
Learn 4 career
Hierarchy of motivators
More fun than X
Interested in subject
Assignment
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Final Thoughts
Are we there yet?
My 10 Commandments
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Solve the problem
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Focus on comparative advantages
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Don’t sell transference. Sell skill, process, insight
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K-12 is a third rail unless you can find a backdoor
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Build networks, lay foundations, partner3
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Be as creative with your project as your product
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Beware of other ways problem could be solved
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Though shall not retail
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We need to think big
10. This is not the game business as you know it
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Futher recommendations
> Build an industry face & Attract things
collectively
> Identify and root out preconceptions
Create legitimacy through education
Push back properly against detractors
Promote professional development
> Push for big projects and problems
“We will not be successful with 50 $100K projects”
> Catalog things better
Social Impact Games, Weblab, Teachers Arcade
Games for Health
> Think Global, Act Local
Elected representatives, local companies, grassroots
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Future Events
> NGO Group Meeting
NYC, April, time & place TBA
> Education Arcade
E3 Expo, May 9-10, Los Angeles
> Games For Health
University of Wisconsin, September 16-17
> D.C. Serious Games Day II
Fall 2004
> Serious Games Summit 2005
Spring 2005, Time & Place TBD
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Next Efforts
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IGDA SIG Possibility
More Serious Game Subgroups
Expanded Web site features
More frequent issues of SNAGGED
Serious Games Annual 2005
Games for Health Literature Review
Drive down cost of ramp-up
Expand Serious Games.org
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Resources
> www.seriousgames.org
Serious Games Mailing List
S.N.A.G.G.E.D.
> www.educationarcade.org
> www.gamesforhealth.org
Games for Health List
> www.socialimpactgames.com
> www.acm.org/pubs/cie.html
> Books
Gee, Aldrich, and Prensky
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My Preamble…
> The are likely exceptions to everything I will say.
> I do not pretend to know everything about this space.
> I am not aware of every last project.
> My ideas are only part of the answer we’re constructing.
> I am trying to speak as much from experience as I can.
> I did not start out here. I am new to this area.
> Please laugh at my lame attempts at humor.
> And finally…
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Detour on SCORM®
> What the heck is this!!?!@?!
Shareable Courseware Object Reference Model
> The LMS or LCMS
Learning Management System
Learning Content Management System
> It’s almost all Web based
HTML, XML, Javascript, Java, Flash
> How do games fit in?
Can we retrofit high-end C++ .exes with SCORM
and LMS Systems?
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Don’t Take ROI for an Answer
> Fire Department
My building burned down…
> Jumbo Jets & Rocket Ships
What’s this button do?
> Can you really teach this with a book?
Strategy?
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Who’s Who and what’s their role?
> Development Studios
Find projects; educate client; make games
> Learning & Instruction Experts
Provide research; design help; content expertise; assessment tools
> Publishers
Provide tech/industry support; look for crossover possibilities
> Facilitators
Ensure learning experience is fulfilling; build with and on top of our
creations
> Capital Sources
Fund us both philanthropically and commercially
> Customers & Users
“The problem”; support; funds; expertise; feedback; adaptations
> Other Partners
Co-marketing; expert consultants; etc.
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