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WP3-Specification
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Deliverable Name :
Specification
Deliverable Id :
D3.1
Status :
Final
Dissemination Level :
Public
Due date of deliverable :
M10
Actual submission date :
M12
Work Package :
WP3
Lead partner for this deliverable :
University of Central Lancashire
Author(s):
Brendan Cassidy, Janet Read, Lorna McKnight,
15/09/2010
Nick Mitchell, Carlos Vaz de Carvalho, Ricardo
Batista, David Gouveia, Duarte Lopes, Jorge
Moreno, Pedro Latorrer, Martin Sillaots, Joze
Rujelj, Paula Escudeiro
Partner(s) contributing :
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Contents
Summary.................................................................................................................................... 6
1
Game, Interaction and Learning ........................................................................................ 9
1.1
Computer Games....................................................................................................... 9
1.2
Role Play Games ...................................................................................................... 11
1.3
Adventure Games .................................................................................................... 16
1.3.1
1.4
Computer Games and Motivation ........................................................................... 21
1.5
Computer Games and Learning ............................................................................... 22
1.5.1
1.6
Graphic Adventure Games with Educational Characteristics .......................... 28
Serious Games ......................................................................................................... 31
1.6.1
Finding a Correct Genre for Learning Games .................................................. 34
1.6.2
Users (single player vs. Multiplayer approaches) ........................................... 38
1.6.3
Guided / directed learning .............................................................................. 39
1.6.4
User feedback .................................................................................................. 39
1.6.5
Reusability ....................................................................................................... 40
1.6.6
Serious games to aid learning ......................................................................... 40
1.6.7
Serious Games in Medicine ............................................................................. 42
1.6.8
Serious Games in Education ............................................................................ 43
1.6.9
Summary.......................................................................................................... 45
1.7
2
A Few Famous Graphic Adventure Games ...................................................... 17
References ............................................................................................................... 45
Game Engines .................................................................................................................. 51
2.1
Using an Existing Adventure Game Engine ............................................................. 51
2.1.1
Wintermute 1.9 (Windows) ............................................................................. 51
2.1.2
Adventure Game Studio 3.1.2 SP1 (Windows) ................................................ 56
2.1.3
Visionaire 3.3 (Windows)................................................................................. 61
2.1.4
Lassie Shepherd (Web) .................................................................................... 67
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2.1.5
Sancho Island (Web) ........................................................................................ 74
2.1.6
Comparison Grid .............................................................................................. 76
2.1.7
Engine Recommendations ............................................................................... 77
2.2
Developing the Game from Scratch ........................................................................ 78
2.2.1
XNA Game Studio 3.1 (Windows, Xbox 360, Zune) ......................................... 79
2.2.2
Adobe Flash (Web: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Solaris, PocketPC) .................... 79
2.2.3
SilverSprite = XNA in Silverlight (Web: Windows, MacOS, Linux) ................... 79
2.3
Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 80
References........................................................................................................................... 84
3
Game Design.................................................................................................................... 86
3.1
Game Concept ......................................................................................................... 87
3.1.1
Scenarios, threads and scenes ........................................................................ 87
3.1.2
Scene description ............................................................................................ 90
3.1.3
Scenes and plot points..................................................................................... 91
3.2
World War II Scenario ............................................................................................. 93
3.2.1
Scene 0: Intro................................................................................................... 93
3.2.2
Scene 1: France, June 1940 ............................................................................. 94
3.2.3
Scene 2: Germany, June 1939 ......................................................................... 98
3.2.4
Scene 3: Poland, January 1941 ........................................................................ 99
3.2.5
Scene 4: England, *Month 1943 .................................................................... 102
References ..................................................................................................................... 103
3.3
Maritime Discoveries Scenario .............................................................................. 104
3.3.1
Scene 0: Intro................................................................................................. 104
3.3.2
Scene 1: Portuguese King’s Court ................................................................. 105
3.3.3
Scene 2: Pirate ship ....................................................................................... 109
3.3.4
Scene 3: School of navigation ........................................................................ 110
3.3.5
Scene 4: Ship back ......................................................................................... 113
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3.4
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Industrial Revolution Scenario .............................................................................. 117
3.4.1
Scene 1:Home ................................................................................................ 117
3.4.2
Scene 2:Cotton Factory ................................................................................. 119
3.4.3
Scene 3: Mine ................................................................................................ 120
3.4.4
Scene 4: Parliament ....................................................................................... 121
Evaluation Methodology ............................................................................................... 123
4.1
QEF - Quantitative Evaluation Framework ............................................................ 123
4.1.1
Requirement Classification ............................................................................ 125
4.1.2
Factor Classification ....................................................................................... 125
4.1.3
Result Evaluation ........................................................................................... 126
4.1.4
Dimension performance ................................................................................ 126
4.1.5
Global deviation............................................................................................. 126
4.1.6
System Quality ............................................................................................... 126
4.2
Alpha testing.......................................................................................................... 127
4.2.1
4.3
Protocol ......................................................................................................... 127
Beta testing............................................................................................................ 127
4.3.1
Protocol ......................................................................................................... 128
4.3.2
Questionnaire ................................................................................................ 128
4.3.3
Semi-structured interview ............................................................................. 130
4.4
Final Evaluation ..................................................................................................... 131
4.5
References ............................................................................................................. 133
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Summary
Computer games have wide acceptance among younger learners for their challenging design
but also for the social interactions they generate (especially web based games). Research
showed that games do develop mental abilities and skills such as strategy, mental
calculation and decision making but the acquisition of deep knowledge is less well
understood. Serious Games are specifically designed to change behaviors and impart
knowledge and are widely used with adults in training situations, such as emergency
preparedness, training for leadership and even citizenship. The use of Serious Games with a
younger audience has been much less explored, though. In particular, the use of of
interactive multimedia learning tools, with a high degree of immersion (not necessarily
through complex virtual reality) is still mostly experimental and very little systematic.
The objective of the project SELEAG is to evaluate the use of Serious Games for learning
history, culture and social relations. An extensible, online, multi-language, multi-player,
collaborative and social game platform for sharing and acquiring knowledge of the history of
European regions will be developed. Initially 3 different but interrelated geographical
scenarios will be used so that students/players will be involved in a play that replicates the
evolution of these European places over the last 600 years in social, cultural, economic and
resources.The 3 game scenarios will be based on cultural and historic realities of 3 different
European regions but in relation to other regions. The notion of European citizenship will be
brought to the learner/players through these interactions, either in real (students'
interaction in different countries through the platform) or fictional (game scenarios) worlds.
By understanding the shaping of Europe as a result of history students will become familiar
with the formation and evolution of the countries and regions. This understanding is
expected to assist students to identify and respect cultural diversity.Furthermore, the
project’s geographical coverage of Europe brings the multiculturalism and multi-linguistic
aspects of Europe into play. In particular, because students will be integrated in a larger
community of learning that includes all the schools belonging to the project.
The project prepares young students for future challenges in a competitive, technology
based society where the skills for continuous learning are required. Besides the historical
and social context, the game environment and play will develop their mental abilities and
skills such as strategy, decision making, team work, leadership, etc. They will also be better
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prepared to find good sources of information, to cooperate with peers and to integrate into
the European digital society.The project prepares and allows students to develop their
digital literacy skills.
It is not expected that the project results will dramatically change the way schools teach the
areas covered by the project, but it is intended that the project will demonstrate that
learning through serious games can be a valid alternative and that serious games can be an
effective learning tool.A methodology will be developed to evaluate the multidisciplinary
learning (history, geography, economics, etc.), social awareness and changes in attitudes
towards learning and towards a European identity. The SELEAG project plans to adapt,
develop and integrate innovative ICT based content, services and pedagogies. Thereforethe
positive effect that ICT enhanced learning can have in terms of motivation and in terms of
success and knowledge acquisition will also be evaluated. The assessment will take place in
many European countries with children aged 11-16 and will determine the value of serious
games for this age group and context but, at the same, will ensure the best use and the
production of guidelines for its replication. The game can later be easily extended to other
countries and regions due to its web based delivery.
This document relates to the specification stage of the project. It is a point for a thorough
needs analysis, specification and design for the whole game approach. This step is very
important due to the innovation of the approach and the need to define and prepare
activities that effectively create a learning community. In particular, the specification will
include:
- State of the art analysis and review of case studies on the use of Serious Games and Games
for Learning. The focus is to plan and design the game towards the educational context. It
will also include the analysis of existing reusable resources;
- Study of available platforms for developing Serious Games / MMORPGs;
- Research on the multidisciplinary history of the scenarios including historical, social,
military, economic and cultural aspects of the development in the last 600 years. From this
research, scenarios will be setup, defining actors, roles and relations;
- Construction of rich models for the game scenarios and storyboarding. These scenarios
must be beneficial for the construction of transversal thematic lessons. This task involves the
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following aspects: game design (including interaction model), storyboarding (including
functionality) and graphics;
- Pedagogical model and integration into the game context, including the design of contents
and learning activities and the planning of the integration of activities with school activities;
- Specification of an evaluation methodology to assess the use of the game for educational
purposes. The evaluation will address different aspects: the game playability which includes
all the aspects related to game design and play (interface, friendliness, learning curve).
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1 Game, Interaction and Learning
A Game is a particular context where users (players) have structured or semi-structured
goals (with victory as end goal) that they try to achieve by overcoming challenges. At the
same time, they have to respect a set of rules that are made or created in reference to that
restricted environment. Failure to follow these rules constitutes a crime or mistake and
implies a punishment or penalty. Games can involve one player acting alone, two or more
players acting cooperatively, and, more frequently, players or teams of players competing
between themselves.
Play refers to activities and actions with a specific intention, in a specific context. It
represents the interaction with the game environment, game characters, other players, etc.
Therefore Gameplay is the interaction between people, characters and other elements in a
game context.
Games promote mental and/or physicalstimulation. They help develop practical skills,
exercise the body or the mind and can have an educational, simulational or psychological
role. They are associated with an individual desire that differs from individual to individual,
according to age, intelligence, skill and even personality. Depending on these factors, the
creators of the game vary the objectives, rules and challenges so that participants get
increased pleasure and motivation.
1.1 Computer Games
The evolution of computer games is directly related to the evolution of personal computers
(PC). One of the first computer games was "Spacewar", based on statistical
calculations,created by MIT students in 1961with aPDP-1. Another gaming reference is the
first adventure game for PC, launched in 1976, the "Colossal Cave Adventure" or
"Adventure" Like other games at the time, it was text based without pictures. In the early
80s, with the evolution of computers, new interaction devices (like the mouse), better
processing capacity, more memory and improved high definition graphics, games appeared
with colorful graphics, increasing the versatility of the game and ability to generate moving
objects.
Today, computer gameshave different types or genre and are played through a computer,
on a standalone or networked form. It is an interactive product, synchronous or
asynchronous.These technologies, together with the different modes of interaction and
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communication, allow different participants, who have similar interests, to play together
through ICT tools.
A computer game is a system composed of three basic components: plot, engine and
interaction interface, with a success associated with the perfect combination of these
components. The plot sets the theme, objectives and sequence of the game, the engine is
the mechanism that controls the reactions of the game in relation to players' actions, and
finally the interface controls communication between the engine and player, graphically.
Designing a game involves the development of the plot, the definition of scenarios and
characters and the drafting and formatting the script. The graphical interface of the game is
critical to increase its realism and the level of player motivation because most of the
potential attractiveness of games comes from the visual stimuli.
There are several games’ taxonomies, based on different computer games characteristics.
One, focus on the standard of interactivity between the player and game,that is, intrinsic
properties of the various actors of the game, the structure, content and the codification of
the entire context of action - reaction (behavior with other agents and with the user). Chris
Crawford (1997) proposed a classification based onthe action-reflection paradigms:
Game type
Características
Tipo de jogos
“Skill and Action”
Perception and motor skills
Cognitive effort
Action and speed
Adventure, Puzzle and
Role-Playing
“Strategy”
The first type of games are usually real time, have specific control devices and the main
required skills are eye-hand coordination and quick reaction time.The second class
emphasizes the thought instead of frantic action.
Another classification of game types presents six categories based on the interaction model:
Game type
Interaction
Action/Arcade
Physical (actions and choices are physical responses,
in a limited time, to a stimulus)
Competitive (action and player choices are tested by
the opponent player)
Environmental (actions and player choices are tested
War
Strategy
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Role-Playing
Simulation
Adventure
by the game itself)
Cultural (actions and choices are learned and chosen
through the environmental and cultural assimilation)
Mechanical (action and player choices are learned and
chosen by the assimilation of the algorithms of the
simulation models)
Logic (actions and the choices are mental responses in
a limited time)
1.2 Role Play Games
In a Role Playing Game (RPG) there is development of a character and of the story. The
narrative is built between all participants that take part in an imaginary adventure, assuming
another identity, set by an arbitrator named Master. He/she sets the scene and the
characters and situations that the player or players will find during the adventure.
An RPG has the following key elements:
• Player: controls the actions of his or her characters (Player Character - PC) within the plot,
the system of rules and the scenario of the game;
• Master: control characters that interact with the player during the game and is responsible
for all factors of the setting and plot that does not involve the actions of the characters. By
controlling the scene, adapting it to the needs of the plot and is responsible for the
objectives absolute secret. As for the other characters must follow and respect the rule
system can, however, change situations where it is reasonable logic;
• Rule System: limit the types and levels of abilities of a character. The master evaluates the
concordance with the rules of actions and their outcome;
• Scenario: it is the world environment where players are entered with temporal and
geographical references;
• Characters: These are the projections of fantasy players within a scenario can be proposed
and built by the player or pre-existing, however, are necessarily mounted within the system
of rules and scenario set by the game;
• Screen: occurs within the scene where the actors come together for some kind of
adventure or action that happens during the game;
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• NPCs (Non Player Characters): describe the characters controlled by the Master of the
game or the system and not the players, assuming a facilitating role in the adventures of the
characters.
An RPG consists of text-audio-visual descriptions with options that allow design possibilities
asstructures that can be recombined differently by each user. All these elements
(illustrations, text, body language and verbal) are windows or "links" (links) of information
for the player.
There are other references that put the RPG as a form of fiction, considered a "collective act
of creation of oral narratives" (Ludus2004a), retrieving, reviewing and adapting to a modern
context stories from oral tradition. RPGs have an extensive history of use in learning
environments in classroom and other school spaces.
According Tobaldini (2006), RPG's have three important components: atmosphere, history
and rule system. The creation of an atmosphere from a theme represents the context in
which the history of the game unfolds. The storyis an open script for the adventure or
actions determined by the player. The system of rules is a set of regulations that define the
behavior of elements in the world.
In Role Playing Games players face challenges that lead to interaction, dialogue and
exchange of ideas. The RPG does not usually assume a competitive edge, and in many
situations the outcome of the adventure will depend on cooperation among group
members. Being met the objectives of the story, the feeling of victory will be shared by all.
Socialization is therefore another key feature of a RPG. The RPG provides a setting, a
platform where players collectively construct their own stories and characters, regardless of
its medium: paper, electronic or oral (Bettocchi2003) as a group activity. There is a
collaboration between players in history to meet the challenges posed by the master to be
successful, talking, exchanging ideas and exposing the actions of his characters in constant
interactivity.
Interactivity is the latest feature that generates tension and allows for the unpredictability of
events due to unusual situations that end up triggering new experiences and new
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resolutions to problems. This is created by the autonomy of choice, of decision, because one
can expect one or more autonomic responses and difficult to predict.
Therefore learning is gained from the decision in key moments of the adventure and the
possibility of finding different and creative solutions to emerging situations.
The rules of a "Storyteller"RPG, according to Peacock (1996), value the psychological depth
of characters, reflection and interpretation.This author also identifies psychological traits in
this system, because the players specify the nature, behavior, concept, willpower and
humanity when often enter into conflict therefore requires an attitude of reflection and
interpretation.
There are three groups of RPG for computers: the classic game, the multiplayer games and
virtual worlds persistent. The first group is played by a single player in a limited scenario,
where the story is to collect items and character sheets are inspired by traditional RPGs and
no possibility of creating the main character. The second group of RPGs, multi-player, there
is a larger exploitation of the environment, with the story to allow sub-plots for the
construction of small adventures, where you can create and develop characters by using the
system of rules.
Finally, virtual worlds in a persistent manner, MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online RolePlaying Game) enables a large number of players interact with a wide-ranging exploration of
the world, stories are not linear, interpretation and possibility of cooperation, the character
customization and the creation of objects (Tobaldini2006). The player assumes a virtual
citizenship, whether it is or is not networked, there are other players to interact and change
the world. The MMORPG represent a new generation of the popular MUD using graphics
instead of text representation (Bittencourt2003).
The use of RPG in the context of cyberspacecan make the learning process more cooperative
and facilitate the exchange of knowledge between individuals. In education, there are
several scattered experiences whose application in the classroom brought in the first place a
greater motivation for students with the process of teaching and learning. Because this is
the active element of their own learning by looking for the various means at its disposal as
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Computer, Internet, magazines and cable television, among others, to obtain the desired
information and knowledge in a more participatory and interactive. Teachers know it
stimulate the imagination of their students, enabling the creation process, whether scientific
or artistic. The presentation of the issue should not be through a didactic arid, but within a
whole living, breathing, rich in achievement, because young people do not learn by failure or
alienation, but for lack of encouragement and interest (Andrade2002). At this point, fantasy
emerges as an important addition as stated in Hartmann (Andrade2002) "but always fantasy
involves an initial deviation of a real situation, can also be a preparation for reality and bring
about a better command of it."
This complementary function of fantasy is assumed as the learning process and RPG, where
the fancy takes it as his main instrument, has great potential for information. Through
various ambientations historical, geographical, scientific and cultural RPG you can spend
countless concepts. Redeem the interest and encouragement of students in classrooms,
presenting their content in any way more interactive and attractive, has motivated the
researchers in this direction: the use of games to achieve educational goals.
The competitive structure prevents widespread success of all students: the most important
thing is to cooperate, placing the orientation to face a new paradigm for the development of
positive behaviors and where victory can be achieved when a player helps the other to win,
to that both can win together. According Klimick (1992) in (Bolzan2003), the RPG can bring
to school interactivity and participation in education. As in RPGs, the player will interact and
changing the story is being told. At school he can learn while they will use what you learn. To
the same author (1992), this type of game allows the applicability of the contents of an
immediate and simple in the environment of the classroom, involving the use of
imagination.
Many attempts to assist in school learning are geared to the universe or playful fantasy.
However, there must be an adaptation of the RPG rules system with the educational
objectives sought to implement the game in a classroom. The RPG is a teaching tool for
creating practical simulations, experiential classroom, encouraging creativity, participation,
reading, and research. It is adaptable to any subject or educational content, and the target
audience: children, adolescents or adults (Machado2004). According to Marcatto (1996), the
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RPG teaching encourages creativity, participation, reading and research and is easily applied
to any curriculum. Still the same author states that the teacher should adjust the setting of
adventure to the characteristics of their students, such as age, language and culture. Thus,
the RPG can be a tool for discussing complex issues such as urban violence, social inequality
and conflict. That same book also makes reference to strategies for implementation of RPG
for students with course content, since the experience of the characters who shaped the
history of slaves in Brazil, the understanding of physics in freefall and the curvilinear motion
with the calculation and management of projectiles in simulated battle between countries
led by groups of classmates, or even chemistry, learning the various techniques for
fractionation of mixtures to open doors with locks and thus leave a chemical laboratory
created by a mysterious alchemist, among other disciplines (Bolzan2003 ).
The base of the RPG is creativity, so the development of narratives with any educational
content to place the student motivated to adventure (contents apprehended). The student
prepares his character through appropriate rules and directs their actions during the game.
This flexibility brings unlimited possibilities to the story, where the teacher can also join the
adventure in the role of governor of the game's master.
According to Mark Riyis, the use of Educational RPG based on the characteristics:
motivational, cooperative and meets the educational objectives, allows the resolution of
problem situations, application of concepts in practical situations of day-to-day,
interdisciplinary, oral expression, expression cultural awareness and respect for others and
teamwork and cooperative learning (Riyis2006).
The use of RPG should be stimulated as interesting strategy in the teaching-learning so that
students are more motivated and achieve better performance in the assessment, indicating
that learning occurs through play. There are also two other aspects of the RPG that also fit
the educational context: the knowledge and socialization.
The RPG puts players in a situation to face as the character demonstrating knowledge of the
subject from their beliefs, values, emotions and imagination, interaction and cooperation
among players in the classroom. The pursuit of knowledge through interaction and
cooperation among players is enhanced, according to Andrade (2002), by the very structure
of the game is played in groups. Thus in a context of the classroom, the RPG strongly
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reinforces socialization, supported dialogue and exchange of ideas, where the player is
thrust into new experiences, new relationships, just as you browse for new worlds. It is an
exercise in dialogue, group decision and consensus (Nunes2004), supported by a tool rave
environments simulations practices, experiences and to encourage creativity, participation,
research and integration (Marcatto2007).
1.3 Adventure Games
Adventure games are puzzles embedded in a narrative framework, where the solution to
each puzzle allows the player to experience more of the story. The genre's focus on story
allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media, such as literature and film.
Adventure games encompass a wide variety of literary genres, including fantasy, sciencefiction, mystery, horror, and comedy. Nearly all adventure games are designed for a single
player, since the heavy emphasis on story and character makes multi-player design difficult.
Graphic adventures are adventure games that use graphics to convey the environment to
the player. Games under the graphic adventure banner may have a variety of input types,
from text parsers to touch screen interfaces.
Point-and-click adventures are a common type of graphic adventure in which the player uses
a pointer, typically a mouse, to interact with the environment and solve puzzles. This input
method remains popular in the genre, and is well-suited to interaction with the
environment, as opposed to direct control schemes which emphasize character control.
Graphic adventure games differ from role-playing games in that they do not usually involve
action (combat), team-building (recruiting new party members) or points management
(character levels and stats).
While there are some adventure games with action elements, such as Full Throttle and the
Broken Sword games, these elements remain secondary to the narrative and puzzles.
Adventure games are included in the strategy or cognitive, can be separated into two
categories: "Puzzle" and "Role-Playing." The subcategory "Puzzle" emphasizes the logical and
mental agility, based on pure supposition reasons intuitive and deductive. The other
category, "Role-Playing," has a clearly defined objective (Myres1990), where participants
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assume the roles of characters in the game and collaboratively build the second story of the
game regulations. Players can improvise their own choices and build the management and
outcome of the game itself.
Subsequently, however, in a paper by Katz, Kunkel & Wordey, which addresses the
differentiation of the categories, it was concluded that the dividing line between games
"role-playing and adventure games is total, because the first characters gain experience and
energy through the unexpected encounters, while in seconds, the player assumes a specific
character in the game's storyline (Myres1990).
Most graphic adventure games are designed having in mind a mix of the following
characteristics:
a) Narrative
b) Problem solving
c) Exploration
d) Immersive environment
e) Player assumes the role of a character/hero
f)
Collection and manipulation of objects
g) Mystery or situation about which little is known
h) The player embarks on a quest
1.3.1
A Few Famous Graphic Adventure Games
The purpose of this section is not to give insight into each of the presented games, but
rather to familiarize the reader with the look of graphic adventure games that have been
successful in the past.
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The Monkey Island Series
Day of the Tentacle
Sam and Max Series
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Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Full Throttle
Discworld Series
Broken Sword Series
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Grim Fandango
Myst Series
Syberia Series
The Longest Journey Series
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1.4 Computer Games and Motivation
The Knowledge Society is characterized by media information – audio, visual and other
sensorial data is provided to users in short, intense bursts of information. This society, based
on technology and information, is based on an open network system, which, according to
Castells (2002, pp.606-607), "is a set of interconnected nodes, where a node is the point at
which a curve intercepts. (...) These networks are open structures, able to expand without
limit, integrating new nodes as long as they can communicate within the network sharing
the same codes of communication, values or performance goals." Users that were born in
the last 25 years are frequently called Digital Natives, as they grew up on this information
rich society.
Computer games have a wide acceptance amongst this audience. The younger generation
paysa lot of money to spend time in a long, hard and complex activity as playing computer
games can be. Games represent a modern and innovative culture to children and
youth.Johan Huizinga and Roger Caillois claim that "the game is a key element in the cultural
formation of society" (Abreu2003, p.3). Furthermore, games are designed to help us in
adapting to reality, and remarkably facilitate learning and cognitive behavior "(Bystrina1995,
p.15). Computer games seem to offer a cultural insertion, albeit virtual, but not very
different from experiences with traditional games. The combination of content and form
allows to technically reproduce traditional themes (content), in new forms, with the
possibility of insertion into richer emotions.
The power that games have to captivate players has to do with their ability to reach the
natural reward circuits of the brain. Comparative studies show that game playing produces
reactions related to addiction and the production/consumption of dopamine and other
pleasure hormones (Steven2005, p.42). In games, the rewards are part of the universe
through more lives, access to new levels, new equipment and spells, etc.During most of the
game, the players have a major desire: the desire to see what comes next.
Scientific knowledge about gaming in the 50s with computer science and operational
research. This early modern game / simulation corresponded to the emergence of new
educational theories that emphasized more active learning methods. Research and literature
about the educational uses of gaming progressed slowly because of the need to obtain
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validation of their various practices.Furthermore, computer games still carry a set of
prejudices in society, and are often seen as negative for the development of children and
young people. We often hear or read statements like: "the worst of the games is to sanction
and promote aggressiveness and violent responses to conflict; games take the time for
children to read books and are a tremendous waste of time."
1.5 Computer Games and Learning
The relationship of young people with these new tools, computer games, according Moita
(2004), represents an emerging issue that takes a separate role outside the school walls,
with specific features that participate and effectively influence the education of ethical
values, without ceasing to interfere with school curricula, the knowledge of individuals
about themselves, about others and about the world.
The educational space has exceeded the wall space the school, with new ways for formal
and informal education that takes place outside the institutional aspect of education, in
recreational areas, at home or at work. This convergence requires a route to follow an
effective new pedagogical strategy associated with an empathic human-machine interface.
Playing a computer game generates a series of events that, in retrospect, will outline a
narrative, but carry emotions, pleasures and challenges unique to the reading of that
narrative. It is therefore possible to get a convergence of games and learning in three
distinct areas: training (professional and social context); formal education (classroom and
school context), non-formal education (outside the school context).
Furthermore, learning is not confined to the acquisition of a specific tool but rather a
construction of a mental competency that might be useful in another context. The important
thing is not what we think but how we think. The games require to take decisions, much
more than books, movies or music, to make decisions. Literature can activate the
imagination, the music strong emotions, but games force us to decide, to choose, to set
priorities. Thereforegame players "learn to take right decisions: evaluate data, analyze
situations, to revise the long-term objectives and then decide" (Steven2005, p.47).
Pursuing a set of objectives may seem an easy thing, but have two interesting and complex
aspects: first, the number of simultaneous targets/objectives in a game, and second, the
hierarchical form in which these objectives are mentally organized by the player either as
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parallel, simultaneous objectives or as a sequence of interrelated objectives with a longterm vision. So games are also important to long-term planning.
Some types of computer games are already approaching learning as a possible strategy for
action like the contexts of representation in RPG where players assume a specific role in the
context of the game:
Type
Materials
Structure
Player interaction
Arcade
Geometric
Stimulus -
Discovery/Learning
Abstractions
response
Adventure
Dramatic Abstractions
Logic
Discovery/Learning
Simulation
Mechanical Algorithms
Machine
Discovery/Learning/ Manipulation
Role-Play
Cultural Beliefs
Culture
Discovery/Learning
War
Oponent Options
Competition
Discovery/Learning /Test
Strategy
Designer Options
Competition
Discovery/Learning /Test
According to Lino Macedo (2006, p.127), games can be good learning tools for certain
students and teachers (in training contexts) as they are extremely effective for increasing
student motivation and a powerful tool for the teacher in teaching-learning process. But
should reduce aspects inherent to the games, like excessive competitiveness among the
players, although this can promote motivation.
Educational games require compelling storylines. To this author it is very important to use
the computerized games in the educational process because these affect the motivation,
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cognitive functions and the curiosity of students, because these games allow the player's
experimentation and exploration.
Educational games can be quite simple or can be rich learning environments and complex
microworlds, because they provide an imaginary world to be explored by the player. To
Papert (2002), mentor of the idea of a microworld-based computing environment during the
eighties, described it as being fertile environments for cognitive development. This author
suggests than children develop better cognition by discovering themselves the specific
knowledge, becoming thus the active constructor of their knowledge.
Currently there are several investigations underway whose theme is based on the use of
computer games to broadcast educational content. The "Games to Teach” Project, is a
collaboration between the MIT Comparative Media Studies and Microsoft. This project
commits to a new generation of content by way of computer games (Jenkins2002). The main
goal of this project is to develop sophisticated computer games in math, science, technology
and humanities. This objective underlies the ability of games to simulate complex
phenomena, gather the players around a story, expressing ideas creatively and encourage
collaborative work. This process requires a detailed investigation of the pedagogical models
for each area, to transmit the contents and learning through participation and the design of
the game. The concepts applied are the most different genres: action, simulation, RPG and
adventure. So the project develops conceptual prototypes exploring different models to
improve the teaching of science, engineering and mathematics that were applied either in
universities or lower levels of schooling. The perspectives taken in these prototypes are
showing that the games have educational potential, to create the necessary synergies
between the entities responsible for producing and developing the next generation of
educational software (Jenkins2002).
The "Games - to - Teach" is based on someideas that can serve as reference for drafting a
new philosophy for educational games (Clua2004):
1. Mass media such as radio, television, books and movies should be used as decoys for
science, i.e., many individuals could become researchers due to their readings of science
information in the media;
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2. Media used in teaching and learning should be inspired by television series, i.e., media for
learning content should be engaging and motivating for students;
3. The computer games industry is mature and consolidating itself as a new art form that
involves theater, psychology and architecture;
4. Educational games are still strongly emphasizing the educational aspects, and this model
reduces the motivation for learning. The challenge for games with educational goals is to
merge gaming with educational content;
5. The need to design new generation of educational games that allow students to solve
problems critically and creatively. For instance, students should be given the chance to
explore worlds containing resources, challenges, etc.;
6. The ability to handle complex systems in games like SimCity, which allows the player to
run a city having to analyze several variables simultaneously;
7. Computer games end up becoming immersive digital worlds, increasing the immersion
through the testing of these worlds. The knowledge gained will be transferred to other
practical situations of everyday life, due to the development of cognitive skills through a
process of meaningful learning;
8. Communities formed in virtual worlds leverage a network of communication between
individuals and also potentiate the fantasy through the interpretation of characters that live
in these worlds;
9. The evaluation process with computer games can become adaptive through the use of
intelligent agents able to observe a player's performance and challenges customized to
produce it;
10. The production of this new generation of educational games requires multidisciplinary
creative teamsand able to work cooperatively.
Another author, James Paul Gee (2006) presented learning principles already incorporated in
good games:
1. Motivation
Computer games motivate players by requiring their attention to solving complex problems
from the start of the game. Games get profound attention from the players, so the key is
research to understand the source of motivation to apply them to learning.
2. The role of failure
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Failure is one of the characteristics that enables learning. In good games, the cost of failure
is low, because when players make mistakes, they can start the game again. The main
advantage of the failure in the computer game is to allow players to take risks and test the
hypothesis that could have a devastating effect if it occurred for example in classrooms
where the price of failure would impact personally and psychologically the student.
3. Competition and collaboration
Players love to compete with other players in games, either one to one or in teams. It is
notable that many young players see the competition in computer games as pleasureable
and motivational, but do not feel the same in school. What seems clear is that competition
in computer games is viewed by players as social, and it is often organized in ways that allow
people to compete among themselves and the social relations of the act of play are as
important as victory or defeat. Additionally, players highly regard collaborative games
because they play the game together and in collaboration with others. In fact, collaboration
and competition seem to be closely linked and integrated in the act of playing, whereas this
is not a usual situation in school.
4. Designing Games
Beyond the issues of motivation, failure, competition and collaboration, there are other
ways of designing games to promote learning and a sense of mastery. These design features
of computer games have to be closely linked with the principles already known to the
learning. Therefore, seven design features that are also important for effective learning
should be considered:
(A) Interactivity
In good games, players feel in charge, are responsible for their actions and decisions, and
consider themselves as co-creators of the game world and the experiences they have. Each
player, with its style, decisions and actions take a different path in the game world. So all
players are simultaneously in read mode (interpretation) and write mode (production). All
learning implies that students feel a strong sense of ownership and participation, as well as
the ability to produce and not just passively consume knowledge.
(B) Configurable/Flexible
In some games, players are able to change it, and adjust their learning styles, such as
adoption of different difficulty levels or the choice of different characters with different
skills. Other games are also designed to allow a variety of learning styles, providing multiple
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ways of solving problems. The possibility of configuring the various learning styles and
multiple paths is an important principle of learning for multi-contexts.
(C) Strong identity
Good games offer players an identity that requires a deep investment from the player. This
identity is often attached to a specific virtual character (Avatar). When players are using
characters in the game, the strong identity is held in the character that the players want to
inhabit, projecting their own fantasies, desires and pleasures, or determining the traits of a
character such that no player can create an identical life story in the game world. Moreover,
the identity of the character that each player assumes is directly associated with the types of
functions, skills and goals that each one has to perform in the virtual world.
(D) Well sequenced problems
In good games, the presentation of the problems is carefully sequenced. More specifically,
some problems are introduced early in the game to bring the players to form good
assumptions so as to continue when the problems become more difficult during the game.
Thus, throughout the game are always yearning for what comes later. In the context of
learning, the sequence is crucial for effective learning in complex domains.
(E) An adequate level of frustration
Good games adjust challenges and give feedback so that players can experience the game as
a challenge, with feedback indicating that they are on track for success in the game.
(F) A cycle of expertise
Good games create and support what was called a "cycle of expertise" in science learning.
This consists of repeated cycles of action and practice of the same area before moving to a
new challenge.
(G) "Depth" and "fair"
These terms are used in the gaming community to describe the art of building the game. A
game is "fair" when it is challenging, but in a structured way to success. The game is
"'deep”when the elements of the game that initially seemed simple and easy to be learned
are becoming increasingly complex as the player seeks to dominate them and understand
them. These two features could also be put into use in learning.
Yasmin Kafa (2001) considers that games for educational purposes may have two possible
approaches: instructional and constructivist. The first is focused on building games to teach.
The child learns something while doing an activity, as there is integration of content to be
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taught with the idea of the game, creating games for learning instead of playing learning
games. The last idea, learning games, is embraced by the constructivist approach. This
alternative approach seeks to provide learners a wider range of opportunities to build their
own worlds using computational tools, while simultaneously building new relationships with
knowledge acquired during the learning process.
The biggest challenge that educational computer games face is to offer an environment that
provides an immersion where players want to be, explore and learn the same way they do in
the computer games. Hence educational games should follow the route of successful
commercial games because they allow for greater immersion, a space exploration and allow
the learner to interpret a character and explore the virtual world.
Games should be spontaneous, entertaining and pleasureable so that in the design process
the teacher has to think the appropriate times to enter content, without forgetting the
essentials: the pleasure of playing. Aspects related to content should be inserted as a
background ("background") and not highlighting them as the main elements of the plot. The
adventure, challenges and solving puzzles is which constitute the key elements that can
motivate the players to interact.
Games have to encourage people to gain important skills such as negotiation, planning,
strategic thinking and decision making. The games should address interdisciplinary themes
embedded in webs of adventure and mystery. So the player to develop a strategy to solve
some mystery in the plot will find a number of challenges related to school content.
1.5.1
Graphic Adventure Games with Educational Characteristics
Time Travelling and Historical Interactions: Day of the Tentacle
George Washington (left) and Benjamin Frankling (right)
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Day of the Tentacle uses time travel extensively; early in the game, the three main
protagonists are separated across time by the effects of a faulty time machine. The player,
after completing certain puzzles, can then freely switch between these characters,
interacting with the game's world in the separate time periods. Certain small inventory items
can be shared by placing the item into the "Chron-o-Johns", modified portable toilets which
instantly transports them to the other time period, while other items are shared by simply
leaving the item in a past time period to be picked up by a character in a future period.
Changes made to a past time period will affect a future one, and many of the game's puzzles
are based on the effect of time travel, aging of certain items, and alterations of the time
stream.
Another interesting aspect of Day of the Tentacle's plot is that it gives the game player the
opportunity to interact with the comedic, cartoony versions of several figures from colonial
America, like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock and
Betsy Ross; whose descendants (or at least characters that resemble them) can be spotted in
the other ages. Harold, seemingly a descendant of Washington, appears as a transvestite in a
future beauty contest organized by the Tentacles. An apparent descendant of Ben Franklin
makes an appearance as a novelty toy salesman and a descendant of John Hancock appears
as a depressed inventor named Dwayne.
Some of the more entertaining puzzles of the game involve these characters. In one
sequence, Hoagie must give an exploding cigar to Washington in order to replace his famous
false teeth with chattering novelty mechanical dentures, while in another he gives a drawing
of a tentacle to Ross, who sews it into the American flag. In another scene, in order to coax
Washington into chopping down a kumquat tree, Hoagie must paint the fruits red, as
Washington insists that he only chops down cherry trees, referring to a legend concerning
Washington's youth.
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Real World Locations: Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Tikal (left) and Azores (right)
Flying over Algiers (left) and the Hermocrates (right)
While the story in Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis is purely fictional, it unfolds in a real
world scenario, having the player travel between locations like, Iceland, the Azores islands,
Tikal in Guatemala (one of the largest archaeological sites and urban centers of the preColumbian Maya civilization), Monte Carlo, Algiers, Thera and Crete, before finally arriving
on Atlantis.
It also references some important historical figures, most notably the Greek philosophers
Plato and Socrates, by having the location of Atlantis be depicted in the "Hermocrates", a
hypothetic dialogue assumed to be the third part of Plato's late trilogy along with Timaeus
and Critias. In the game the book was actually extant and an important tool for Dr. Jones
throughout the game.
The game also draws heavily from Greek mythology. For instance, late in the game, Indy
finds himself venturing into a labyrinth on Knossos (Crete), where he passes by a statue of a
giant half-man half-bull. This is an obvious reference to the Greek myth of the great Cretan
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Labyrinth which was built by the architect Daedalus and his son Icarusto hold the "part man
and part bull" beast, Minotaur.
1.6 Serious Games
In today’s high tech world computer games are part of our everyday culture. In the space of
around 30 years videogames have become a major source of entertainment, for the first
time last year surpassing the film industry in gross sales. It makes sense then to ask whether
or not this medium can be used to aid learning, as film and literature has done in the past.
The answer here is potentially yes. We have seen successful examples in the use of
simulators, such as flight simulators, to successfully train military and civilian pilots. These
pilots were allowed to make their own mistakes and learn from them in a virtual
environment preparing them for the real world. Before we continue, however, it is
important to draw a distinction between simulations and serious games.
Simulations have been used as a means to gather/impart knowledge since before the
computer (Gredller, 2004). In fact, simulations in the form of ‘wargames’ have been used as
a tool for training military officers for hundreds of years.
Simulators like serious games both involve scenarios, to which the user must apply their
knowledge and skills in order to progress. Games, by their nature, are competitive and the
objective is to ultimately win. Simulators tend to be open ended with no clear goal, the user
must react to a number of different factors in order address problems that arise within a
simulation in order to understand the consequences of their actions. Serious games can be
defined as:
“a mental contest, played with a computer in accordance with specific rules, that uses
entertainment to further government or corporate training, education, health, public policy,
and strategic communication objectives.” (Zyda, 2005).
“Games that do not have entertainment, enjoyment or fun as their primary purpose.”
(Chen & Michael 2005).
Johnson and Whitehead (2009) distinguish serious games and simulators based on closeness
to reality and basis of intent. For example if the intent of using a system is purely to hone
and develop specific skills then it is seen as a simulation. if, however, the primary objective is
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simply for fun, but the user learns a little along the way it could be seen as a serious game.
Figure 1 illustrates Johnson and Whiteheads approach.
(Johnston & Whitehead, 2009)
Figure 1: Relationship between Games, Serious Games and Simulations
As stated previously simulations can exist outside of the sphere of gaming but Johnson &
Whiteheads approach shows simulations can be a type of serious game, a serious game that
attempts to closely mirror the real world.
Serious games are especially useful for distance or elearning. They can provide motivation
and can play a big role in the creation of future learning environments. Rather than simply
offering online course notes and some form of email contact with a personal tutor games
can offer an incredibly immersive and engaging environment within which to learn. Within
these environments we can also encourage collaboration and teamwork with peers to help
each other learn. Indeed it has been seen that serious games can improve teamwork in
military applications.
Hussain et al (2008) looked at the use of a fantasy based multiplayer game to train
teamwork skills within the US army. It was found that a training system that used
multiplayer games was suitable to elicit teamwork behaviours and was also suitable to
practice this behavior and improve upon it. This in part is due to the immersive and engaging
nature of multiplayer games.
As well as the evidence that games can increase learning in an educational capacity to
varying extents (Dondlinger, 2007), there is also evidence that serious games can increase
physical performance (See Section 5) and spatial skills. Okagaki (1994) describes a study
where participants were tested for spatial ability before and after playing Tetris, it was
found, when compared to a control group, spatial ability was better in the participants who
had played Tetris for 3 hours. Increases in spatial skills was also seen in a study
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(Subrahmanyam & Greenfield, 1994) to measure spatial skills pre and post test between
using an action video game. As expected boys performed better than girls, but in both
genders it was seen that practice on the video game improved spatial skills and in particular
in those children who began with poorer spatial skills.
For today’s generation of young adults and their children computer and videogames are
second nature to most, people identify with and embrace the medium. Videogames are
associated with fun and pleasure. With large budgets and teams behind their development
and the increasing power of the platforms on which they run videogames are becoming ever
more immersive. Greater immersion leads to high use for many and pathological videogame
use for some.
There have been some reports (Roe & Muijs, 1998) that heavy computer game users are
more likely to experience negative effects on academic achievement, self-esteem and
sociability. Perhaps incorrectly, this research did not state that negative performance in
these areas may have lead to heavy computer use as a means of distraction from underlying
issues in everyday life.
The research of Durkin & Barber (2002) argues this is not the case. Questionnaires from
school children were taken that looked at several different metrics including family
closeness, activity involvement, positive school engagement, positive mental health,
substance use, self-concept, friendship network, and disobedience to parents. These were
also compared with school reports from the participant’s school and it was found there were
no negative outcomes directly related to gameplay. In fact game players scored more
favourably than non game players suggesting gameplay can be a positive adolescent
experience. However, the research did show that users who played less generally performed
better than heavier users.
Gentile (2009) states that pathological game use (or game addiction) correlates with poorer
performance at school and shows a co-morbidity (the presence of an additional disorder)
with attention problems. There is no suggestion that high levels of gameplay and
pathological gameplay are connected however, and it may not necessarily be true that
gameplay causes poor performance at school. It may equally be the case the poor
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performance in school causes an attraction to games, perhaps to provide a sense of
achievement.
1.6.1
Finding a Correct Genre for Serious Games
Games come in all different shapes and sizes. Some of which are more suitable to support
serious games than others. This section intends to outline a number of game genres that
have been considered in the past to be of use for serious games. Game structure can be
implemented in a number of ways dependent upon the intended learning targets of the
game.
The following lists a few main game genres along with their advantages and
disadvantages in an educational game context.
1.6.1.1
Puzzle
The puzzle genre of gaming covers a diverse range of styles, from simulated board games
(Hill et al, 2003) to word games and problem solving challenges (Norte and Lobo, 2008). By
nature these games tend to be less resource intensive and easier to develop than, for
example online role-playing games and so have been utilised or developed for educational
purposes over a much longer time period than other gaming genres (Hill et al, 2003).
1.6.1.2
First person story
First person based games have most commonly been seen in the form of first person
shooters, such as ‘Doom’ or more recently the ‘Call of Duty’ franchise. The Call of Duty
games attempt to replicate wars and battle conditions at specific events in recent history.
Although in this light it could be argued they have some educational merit (Fullerton et al,
2009), for the most part events within these games are largely fictional, and the main aim of
the call of duty franchise is fun. The genre itself does have a very engaging aspect as it places
players directly in the position of the character within the game, seeing exactly as they see.
Indeed serious game engines do exist (Thinking Worlds, http://www.thinkingworlds.com/)
that support this genre for learning games. Examples of games created using this engine
include a training game for new sailors to familiarise themselves with rules and protocols
when joining an aircraft carrier, a military game designed to teach and test soldiers
knowledge of the rules and procedures when stationed at a military checkpoint and a game
to teach secondary school children about the history of Rome. Examples of these are
available on the Thinking Worlds website.
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1.6.1.3
Online role-playing game
Online role-playing games differ from first person story driven games, in that the narratives
and stories are more heavily influenced by the actions of large groups of avatar based
characters as opposed to a preset story. As such they traditionally aim to develop social,
cooperation and critical thinking skills. One example of an online role-playing game used in
secondary school education is Europe 2045 (Šisler et al, 2008); a social science, politics and
economics related game whereby pupils represent various European nations and form /
negotiate for policy proposals which are assessed by a teacher. The subject of growing
success, Europe 2045 is primarily concerned with skill development as opposed to conveying
specific factual information.
1.6.1.4
Real-time strategy
Real-time strategy games focus heavily on top-level coordination and command of multiple
elements in a relatively open-ended fashion (Bellotti et al, 2009) whereby the outcomes of
the game are heavily dependent on the actions of the player(s). A common example of realtime strategy game (following the historical theme) would be the ‘Civilization’ series (Šisler
and Brom, 2008). Such games, whilst in the historical setting, show resemblances of the
technologies, weaponry and aesthetics of the period in which they are set however do not
place emphasis on replicating strategies or tactics used at the time during battles, nor do
they accurately depict the period in which they are set. Therefore it could be argued that
whilst they may have value in, for example, developing strategy or cognitive coordination
and tracking skills through building on pre-existing knowledge (Adcock et al, 20008), their
value for conveying specific pieces of information may be limited.
1.6.1.5
Dialogue Based Games
Dialogue based games generally tend to follow a question/answer structure. Ravenscroft
(2002) describes the evaluation of dialogue based games to teach physics. Users are asked
physics questions and further questions are asked based on their answers test their
theoretical understanding of the subject. The nature of the dialogue games allowed the
users to re-think their answers if they were incorrect until they had arrived at a solid
understanding of the subject matter (in this case the physics of motion). Results illustrated
the effectiveness of two dialogue games to improve the users understanding of the physics
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of motion. This shows that an approach where the user is allowed to test and refine their
knowledge with instant feedback can be an effective learning tool. Key to this is keeping the
player suitably immersed/entertained while they are actually carrying out the learning
process.
1.6.2
Finding a Structure for History Based Games
Serious learning games focusing specifically on chronology or specific time events would
seem to suit an individual centric story revolving around a character or characters moving
through events in a linear fashion. However it should be noted that while such formats
would inherently incorporate the linearity / chronology of events into the learning
experience, alternative structures may be employed either entirely or in part to help support
collaboration and competition. Which we know helps support engagement (Akl et al, 2008).
Figure 2: linear event structure
Figure 2 demonstrates one of the simplest forms of linear game type. Not particularly
explorative, the premise of this model is that the player is confronted with tasks or problems
in a linear fashion whereby a specific action or a correct solution allows the player to
progress through the game. Such a game might be in the style of a quiz(e.g. Dialogue
based); the player is presented with information and then tested on that information at each
event point. Feedback would be provided either at each point or in summary at the end of
the game. An example of this could be in the form of an interactive terminal found in a
museum in an interactive textbook format (Hall and Bannon, 2005).
Figure 3: Combination event structure
Figure 3 illustrates an alternative approach, a combination event game structure. This type
of model would employ a relatively similar linear structure to the first, the difference being
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that events run in parallel and a player may take multiple routes through the game. An
example of this kind may be a virtual memory cards game whereby the user has to
remember spatial locations of pairs of cards (Fisch, 2005). Therefore events 1 and 2 might
represent the first batch of pairs whereas event is 3 and 4 represent second batch of pairs.
The order in which the cards are paired off in either event set does not alter the outcome of
the game as long as all cards are paired off to progress through the levels. This type of game
structure is advantageous to being reusable as a player may have different experiences or
encounter different scenarios during repeat uses. However if either event one or two could
be used to progress to events three or four (operating in a mutually exclusive fashion) it
would carry the disadvantage that if the events are required by the curriculum being taught
they may be repeatedly missed, which would be detrimental to those events being learnt.
With this in mind a more effective structure would be the one outlined in Figure 4
.
Figure 4: Layered Event Structure
In this instance the main events would presumably be formed by the original key curricular
which are to be included in the game. Each sub event would either be then formed by a
narrative specific to the user, such as a character story, or by other educational events
which, although relevant, are not considered essential knowledge. In effect the game would
represent a mesh structure driven by sub-goals or a sub-story with specific relevant events
acting as focal points which must take place within the course of the game for the game to
progress.
In the third instance, the multiple route system carries the advantage of potentially being a
more engaging, fun and reusable product (Tashiro, 2009); providing a repeat user with
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varying experiences while still delivering the required information. However studies such as
Fullerton et al (2009) make the case that caution must be taken so as not to detract from the
key elements or learning objectives in the; creating a complex and involving narrative
through the sub events could draw a player's attention away from achieving the main aims
of the game and if played during lesson time, detract from key learning objectives. As such it
is possible that including elements of the main events or suggestions therein into the sub
event narrative would reinforce or provide focus towards said learning objectives.
Again structure will most likely be dependent on factors such as development time, cost,
resource availability etc.
and therefore being towards one particular genre or style.
However if possible, a game or product intended for use in education could ultimately be
comprised of different structural types. For example, the game could follow role-playing or
narrative-based story with educational elements or content being reinforced by puzzles or
activities which test the user's knowledge gained (similar to the summary section at the end
of a chapter in a textbook). Not only would this allow variation in the game-playing
experience but studies such as Hughes (2005) and Dai et al (2002) point out that this may
also have the effect of making such a product is more suitable for both sexes (as video game
type products traditionally catered towards males (Zimek, 2005)).
1.6.3
Users (single player vs. Multiplayer approaches)
The approaches of single player vs. multiplayer, as well as having developmental and
technological repercussions, can also have a profound impact on the psychological and
sociological aspects of the game. It should be noted that in either instance, a positive and
constructive user experience is highly beneficial to the learning process; usability issues,
unclear objectives or other issues which may lead to frustration on the part of the player can
severely impede the learning process (Wong et al, 2007).
In contrast to an environment engaging a single user to achieve goals, collaborative
environments; environments requiring multiple users to simultaneously achieve objectives
and solve problems in a corporative and social fashion are recognised as having a number of
profound benefits in a learning context.
Papaloukas and Xenos (2008) states that
collaborative learning in a classroom environment has been shown to increase both a pupil’s
motivation and overall learning. The use of competition has been seen as a factor to improve
motivation and engagement in dialogue based learning games (Akl et al, 2008). However, it
is also recognised that there can be disadvantages to this type of learning environment.
Charoenying (2008) suggests that in instances where the performances of a single individual
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are predominantly higher than the performances of others (to which the group is aware) the
negative psychological connotations instilled can quickly remove both enthusiasm for the
game and thus the will to learn from it. In consequence, it could be considered that if a
game is to be collaborative, then the interactions between players must be both positive
and constructive throughout without directly generating rivalry to complete objectives. This
could be achieved by the explorative bounds of the game being such there is no one
specifically correct route through the game and by sensitising statistical / performance
based feedback.
1.6.4
Guided / directed learning
There should be different approaches to learning games based on the nature of the user and
the context in which the serious games is to be used. For example, in the case where the
users are children the game should reflect the normal learning styles associated with a
classroom or home environment which generates the requirements for both independent
and teacher directed elements (Komisarczuk and Welch,2006 ) and (Fullerton et al, 2009). In
the context of a game which has linear progression from one stage to the next, an example
of these elements might be the ability for a teacher to select a particular chapter or theme
(such as a particular event)
within the game from which the pupil could progress
independently either at school or at home.
1.6.5
User feedback
Feedback in the context of a serious learning game concerns two specific criteria:


In play user feedback
Overall feedback representative of the user's learning experience
Appropriate feedback, delivered in an effective and efficient manner is considered critical to
providing an engaging user experience (Bellotti et al, 2009) and very important to the
knowledge assimilation process when concerning games of an educational nature (Fisch,
2005). Real-time feedback showing not only responses necessary for game progression, but
also engaging in learning elements of a game step-by step, allow a pupil to self evaluate their
own performance and learning.
Hirayama and Yamamoto (2009) suggest that in addition,
appropriate and timely feedback will also have the effect of retaining a person’s attention
for longer, especially during protracted periods of game-play.
Similarly, one study in
particular (Yue and Zin, 2009) suggests that feedback characterised by all game activity
should not inhibit the user experience; pauses in a game, for example, (usually for purposes
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of loading or progression) should reflect the natural pauses in the narrative of the game; in a
serious game context allowing the user to absorb the information they have just been
exposed to.
Rookhuiszen and Theune (2009) makes the case that less absolute feedback (for instance a
‘warmer / cooler’ system as opposed to a definitive correct / incorrect system) will have the
effect of making a pupil less concerned with the overall outcome of the game and more
engaged in the actual playing of the game. From an educational perspective this would be
of benefit as it will encourage the user to be more explorative unless focused on simply
completing the game.
1.6.6
Reusability
Ultimately the reusability of a game as a teaching aid comes from its effectiveness in
combining the required information in an efficient and suitable fashion.
From a
psychological perspective this can only be achieved if the product instils motivation on the
part of the user to learn and therefore must be both fun and engaging (Chaffin and Barnes,
2010). Keeping players of serious games engaged while still maintaining the educational
integrity of the game is vital for the game to be useful. Studies such as (Lopes 2010) and
(Hanna et al, 2004) state that the downfall of many serious games comes through
predictable linearity and repetitive game play experiences. They state that adaptability and
variability in the user experience is key to producing a successful and engaging product. In
the perspective of the models outlined in Section 2.6 a further example would provide a
potentially adaptable user experience through subtle integration of the main events into the
background of the game and surrounding those events with an explorative and varying
narrative for the player. Although a secondary effect, a game encouraging repeat use would
carry the benefits of reinforcing the key information to be conveyed through repeated
exposure to that information (Hu and Wellman, 2003).
1.6.7
Serious games to aid learning
The previous section explored game structure and established the importance of keeping
players engaged and supporting reusability while also preserving the educational aspect of
the game. This section looks at some further aspects that may help to aid learning in serious
games. In subsequent sections we will examine lessons learned from more domain specific
learning games, specifically Medicine and Education.
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Users should be able to relate to the characters within the game as this will effect how much
they like the character. A Study by Atkinson (Atkinson et al, 2005) compared an avatar with a
machine voice and a human voice and tested which was better to learn from. The human
voice performed better, backing up the idea that social cues in multimedia (like type of
voice) affect how much users like the character and thus how hard they try to understand
what the avatar is describing. If there is no connection between the character and the player
then users, especially younger children, may become bored more quickly if the game is not
progressing at a satisfactory pace. Another study (Moreno & Flowerday, 2006) found that
when given a choice of avatar participants tended to choose an avatar that matched their
ethnicity, suggesting people wanted to choose an avatar that was like them.
An important part of keeping children engaged with games is the ability to become more
skilled at the game, and potentially to master the game. This is what keeps the game
challenging. Gee (Gee, 2003) states games need to be learnable in order to be mastered.
Developers do not want to make their games easy or short as they won’t be played, so the
question is how do games get people to learn something that is long and challenging? Fun
and engagement is the answer. In many games users get new pieces of information
immediately prior to needing to apply that information (e.g. in tutorial levels a user is shown
or told how to climb a wall, and then they are required to perform that task and are
continually required to repeat that task throughout the game). Gee also suggests playing
computer games aid learning as they get children thinking about the associated themes in
the real world.
Gaining knowledge of a game while playing it was also highlighted in earlier research by
Greenfield (Greenfield et al, 1994) Who stated that knowledge of a game is acquired while
playing it, (and not from a manual or slides). When playing an electronics game players
gained knowledge or rules, regularities and strategies by formulating their own hypotheses
and testing them within the game. Essentially, this was a form of trial and error. It is also
commonplace amongst children, that new players benefit from being introduced to a game
by more experienced players (Greenfield et al, 1994). The novice can then use this assistance
to further practice and improve their skills/knowledge. This is another example of how when
players are given only the required information ‘on demand’, and with the user being
allowed to practice it, they will be better able to learn that particular skill. Learning through
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experience is not new, and is the reason for the success and popularity of simulators as a
training tool.
Prior knowledge of videogames will effect how well children perform in acquiring knowledge
and mastering learning games. A Paper by the US Military (Orvis et al, 2005)investigated the
effect of prior gaming experience and computer self efficacy (players belief in computer
ability). Participants with prior experience and greater computer self efficacy reported fewer
problems when using a learning game interface and reported greater teamwork than those
with little prior experience. There may be a similar effect to this in a classroom environment.
This being the case it suggested that some form of peer tutoring system could be employed
when children are learning games together in the classroom.
1.6.8
Serious Games in Medicine
We know that videogames may be a valuable tool in training surgeons (Rosser et al, 2007).
This section illustrates some examples of serious games used in the medical field, both in
medical training and patient rehabilitation.
Akl et al (2008) developed a gameshow style learning game (a multiple choice quiz). Where
two teams compete, the aim of which is to encourage students to learn guidelines away
from the computer before their knowledge is tested against their peers. While the game
does not facilitate learning as such (students are still required to do their learning from
course materials), knowledge could be gained during use of the game as answers to
questions were revealed to the user after both teams had answered. The paper concluded
that games of this style were feasible to use in a teaching program and were acceptable to
students but a much larger more structured evaluation would be needed to measure the
effects on students knowledge.
Other research that looked at acceptability in the medical field was that of Akoi et al (2004),
this time on the patient side in an educational game to provide children with diabetes
dietary knowledge related to their condition. There was a need for this because current
recognized methods for teaching about food groups with relation to diabetes did not contain
an element of fun and therefore were not engaging for the children. The research also
highlighted that there is a need to balance entertainment and learning well in order to keep
the children engaged and keep the software useful.
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In the area of rehabilitation a number of serious games have been shown to produce
encouraging results (Crosbie et al, 2007). Serious games are particularly useful at
maintaining patient interest during repetitive tasks (Betker et al, 2007). It is difficult to
maintain patient interest during rehabilitation of patients with spinal cord or brain injuries.
This reduces practice volume and concentration that is required for recovery. Betker created
a balance based game (where the users balance is measured while they are sat down for
short periods) and it was seen to increase practice volume and attention span. Patients also
showed substantial improvements in dynamic balance control.
The work of Crosbie et al (2007) compared a number of papers on stroke rehabilitation and
it was found that although many reported VR based therapy to be beneficial it also
highlighted that the evidence base is too limited by desgn and power issues and concludes
the level of evidence is still weak in terms of research quality. It recommends further
rigorous, controlled studies. We can conclude from this that although initial results in the
medical field are encouraging, the research area is still young and more rigorous research
needs to be carried out to determine the value of serious games in this area.
There is no doubt, however, about the recurring theme of games increasing engagement
and motivation, even if the end goal is not to ‘win’ or complete a game. Curtis et al (2009)
investigated serious games as a means to rehabilitate handwriting skills in stroke victims.
Four separate games were evaluated against pen and paper based exercises. All found the
interactive games fun and engaging but all viewed being able to complete the pen and paper
exercises as the ultimate goal and so the interactive application was only viewed as a
supplement to their training.
1.6.9
Serious Games in Education
Din & Calao (2001) looked at the effect of educational videogames on the learning of
kindergarten children. Although they found a significant increase in spelling and reading
skills, they urged caution stating that the videogames may have only played a facilitative
role, rather than a causal role in their learning. As with the medical literature the author’s
state the findings are encouraging but suggest further more rigorous research with larger
sample sizes would be needed to provide convincing evidence. Interestingly no increase in
mathematical skill was observed between the children in the experimental group and the
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children in the control group when playing a mathematical educational game. A reason for
this, however, may be the age of the children.
Another study investigating the effectiveness of serious games in teaching mathematics was
carried out by Ke (2008). Ke Conducted a much larger study involving over 480 children aged
10 and 11 and found that serious games when compared to normal pencil and paper
exercises were significantly more effective in encouraging learning motivation.
Ke also found that, again, there was no significant difference when measuring actual
mathematical performance. So although motivation increased, actual performance did not.
It could be argued that motivation alone could be an argument for the use of serious games
in education as it may make the children happier compared to children carrying out the
relatively mundane tasks based on pencil and paper.
In Dondlingers (2007) review of the literature concerning educational videogames she saw
that videogames do effect learning (although perhaps not in mathematical disciplines). She
concludes there is a widespread consensus that games motivate players to spend time
mastering the required skills to finish the game. There is disagreement, however, over what
specific characteristics effect that motivation, which could be an area worthy of further
research.
Having seen throughout this review that rich engrossing environments have been seen to
have a positive effect on motivation and engagement. It is interesting to see how these work
in an educational setting. The work of Ketelhut et al (2006) uses a 3D virtual environment to
encourage scientific enquiry. The environment “river city” was created for students to
interact with and figure out the cities problems, e.g. illness, by making observations, posing
questions and planning investigations. The results showed that the application was able to
support and improve scientific enquiry skills.
Furthermore it was seen students were able to better learn content associated with a
biology curriculum and both students and teachers were highly engaged. Attendance
improved and disruptive behavior was also seen to decline. This method of learning shows
great promise for the potential of serious game use in the classrooms of the future.
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1.6.10 Summary
We have seen how a layered event structure (Figure 4) is well suited to the design of serious
games and examined a number of different serious gaming genres
The most striking effect across all these genres in the use of serious games is that of
increased motivation and engagement. This was seen in three of the major sectors that
serious games are used in currently, education, military and medicine. There is a clear
consensus that serious games should be considered as a tool for use in delivering future
curricula of both children and young adults.
We have seen serious games can support the repetitive behaviour that allows users to
master computer based tasks. This is of particular benefit in both rehabilitation in the
medical field and in increasing spatial skills.
As with simulations the use of serious games allows users to ‘learn by doing’ rather than
using traditional paper and pen based exercises. This allows users to make and learn from
their own mistakes in a controlled environment. Users are able to see the consequences of
their actions and learn from them. This trial and error based approach has been seen to
support learning.
Collaboration and teamwork can be supported in serious games. Indeed it has been seen to
increase motivation to learn, although in some cases when one particular player excels much
more than the others it can be seen as a demotivating factor and players are more likely to
disengage from the game.
Many of the studies detailed in this review mentioned that the results were encouraging,
but sample sizes were fairly small and further more rigorous research into the field of
serious games was needed before reliable conclusions could be made about the usefulness
of the data. Serious learning games have shown excellent promise, and the growth of the
field in recent years testament to that.
1.7 References
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2 Game Engines
There are quite a few game engines available online that are specifically tailored for the
development of graphic adventure games. This section gives an overview of some of the
best graphic adventure game engines currently in existence. Using one of these engines
would decrease development time significantly, but as advanced as some of them may
already be, there's always the possibility that it could restrict the implementation of certain
features. In the eventuality that some mandatory feature can't be implemented in any of the
presented game engines, it might be necessary to develop a new engine from scratch. For
that reason, we also cover some development environments that could be used to develop a
custom graphic adventure game engine.
2.1 Using an Existing Adventure Game Engine
One of the development possibilities for the game involves the use of an existing game
engine to speed up development and testing. The following presents the most used game
engines.
2.1.1
Wintermute 1.9 (Windows)
Website
http://dead-code.org
License
Free (Donationware)
"Wintermute Engine Development Kit is provided for free for both hobby and
commercial use. However, if you find it useful and you’d like to support its
further development and/or express your appreciation, you’re encouraged to
make a donation. Engine source code is available upon request under the
terms of GNU Lesser General Public License."
(http://dead-code.org/home/index.php/license/)
Relevant Features

Support for high screen resolutions

Support for hardware acceleration (DirectX)

Powerful scripting system
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
Extensible through a plugin architecture

Support for 3D characters

Support for game localization

Support for parallax scrolling backgrounds

Support for automatic text-to-speech conversion
Pros and Cons
Open-source and free for commercial use
Only engine that currently supports 3D characters
Powerful scripting system providing a great deal of flexibility
Extensible through a plugin architecture
Available for Windows only
Somewhat more complex to work with than the alternatives
Libraries developed externally may be called from within Wintermute scripts. This
means that it should be possible (albeit difficult) to extend the engine to support
multiplayer functionalities, by encapsulating all of these inside one or more dll files.
Project Manager
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SpriteEdit
SceneEdit
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WindowEdit
Scripting Editor
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Example Games
Darkfall: Lost Souls - http://www.darkfallgames.com/
A Stroke of Fate - http://astrokeoffate.akella.com/
Rosemary - http://gambit.mit.edu/loadgame/rosemary.php
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2.1.2
Adventure Game Studio 3.1.2 SP1 (Windows)
While it is stated that games can run on Linux and Mac, that only applies to 2.x
games and development on both ports have since then been discontinued.
"A Linux port of the AGS 2.72 game engine is available, which allows you to
play AGS 2.x games on Linux. This does not include a Linux version of the
AGS Editor. Currently the Linux port is discontinued awaiting a Linux C++
developer who has the time and skills to take on the job of maintaining it.
A Mac port of the AGS 2.71 game engine is currently in beta. It only supports
OSX 10.4 and later, and should allow you to play AGS 2.x games on MacOS
X. This does not include a Mac version of the AGS Editor. Currently the Mac
port is discontinued awaiting a Mac C++ developer who has the time and
skills to take on the job of maintaining it."
(http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/acdload.htm)
Website
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/
License
Free (but makes use of many third-party components with different license
agreements)
"AGS is free for non-commercial use. However, it is not open source. If you
wish to make money from your game (either shareware or commercial) you
should
read
the
Legal
Information
page
(http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/aclegal.htm) to be clear on the license
agreements of AGS components. AGS itself has no license fee and is free for
commercial use, bearing in mind the terms of the legal information page."
(http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/acfaq.htm)
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Relevant Features

Support for hardware acceleration

Script editor has incorporated "intellisense" to ease development

Extensible through a plugin architecture

Support for game localization

Simple IDE with integrated source control integration and debugging
Pros and Cons
Fast learning curve
Extensible through a plugin architecture
Incorporated "intellisense" on the script editor
Available for Windows only
License terms are somewhat unclear
Last update was more than one year ago
More appropriate for retro, low resolution games
Doesn't support 3D characters
Note
Through the use of externally developed plugins, it seems to be possible to
incorporate a multiplayer component into the game. This however makes games
restricted to the Windows platform. It is also known to be a very difficult task, and
though many have achieved different degrees of results, nothing official ever
emerged of this research.
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IDE Screenshots
AGS Character Editor
AGS Room Editor
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AGS Dialogue Editor
AGS GUI Editor
AGS Script Editor
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Example Games
A Tale of Two Kingdoms - http://www.crystalshard.net/atotk.php
Apprentice II - http://www.herculeaneffort.com/index.php?page=apprentice2
5 Days a Stranger - http://www.fullyramblomatic.com/5days/
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2.1.3
Visionaire 3.3 (Windows)
Website
http://www.visionaire2d.net/
License
Commercial
"To obtain a license for Visionaire 3.x, the users have 3 differentoptions to
choose from:
FREEWARE: The freeware version of Visionaire 3.x is available here and
does not cost anything. There is only a registration required, where the user
has to provide his name and email address. After having downloaded the
software, the user can test the software extensively. All features of Visionaire
3.x are available for that - there are no constraints of functionality. But the
user of the freeware version has no possibility of compiling his games into one
file (Vis game file). Therefore, the "uncompiled game resources" can be still
edited with the Visionaire editor, i.e. all the files of the game (graphics, sound,
etc.) can be seen and edited by other users of Visionaire. Also only freewaregames may be developed. It's prohibited to use the freeware-version of
"Visionaire" for developing or distributing commercial games.
LIMITED DISTRIBUTION: The full version of Visionaire 3.x costs 30
Euros.The advantage of purchasing this full version is the possibility of
compiling the game into a VIS or EXE file. Using that functionality, games
can be published e.g. on the Internet, without the users being able to change it
or to look at the texts or graphics of the game. With this license, you can
develop and distribute both freeware and commercial games with limited
distribution rights. The games are only to be sold for a maximum price of 15
Euro (or the according value in another currency). This license does not allow
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for unlimited distribution and selling rights of developed games, which
includes advertisement games etc.!
UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION: The purchase of unlimited distribution rights
for games developed with Visionaire 2.x requires a individually negotiated
contract with the Visionaire Team. The parties that want to use Visionaire 3.x
for the development of their fully distributable game, have to negotiate with
the licensor about a contract. The conditions will be outlined individually for
each contractor."
(http://www.visionaire2d.net/cms/front_content.php?idart=8&idcat=3&lang=
3)
Relevant Features

Support for high screen resolutions

Support for hardware acceleration (DirectX and OpenGL)

Extremely smooth scrolling backgrounds and animations

Support for parallax scrolling backgrounds

Particle system for effects like snow, rain, etc.

Create games with little programming knowledge with an action
system

Package everything into a single single VIS- or EXE-file

Allows access to all fields of the internal data structure through scripts
Pros and Cons
Very complete and intuitive IDE
Doesn't require extensive programming skills
Extremely smooth scrolling backgrounds and animations
Available for Windows only
Commercial license
Doesn't support 3D characters
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Scripting system isn't as mature or powerful as the alternatives
Doesn't provide a plugin architecture to support extensibility
Note
Because Visionaire is not extensible, it might be impossible to incorporate online
multiplayer functionalities into the games.
IDE Screenshots
Visionaire Game Properties
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Visionaire Character Editor
Visionaire Scene Editor
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Visionaire Dialogue Editor
Visionaire Interface Editor
Visionaire Particle System Editor
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Example Games
The Whispered World - http://www.the-whispered-world.com/
Kaptain Brawe - http://www.naphtalite.com/KB-A-Brawe-New-World.aspx
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2.1.4
Lassie Shepherd (Web)
Website
http://lassiegames.com/
License
Free or Commercial
FREEWARE: Freeware development means that you are building a game that
will be free for all to play. A freeware game must meet the following
requirements:
Players may download the game or play it online without paying any fee,
direct or indirect. The game´s presentation page or download page must be
free of advertising that directly profits you, the game developer. The game and
its promotional material must be free of advertising or bias for a commercial
product. Under this license, you are free to share your Lassie creations and
adaptations of the Lassie game engine under the following conditions:
Attribution must be given to Greg MacWilliam and Lassie Adventure Studio in
your game´s programming credits. When using Lassie Shepherd, freeware
developers will NOT be able to change the Lassie-themed game menu, and for
the time being they will have the Lassie watermark in the upper-left corner of
the game window.
BASIC COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT: Lassie Adventure Studio is
available to developers who wish to build commercial games. A basic
commercial game is defined by the following:
-
Any game that the player must pay a fee to access or download.
-
Any game that is hosted on a website for play or download surrounded by
advertizing that directly profits the game developer.
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-
Any game that includes commercial product promotions or bias (advergames).
In the case of basic commercial development, I do ask for some payment for
my programming contribution to your commercial product. Given that all
commercial products are unique in their scale and returns, I currently have no
standardized licensing policy. I simply go by this: I have no reason to restrict
developers from using the Lassie system for their project. Therefore, I´m more
than happy to negotiate a fair price that works for you and fits within your
budget and expected returns. Lassie Shepherd developers who license a basic
commercial game will receive the following:
-
The source files for the Shepherd game menu so that you can compile your
own themed menu screen.
-
A Shepherd license key that will disable the Lassie watermark within the
game window.
(http://lassiegames.com/lassie/about/license)
Relevant features

Unrestricted screen resolution

Full support for Flash animation and custom Flash media as cutscenes
and mini-games

Out-of-the-box load/save using Flash SharedObjects or server
technology (PHP, etc)

Default world responses provide generic dialogue for objects without
custom responses.

Dialogue tree interface for composing large trees of interactive
dialogue menus

Multiple playable characters, each with their own inventory and default
world responses

Easy-to-use scripting API using XML
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
Actionscript API to allow external Flash media to communicate
directly with the inner workings of the Lassie Shepherd game engine.

Parallax scrolling layers

Web editor allowing worldwide team-based project development
Pros and Cons
Multi-platform
Simple scripting geared towards non-programmers
Web editor allowing worldwide team-based project development
Easy to develop mini-games separately
Commercial license
Not hardware accelerated
Doesn’t support 3D characters
Note
When prompted about the possibility to add multiplayer support to Lassie Shepherd
games, the author replied:
If you're looking to do multi-player game play, then I'm afraid that Lassie is
NOT the system that you need. While you can create multiple playable
characters that move around within the game world, they are all controlled
(one at a time) by a single player.
gmacwill@gmail.com
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IDE Screenshots
Project Manager
Global Setup
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Actors
Scene Editor
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Inventory Items
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Example of Games
What Makes You Tick? - http://www.lassiegames.com/wmyt/
Nearly Departed - http://www.johngreenart.com/nearlydeparted/
Something Amiss - http://www.somethingamiss.com/
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2.1.5
Sancho Island (Web)
Website
http://www.sanchoisland.com/
License
Source Code available. Likely Open Source Project parallel to SELEAG
Relevant features

Same as Lassie plus:

SQL-Database based  easy communication, easy trace of player
actions

Multilanguage support
Pros and Cons
Multi-platform
Simple scripting geared towards non-programmers
Web editor allowing worldwide team-based project development
Easy to develop mini-games separately
Not hardware accelerated (it depends)
Doesn’t support 3D characters
Note
Multiplayer support (In the form of teams+chat ) it is easily achievable modifying the
source code.
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IDE Screenshots
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Editor
Editor (Flash Editor)
Used to create clip art, walking areas, triggers and animations
Example of Games
Sanchos’ Island - http://www.sanchoisland.com/
2.1.6
Comparison Grid
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The following chart compares the most important features from each of the game
engines previously described:
Multi Platform
Free for
Commercial Use
Max. Screen
Resolution
Hardware
Acceleration1
3D Characters
Scripting
Extensible
Localization
Support
Parallax Scrolling
Particle Systems
Text-To-Speech
Intellisense
Recently
Updated
General Game
Types
2.1.7
Adventure
Game
Studio
No
(Windows)
Uses 3rd
Party
Libraries
Visionaire
Wintermute
Lassie
Shepherd
Sancho Island
engine
No
(Windows)
No
(Windows)
Yes (Flash)
Yes (Flash)
No
Yes
No
Yes (Sources
provided)
1024x768
Any
Any
Any
Any
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
C-Style
Yes
No
Lua
No
Yes
C-Style
Yes
No
XML
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
XML
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Retro
Cartoon
Realistic
Cartoon
Yes
2
No
No
Yes3
Sprite Based
Engine Recommendations
1
See
http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/features/and
http://www.kaourantin.net/2008/05/what-does-gpu-acceleration-mean.html. Last Flash Player is
able to use GPU if asked for (it might not improve though).
2
Not
yet
but
could
be
implemented
in
AS2:
http://www.kirupa.com/developer/actionscript/random_motion.htm
3
Still based in AS2
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Based on all that has been presented so far, choosing one of the game engines isn’t
exactly straightforward, depending a lot on what is intended:

If 3D characters are mandatory: use Wintermute.

If multi-platform support is mandatory: use Lassie Shepherd or Sancho Island.

If online play is mandatory: try Wintermute or roll our own engine.

Otherwise: use Visionaire.
Visionaire seems to be the most user friendly choice to create a narrative centered
graphic adventure game. If any of the mentioned special features are required, then
an alternative will have to be considered. Also, read the section on multiplayer
adventure games at the end of this document for more information on its pitfalls
and why it isn’t a common practice.
In case that the decision is between Lassie and Sancho, the only advantages of Lassie
is that it is based on AS3 (for programmers) and a very user friendly editor (for
artists/scripters). That said, for our project it might not suppose a drawback. Sancho
Island engine has the same features and the advantage of having full support (the
creators are involved in this project) and the scene editor and documentation for
artists and scripters have been tested in (as far as I know) three commercial games,
proving its game editing capabilities.
Additionally Sancho Island is based on a database (MySQL) which makes it really
easy to communicate with other applications/platforms.
Example of load/save/continue feature. Each action is recorded in real time. Users
can recover their game plays even if they turned the computer off without saving.
2.2 Developing the Game from Scratch
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If push comes to stove and it ends up being necessary to develop the game from
scratch without relying on any existing graphic adventure game engine (which we do
not recommend, given the quality of the tools already available), the following
technologies are possible candidates:
2.2.1
XNA Game Studio 3.1 (Windows, Xbox 360, Zune)
Microsoft’s successor to Managed DirectX, it also incorporates many game specific
constructs and libraries, making it a very popular environment, and much easier to
work with than unmanaged DirectX or OpenGL. It uses C# as the primary
programming language.
(http://creators.xna.com/)
2.2.2
Adobe Flash (Web: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Solaris, PocketPC)
Adobe Flash is the uncontested king in the domain of plugin-based browser game
development. Several software products, systems, and devices are able to create or
display Flash content, including Adobe Flash Player, which is available free for most
common web browsers, some mobile phones and for other electronic devices. Some
criticism has been made on its stability and performance.
(http://www.adobe.com/products/flash/)
2.2.3
SilverSprite = XNA in Silverlight (Web: Windows, MacOS, Linux)
SilverSprite is an emerging technology aiming to enable the execution of XNA games
on the web, by compiling them into Silverlight code. This applies only to SpriteBatchbased 2D games, and there’s currently no support for 3D rendering, amongst other
limitations such as XACT sound or networking. While it isn’t mature enough yet to be
used in large-scale projects, it is frequently updated, and something to keep in mind
for the future.
(http://silversprite.codeplex.com/)
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2.3 Conclusion
Generally speaking, graphic adventure games all tend to provide only a single player
mode, since having a heavy emphasis on story and character development makes
multi-player design difficult; At least, this seems to hold true for all famous
commercial titles.
There are a few graphic adventure games that allow the player to control multiple
characters simultaneously (e.g. Gobliiins, depicted below), the basic concept being
to have different characters with unique abilities and allow the player to alternate
between them as necessary to solve puzzles and advance in the storyline, but
ultimately, this is still a single player experience since all characters are controlled by
the same person.
Gobliiins
The folks at Sarien.net have created a platform allowing a point-and-click
multiplayer adventure experience in a browser environment (reliving the classic
Sierra On-Line games), but this interaction is actually limited to letting each player
play their own single player game as usual, yet allow them to see and talk with other
players in the same room. Beyond that, there is no actual synchronization or
cooperation mechanism involved so, despite the multiplayer facade, the game still
fits into a single player framework in terms of narrative and development, and
advancing in the game depends in no way in the multiplayer component. There’s
also a lack of concern regarding how to make this multitude of characters actually
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make sense in the context of the story (i.e. every other player looks just like a clone
of yours).
Perhaps the solution to having an actual online multiplayer platform embedded in a
graphic adventure game goes through the combination of the concepts of multiple
characters (like the Gobliiins games) and real-time chat (reminiscent of MMOs). In
this case, each game session would have to be limited to a fixed amount of
characters (e.g. 3), each controlled by a different player, and advancing in the game
would require the combined efforts of all players, by having certain puzzles require
item sharing or action synchronization between characters.
There are many variables at work here, and since nothing relevant of this kind has
been created before, different ideas and implementations would have to be tested
before being able to find the optimal formula. For instance:

Should there be a shared inventory between all characters (like Gobliiins) or
should each character have his own inventory (like Maniac Mansion)?

Should all players be kept in the same room and limit their action to several
small enclosed areas, or should characters be let lose all over the game area?

Should each character have different talents or should they all be given the
same capabilities?
Additionally, there are also many others problems that would have to be addressed,
e.g:
Problem #1: What if there aren’t enough players available for a specific
scenario?
Solution: In the occurrence that there aren’t enough players, one player,
elected the leader (e.g. the one who initiated the session) could be given the
ability to permute between all non-controlled characters himself.
Problem #2: What if one of the players disconnects during the game
session?
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Solution: If the disconnecting player isn’t the leader of the session, the leader
reclaims control of the lost characters as proposed on problem #1. If the leader
is disconnected, a new leader could be elected from the remaining players.
Problem #3: What if a player tries to connect in the middle of a game
session?
Solution: If there are still non-controlled characters spots available, and the
leader accepts the connection request, the new player starts controlling one of
those characters.
Problem #4: How will a player that connected to game in the middle of its
development manage to keep up with the plot and progress of the game so
far?
Solution 1: A text summary of the story up to that point could be presented to
the connecting player, which he may opt to read if interested. He could also
ask the other players to bring him up to date directly.
Solution 2: Divide each episode into small modules (chapters), so that the
multiplayer system can always match players that are currently in the same
part of the story. If a player leaves before the end of a chapter, the remaining
players can finish the chapter and proceed by themselves. When he returns,
he’ll resume from the chapter where he previously left and be automatically
matched with other players that are also currently on that chapter.
A different, simpler design alternative is presented by Harboe and Basapur (2009).
Quoting them:
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Instead of working out the highly complex issues of designing adventure
games with multiple independent characters, how about trying to replicate the
old experience of huddling around a computer playing a single-player
game?A group of people (say 2-6) would log on to play the game together.
They'd have a chat window to talk to each other. One player would get to
control the character, and it would switch off every 5-10 minutes.A problem
with this would be that the people who aren't in control of the character could
feel a bit powerless. It's fine if they can help out solving the puzzles, but what
if the player in control is able to solve them alone, or just ignores the
suggestions of the other players?One way to get around this would be to make
it so the controlling player could only perform actions suggested by the other
players. Basically, the other players would type text commands ("take key",
"open door", etc.), and the player who's controlling the character would click
on the one they wanted to do. That way, cooperation is required, and the other
players get to see how their input is helping. (I'm not sure whether the main
player should be allowed to chat with the others. It'd be fun if they could only
make the character gesture with sign language in order to make suggestions to
them. Also, if the main player had an idea none of the others had for how to
solve a puzzle, they would have to give up control of the character to one of
the others in order to state it.)Another thing I like about this idea is that it
would revive the parser interface by merging it with a chat. You could write
whatever: chat with your mates, discuss the game story, speculate on the
puzzles, and suggest actions. If what you write is recognized as a command, it
would become available for the character to execute.Also, by distributing the
writing load between several different people, it would get around the
sometime tediousness of the parser interface.And it would probably take a
longer time playing a game this way, increasing the perceived value-formoney.It sounds like fun to me...
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Prototype of the interaction model presented above (Harboe and Basapur, 2009)
References
Wintermute
Wintermute Engine, “Wintermute Engine Resource Center,”res.dead-code.org, 1-12009. [Online]. Available: http://res.dead-code.org. [Accessed: 3-3-2010].
Wintermute Engine, “WME Book Online,” res.dead-code.org, 10-12-2010. [Online].
Available: http://res.dead-code.org/doku.php/wmebook:start. [Accessed: 5-3-2010].
Adventure Game Studio
Adventure Game Studio, “AGS Resources,” adventuregamestudio.co.uk. [Online].
Available: http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/acres.shtml. [Accessed: 3-32010].
americangirlscouts.org, ”AGS Wiki,” americangirlscouts.org. [Online]. Available:
http://www.americangirlscouts.org/agswiki/Main_Page. [Accessed:5-3-2010].
Visionaire
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wiki.visionaire2d.net, “Visionaire Wiki,”wiki.visionaire2d.net, 19-2-2008. [Online].
Available: http://wiki.visionaire2d.net. [Accessed: 8-3-2010].
wiki.visionaire2d.net, “Visionaire Manual,” wiki.visionaire2d.net, 5-3-2010. [Online].
Available:
http://wiki.visionaire2d.net/index.php?title=Visionaire_Manual.
[Accessed: 8-3-2010].
Fernandez, G., “Visionaire Tutorials,” www2.visionaire2d.net. [Online]. Available:
http://www2.visionaire2d.net/glenfx. [Accessed: 5-3-2010].
Lassie Shepherd
Greg
MacWilliam,
“About,”
lassiegames.com.
[Online].
Available:
http://lassiegames.com/lassie/about. [Accessed: 4-3-2010].
lassie.10.forumer.com, “Lassie Adventure Studio,” lassie.10.forumer.com. [Online].
Available: http://lassie.10.forumer.com. [Accessed: 4-3-2010].
General
Harboe, G. and Basapur, S., “From Social TV to Structured Communication Formats,”
ta2-project.eu/euroitv-workshop2009/accepted_papers.html,
Available:
2009.
[Online].
http://www.ta2-project.eu/euroitv-workshop2009/Papers/Harboe-
Basapur.pdf. [Accessed: 8-3-2010].
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3 Game Design
This chapter presents the method for structuring and reporting scenario design within the
SELEAG time travel game. A uniform structure for presenting all potential scenarios will
allow us to better compare and evaluate each scenario for inclusion in the final game and
help keep all scenarios similar in overall design helping provide better overall consistency for
the user throughout the game. This modular approach should also help make it easier to
integrate or change certain aspects of different scenarios if this is required.
The main concepts based on the previous meetings and discussions on the SELEAG website,
are:
1. The player notices something wrong with their current time period; E.g. Newspapers are
in a different language. This is the trigger for a specific scenario action.
2. The player then learns of a past event or sequence of events in history that somehow
happened differently and changed history. This event or sequence of events can be
explained by a short narrative and is the basis for a game scenario.
3. Each scenario consists of a number of story threads that are each to be implemented in
the game. For example the Second World War scenario of the game will consist of a
number of different story threads related to the Second World War that the player can
play through. E.g. Refugee Thread, Radar/Sonar Thread, Enigma Thread.
4. Each story thread will have a number of different goals to be achieved in order to
progress and ‘put history back to how it used to be’. Each thread will take the player to a
limited set of scenes (corresponding to “physical” contexts). For instance, in the WWII
scenario, Enigma thread, one scene will take place in the Polish ghetto and another in
the British Intelligence services. There will be one main goal per scene.
5. Players may be starting and ending at different points (scenes/events) depending on
what thread they are completing.
6. For many sequences of events in history there will be common events that occur in each
of them. For example, victory in the Battle of Britain was important in both stopping the
German Bombing campaign and also in helping secure shipping routes across to the UK.
We can see here how two separate scenarios involving these goals can both use the
Battle of Britain as a common event.
7. Players can meet in the game, regardless of what thread they are playing through, at
common locations in order to collaborate and swap information/objects relevant to
them to complete aspects of the scenario they are in.
8. Each scene will be formed by a graph plot points, representing activities that the user
must accomplish. These can be interaction (dialogue or fight or other) with NPC’s,
interaction with objects, etc. Some of these plot points are compulsory other not.
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3.1 Game Concept
The player notices something wrong with their current time period; E.g. Newspapers are in a
different language. This is the trigger for a specific scenario action.The player then learns of
a past event or sequence of events in history that somehow happened differently and
changed history. This event or sequence of events can be explained by a short narrative and
is the basis for a game scenario.
Each trigger event leads to a different scenario. The player chooses what scenario he wants
to play in the beginning of the game. The structure of the game must allow adding new
scenarios to the game framework.
The current time will function as a scenario on its own, with threads and scenes. One scene
will include a plot point that allows travelling to the past.
WW II
Industrial
Revolution
Maritime
History
Other…
Trigger events
Current time
Fig.1 - Current time trigger events start scenario action
Trigger events can take the form of:
3.1.1
Newspapers articles
Television commercials
European maps with different borders
Different politicians in charge
Different spoken languages
Etc.
Scenarios, threads and scenes
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Each scenario consists of a number of story threads that are each to be implemented in the
game4. Each story thread will have a number of different goals to be achieved in order to
progress and ‘put history back to how it used to be’.
Players may be starting and ending at different points (scenes/events) depending on what
thread they are completing. Players can meet in the game, regardless of what thread they
are playing through, at common locations in order to collaborate and swap
information/objects relevant to them to complete aspects of the scenario they are in.
Each thread will take the player to a limited set of scenes (corresponding to “physical”
contexts). There will be one main goal per scene. Each SELEAG thread will have four scenes,
for simplicity.
Figure 2 illustrates how different threads can contain both different and common scenes.
Fig.2 - Common and unique scenes/events in a thread
4
For this project, each scenario will have a single thread.
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It may be difficult to find a large number of commonly occurring scenes for two different
scenarios. To help make this easier ‘generic wartime’ scenes can be used. These are scenes
that may have occurred often but across a number of different contexts.
This generalization can help interlink scenarios to allow inter player collaboration while still
preserving the storyline of each individual thread. One example of a generic wartime scene
may be ‘travelling on a ship’. Figure 3 shows how this structure would allow for player
playing through different threads to meet each other and help each other progress through
their own individual threads.
Fig.3 - How players meet when playing through their threads
Note however that players can still meet while playing in the same thread. They can
communicate and share information to achieve faster their goals.
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Fig.4 - Example of how three different threads can interact
3.1.2
Scene description
Fig. 5 - Scene description
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Fig.6 - A Partially Complete Example Scenario
Fig.7 - Three layers to scenario definition and design
3.1.3
Scenes and plot points
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In each scene the user will be required to do a certain number of actions. Each action
corresponds to a plot point. These actions can be:
-
-
Interacting with NPC
o Dialogue
o Fight
o Receiving object
o Giving object
o ...
Interacting with objects
o Using
o Opening
o Reading
o ...
The set of actions is defined by a graph that establishes precedence between plot points or
alternative paths. For instance, to open a door the player is required to previously find a key.
But the information he finds behind the door can also be obtained talking with a NPC.
Some plot points can also lead to the side quests. These side quests can provide information,
health points and fuel points.
Final
Plot
Point
PP15
PP16
PP9
PP7
PP10
PP6
PP11
PP14
PP5
PP4
PP8
PP13
PP2
PP3
PP12
Starting
plot
point
Fig.8 - Plot points: Required (dark blue), optional (light blue) and side quests (orange)
The previous scheme is quite open. It is probable better to have a “skeleton” of required PPs
and add optional and side quests to that central spine.
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3.2 World War II Scenario
3.2.1
Scene 0: Intro
The main character is currently on a school trip to a history museum. The museum guide is
giving a lecture. Right now they're in front of a showcase with an enigma machine inside.
Guide - "And here we can see an encryption device called "Enigma Machine" that was
recovered from World War II. First invented by Arthur Scherbius, a German engineer, at the
end of World War I, it was most notably used by Nazi Germany before and during World War
II. But the reason it became famous, is because through the combined efforts of allied code
breakers, a vast number of enciphered messages were decrypted, which provided valuable
information that helped decide the outcome of the war."
Suddenly the surroundings start becoming distorted, and everything around the main
character changes. A world map showing on the wall starts having different country
frontiers. He's the only one who seems to notice it.
Guide - "-and it proved to be unbreakable throughout the course of the war. It was greatly
because of the security provided by the Enigma Machine, that the German operations
managed to be so efficient, which ultimately lead to the defeat of the allies forces."
Main Character - "Huh? What is happening? "This sounds different from what she was
saying earlier... And why has everything changed?"
A shady figure is seen leaving a room on the upper floor.
Main Character - "Who was that? I'll go check it out..."
The main character enters the room and finds a strange machine with some controls and a
screen. The screen reads "France, June 1940".
Main Character - "Whoa, what is this?"
Machine - "This is prototype number one of the time travelling device. Select the time and
place where you would like to act, and press the "Travel" button. Warning: Any changes to
history that you make through this device WILL affect the world as you know it. Please use
with utmost caution."
Main Character - "It talked! Oh I get it... Whoever left this room must have messed with
history, and made everything change. Maybe I should try to set it back straight. Let's see...
"Travel" button."
The main character presses the Travel button and starts playing in France, June 1940.
Triggering event: When looking at a Europe map (newspaper), the player realizes that
borders are different. Germany won the Second World War and there are much less
countries.
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Major difference: In September, 1940, Hitler was preparing England's invasion which finally
aborted. He postponed it till next Spring and it never happen. In our story he was successful
because his plans were never intercepted - the German code was never broken because the
enigma machine was not available - England was successfully invaded and our UCLAN
colleagues now speak German. The player must go back and make sure that the enigma
machine codes (discovered by Polish) were delivered as historically factual. The player
knows that this was the fundamental event because the cleverness of the German code
engineers and the unbreakability of their cryptographic system is pointed out in the
newspaper.
History Facts:
July 25, 1939 - A secret meeting took place in the Kabackie Woods (Lasy Kabackie) near the
town of Pyry, (South of Warsaw), where the Poles handed over to the French and British
representatives of the Intelligence Service, their complete solution to the German codes,
along with two replicas of the Enigma Machine, built by the Warsaw company AVA. Both
machines were taken by Gen. Bertrande to France.
One month later, Poland is invaded.
Learning Outcomes:





3.2.2
Knowledge about the second world war in general. Focus on events at the start of
the war. Focus on religious and other persecutions. Focus on main characters (Hitler,
Churchill, etc.)
Understand what a war really means in terms of lost of lives and impact on a
"normal", everyday life.
Understand basic cryptographic mechanisms (we can create several puzzles and
embed them in the game)
Realize that people can behave strangely under pressure (betrayal by a close friend)
Understand co-operation between the different countries (passing information etc),
movement between countries, life in wartime, and the importance of technology
advancements to the war effort.
Scene 1: France, June 1940
Location
Paris, Eiffel Tower Surroundings
Objective
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Find a French spy called Rex and learn about the Enigma machine and the codebooks
Places
1) Eiffel Tower Square (ETS)
a. Top of Eiffel Tower (access from “Eiffel Tower Square”)
b. Right Perpendicular Street (access from “Eiffel Tower Square”) (for example)
c. Left Perpendicular Street (access from “Eiffel Tower Square”) (for example)
d. Café / Café Basement (access from “Eiffel Tower Square”)
Here’s a rough sketch of how these places might be spatially organized (green dots stand for
items and red dots stand for possible character locations):
Themes
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
Life of the German army in France
French resistance
French supply problems/lack of food (existence of food tickets)
Charles de Gaulle speech to the French's people
Spies (distrust and riddle code system to pass information)
Characters





Gruber and Geering, 2 German soldiers talk about life in the army
Michelle, french woman accused of being member of the resistance
Colonel Strohm, greedy german colonel that will give the order to execute Michelle
René, owner of café “C’est la vie”
Monsieur Alfonse, starving ex-banker roams in the square asking for food
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
Monsieur LeClerc, french man that says he has a dog named Rex (red herring)

Rex, a French spy who is taking information from a German informant.
Walkthrough
1) In ETS: There are two soldiers (near a BMW motorcycle sidecar) talking about the
good life they are having in Paris since they frequent the best restaurants, the tourist
sites, the concert halls, etc, all paid by France (armistice terms imposed on France).
2) There is a woman named Michelle in the right perpendicular street chained to the
wall. She is going to be executed for suspicion of being a member of the resistance.
She will ask you to save her. In the same street talk to colonel Strohm and try to
convince him that you know the woman and she isn’t a member of the resistance.
The colonel is very greedy so he asks you a golden watch for Michelle’s life.
3) Talk to Alfonse in ETS. He’s hungry (French stores lacked most items and
government answered by creating food charts and tickets) so he trades his watch for
food.
4) Go talk with René in “C’est la vie”. If you already talked to Alfonse you’ll ask for food.
René will propose a little job in return for the food. He heard that soon his beloved
leader Charles de Gaulle will make a speech for the French people (from London via
the BBC Radio service) but the problem is that the Germans stole his radio. He wants
you to get it back.
5) The radio is inside the BMW motorcycle sidecar in ETS. To take the radio inside the
BMW you have to convince Gruber and Geering. They purpose a race in the square.
IF you win you can get the radio.
6) Deliver the radio (option to play the real de Gaulle speech?? with subtitles??) and
René will give you food.
7) With the possession of the food talk to Alfonse so he can give you the watch. The
watch isn’t made of gold. In the left perpendicular street there is a building that is
being painted with golden paint. There are painting materials in the floor. Use the
watch
with
the
golden
paint.
8) Deliver the “golden” watch to colonel Strohm and he’ll free Michelle. Talk to
Michelle about the enigma machine. She asks for another favor and tells you to go
to the top of the Eiffel tower.
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9) On top of Eiffel tower, talk to the people there. A man identifies himself as Monsieur
LeClerc. To know he can trust you he gives you a riddle. The Riddle is a mini-game
(see below). To solve is needed information from the other team. Solve it and
LeClerc will give you an iron “Croix de Lorraine” (cross of Lorraine, symbol of
resistance) and tells you to show it to René.
Note:“The French resistance during World War II often resorted to codes in the form
of riddles to pass on information to the Allied Forces on Nazi troop movements.”
(http://www.2020site.org/riddles/Short-Riddles.html)
10) Go to café “C’est la vie” and show the cross to René. He will let you go to the
basement where you find Rex, a French spy. He reveals that he has a German
informant called Schmidt, from whom he got most of his information, and teaches
you what you need to know about the German Enigma machine and their methods
of cryptography.
a. He talks about the location of the codebooks which are being kept at the
main German Intelligence HQ, but the problem is that their security has
been reinforced since the war started in 1939, making it virtually impossible
to infiltrate. (Because of this, the character has to use his time machine to
reach the German Intelligence HQ before the burst of the war).
b. He also mentions a rumor about the remains of an old Enigma machine
having been spotted in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland, wishing they could
somehow get their hands on it.
Mini-Games
Riddle 1 Example
“In these dark times. The French people won't bend. For our freedom we'll fight. For our old
motto we'll live!What is that motto?”
Solution: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité
There is a list of words but those words are for the solution of mini-game 2to persuade
cooperation.
Riddle 2 Example
“In these dark times. The French people won't bend. For our freedom we'll fight. For our new
motto we won't live!What is that motto?”
Solution: Travail, Famille, Patrie
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There is a list of words but those words are for the solution of mini-game 1to persuade
cooperation.
Note:“Travail, Famille, Patrie” (English: "work, family, homeland") was the motto of the
French State (usually known as Vichy France) during World War II. It replaced the republican
motto, “Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité”. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travail,_famille,_patrie)
3.2.3
Scene 2: Germany, June 1939
Location
Main German Intelligence headquarters (inside the building), before the war started
Objective
Find a codebook
Characters
Albert, soldier guarding the entrance of the building
Evert, soldier guarding the entrance of the safe room
Dieter, officer in the meeting room
Claus, officer in the meeting room
Eckart, officer in the meeting room
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Walkthrough
1. The main character arrives just outside the Main German Intelligence HQ in his
time machine. Trying to get in the building but Albert doesn’t allow it. Pick a
Newspaper from the floor, read it, find the name of a German officer, talk with
the Albert, pretend you are the son of the officer
2. Taken to aMeeting room where there are German officials (Dieter, Claus and
Eckart) in a meeting. He overhears the discussion which provides information on
the enigma machine. He must leave the room before the “father” arrives. He
hears about the codebook and its location.
3. Corridor. Has to pick up and read theBook lying on the table. The book contains
the clues for the next mini-game.
4. Normal Room which he has to enter through the window. To get to the window
he must push the Table. Inside the room he plays a mini-game (fill crosswords
puzzle with information from Book. They must collaborate to get all the
necessary information. The book explains that it is required the other book to
finish the mini-game). The mini-game gives a code to a closet. Grab Paperweight
from desk too.
5. Door to the Safe Room is guarded. You must find a way to distract the Evert.
Throw the Paperweight to the glass window to get the guard to enter the left
room in order to investigate it. The player automatically locks the door with the
Evert inside. Now enter the Safe Room, use the code you got earlier on the safe
to find the Codebook.
3.2.4
Scene 3: Poland, January 1941
Location
Warsaw Ghetto
Objective
Gather the pieces of an Enigma Machine
Places
1) Small (richer) Ghetto (connects to "Large Ghetto" through a single step bridge)
2) Large (poor) Ghetto (connects to "Small Ghetto" through a single step bridge)
a. Metal Shop (access from "Large Ghetto")
b. Soup Shop / Secret School (access from "Large Ghetto")
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Here’s a rough sketch of how these places might be spatially organized (green dots stand for
machine pieces and red dots stand for possible character locations):
Themes
a) Forced Labor
b) Forbidden Education
c) Starvation, Child Smuggling, Betrayal
Characters
a) Factory Workers (2-3), Factory Chief (Metal Shop)
b) Soup Shop Owner, Teacher, Students (2-3) (Soup Shop / Secret School)
c) Rich Brother (Small Ghetto) , Poor Brother (Large Ghetto)
Walkthrough
The character arrives inside the Warsaw Ghetto in his time machine. There will be three
different pieces of the enigma machine to be found. Getting each piece is independent of
the others, so the player can tackle them in any order. This scene can then be considered as
being composed of three independent mini-scenes:
a) Enigma Machine's Rotors
Mixed with other machinery parts in the "Metal Shop"
1. Inside the “Metal Shop”, talk to the workers and learn how they're being forced to
work under terrible conditions just to be able to get a miserable amount of food.
While talking, one of the workers throws a conspicuously looking piece of machinery
into the scrap pile.
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2. It turns out that the piece he scrapped is exactly what you’re looking for, but as you
try to pick it up, the factory’s chief yells at you claiming that you’re disturbing his
work. You must find a way to make him leave first.
3. Talk to the chief and offer to help in the factory. He lets you do as you wish as long
as you don’t expect anything in return.
4. Mini-game: Pick out the damaged pieces from the assembly line. Must remove at
least 80% of the damaged items to succeed. May become progressively faster.
5. If you succeed you can grab your “Rotors” from the metal scrap.
b) Enigma Machine's Keyboard
Mistaken for an old broken typewriter in the "Soup Shop / Secret School"
1. Talk to the owner of the “Soup Shop” and tell him that you’re hungry. Being a child
he won’t charge you for the soup, and begin preparing it.
2. The chef moves and you can see a “Book” as he prepares your soup. Taking notice of
your interest, the chief will ask you if you enjoy reading.
3. If you answer affirmatively he takes you to a secret passage on the back of the store
that leads to an underground “Secret School” where other children are having
classes. You can now access it freely whenever you like. The chef also lends you the
“Book” he had.
4. Talk to the teacher at the school. She explains that education is currently banned
and punishable in Poland, so it has to be conducted in secrecy. You can also talk to
the other students.
5. Seating in one of the vacant spots will let you attend the lesson. The lesson should
be composed of three or four important historical facts that will be necessary when
taking the test mini-game.
6. Examine what looks like a “Broken Typewriter” in the back of the class room. It’s
actually a part of the enigma machine that you need to gather. Ask the teacher if
you can have it. She answers that since it’s broken you can have it, but first you’ll
have to prove that you deserve it by taking an exam.
7. Mini-game: Take a quiz focusing on the matters discussed on class. One of the
questions should also be based on the contents of the “Book” that the chief lent
you. If you manage to achieve a passing grade, the teacher will hand you over the
“Enigma Machine’s Keyboard”.
Note: For the team-based cooperation in this scene, team A and team B could get
different class and book contents, needing to consult the forums to get the remaining
information required for the exam.
c) Enigma Machine's Case
Buried in the "Small Ghetto" area (near a destroyed Chopin's statue)
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1. Find a man in the "Small Ghetto" area that boasts about his fortune being safely
hidden. He also mentions having a brother who foolishly opposed the Germans and
is now in misery.
2. Find a man in the "Large Ghetto" who is spiteful of his brother for abandoning his
family and giving in to the Germans to save himself. Ask him about his brother's
fortune. Despite his resentment, he will not sell out his brother.
3. He will ask you to deliver a photo to his brother in the "Small Ghetto".
4. Deliver the photo. The “rich” brother will ask how is his brother and you tell him that
he has hungry. Then he reveals that he had managed to bury his fortune in a box
under a tree right next to what is now left of Chopin's statue, in the "Small Ghetto"
area.
5. Grab the "Shovel" from inside the “Metal Shop”.
6. Use the "Shovel" and dig under the tree, revealing the "Enigma Machine's Case"
d) Finally, after getting your hands on all three pieces, go back to your time machine to
leave the area.
3.2.5
Scene 4: England, *Month 1943
Location
Bletchley Park
Objective
Deliver the Enigma Machineand find the Bombe computer blueprints
Places
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Outside the park. In front of the gate.
The park.
Hut 8
Library
Canteen
Characters:
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
General Bertrand
Gate Soldier (John)
Alan Turing
Library girl (Rachel)
Canteen girl (Sue)
Walkthrough
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1. Talk to the gate soldier. He can’t let you enter because you don’t have an access
code. Convince him by using the enigma machine to encrypt a message that the
soldier has (and already has the solution to compare.)
2. Once inside the park go to hut 8. There talk with Alan Turing. He says that the
enigma machine is useless without the Bombe computer blueprints, which are
missing. You volunteer to find the blueprints.
3. Go to the library and talk with Rachel. She tells you that Sue archived the blueprints
somewhere in the library but she doesn’t reminds where. The library has a big file
cabinet organized by subjects.
4. In the canteen talk with Sue but she only remembers that the blueprints are in the
“subject ” row/column.
5. Ask for another clue from the other team. With both clues go to the library to
retrieve the blueprints. Deliver it to Alan Turing in hut 8.
References
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/content/hist/wartime.rhtm
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/content/hist/history/polish.rhtm
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/content/hist/history/Veterans.rhtm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cryptographers_by_nationality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptonym
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_World_War_II
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participants_in_World_War_II
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_during_World_War_II
http://thedropzone.org/oss/excerpts.asp#ciphers
http://frode.home.cern.ch/frode/ulfving/node8.html#SECTION00044000000000000000
http://enigma.wikispaces.com/Hans-Thilo+Schmidt
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans-Thilo_Schmidt
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_occupation_of_France_during_World_War_II
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armistice_with_France_(Second_Compiègne)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberté,_égalité,_fraternité
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travail,_famille,_patrie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Resistance
http://www.2020site.org/riddles/Short-Riddles.html
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3.3 Maritime Discoveries Scenario
3.3.1
Scene 0: Intro
The sailors enter into the throne room and tell the history of the Discovery of Madeira.
(Porto Santo was accidentally used as shelter during a storm). He also describes the pirate
assault and how one of the pirates was caught during the fight.
The king decides to execute the prisoner as example for others.
Visual description: The avatar is already in the scene as observer from the crowd. We use
the same long background as in the next scene. And the player has the option to avoid the
situation and its dialogues. (Making more complicated to solve the game).
Use mini intro Outside view of map of Lisbon, animated boat arriving to the port (looks like
an ink painting), transition into outside of the castle and transition to the sailor and prisoner
walking into the court (in american clipping, with background blurred)
Flash Animation: Outside view of map of Lisbon, an animated boat arriving to the port
(looks like an ink painting), transition into outside of the castle and transition to the sailor
and prisoner walking into the court (in american clipping, with background blurred).
Animation using the engine:
A group of sailors who seem really exhausted enter into the throne room leaded by the royal
butler. Juan I, King of Portugal listens intently as the boatswain recounts the history of the
discovery of Madeira . (Porto Santo was accidentally used as shelter during a storm).
The weather-beaten face of the boatswain gets distorted with rage as he describes a pirate
assault on the return trip to Lisbon and how one of the pirates was caught during the fight.
Unfortunately, the pirates have stolen the map with the location of the island and both the
pilot and the captain died during the fight. The king, upset by the news, decides to execute
the prisoner to serve as example for others.
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Additional details:

The avatar is already in the scene as observer from the crowd.

We use the same long backgroundas in the next scene.

The player has the option to avoid the situation and its dialogues. (Making more
complicated to solve the game).
3.3.2
Scene 1: Portuguese King’s Court
Backgrounds:

Throne room
o
(long, three screens wide, with access to bedroom)
o
(there is a door to jail where we can talk with the prisoner)
o
Queen Philipa is dead (3 years ago). Her throne is empty

King’s bedroom (With a King’s size bed obviously)
Characters:

The butler of the court, stiff like a stick.

Jack “Flotsam”, the pirate prisoner.

John I, King of Portugal. Age 63.

Duarte, Heir to the throne. Age:28

Prince Juan Manuel , son of Duarte. Age: 3

Prince, Henry the Navigator, Duke of Viseu. Brother to Duarte age:25

Arquitect (Master of Guild) waiting for Henry to give him audience.

Guard of the jail; bored, leaning on his poleaxe.
Walkthrough
We are in 1419, in the court of Juan I, in Lisbon.
1. We start by talking with the pirate through the barred window of his jail. In the colorful
pirate way of talking he tell us that his name is Jack “Flotsam”. Asked about his nickname
(seems not a lucky one for a sailor), he tell us that when he was a baby he was found by the
spouse of a pirate in a beach with the remains of a shipwreck; raised by pirates he became a
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pirate himself. Finally we asked him about the location of his comrades and he answered
that he will not betray his fellows and he is sentenced to death anyway so there is nothing to
win.
2.
We decided to talk with the butler. He tells us who’s who in the court. If we tried to
enter the king’s bedroom before, we can ask him about that door. He will tell us that it is the
private chamber of the king and obviously, as the presence of a guard seems to suggest, not
anyone is allowed in there.
3.
If we try to talk with the guard we will discover that he is not the kind of a talkative
person and all that we get is some grunted answers (negative if we ask for access to the
bedroom). Otherwise he seems to be whistling all the time.
4. If we insist to the butler that we want to take a look inside (out of curiosity of course) he
will tell us that he knows how to convince the guard. However he wants something in return
for the information and he would also like to be sure that we are a well educated person in
the manners of the court, otherwise he could not let us be in the King’s chamber causing any
misdemeanor. He tells you that there is way to solve both issues by helping him with a
problem which is a headache for him: Henry wants to enlarge his Castle at Segres and he
wants to expropriate some lands which are property of the butler. If we can use our
diplomatic skills to his advantage he will tell us how to enter the room.
5.
If you talk to Henry, he tells you that he does not remember exactly about the
expropriation but if it is included in the blueprints of the castle there is nothing to do. His
word is law and he will not change his mind.
6. Thus, we decide to talk with the architect and convince him that Henry wants us to get
the building blueprints. Obviously the architect likes to keep his head over his shoulders and
out of pure self preservation instinct he will not hand the blueprints in to a stranger.
7. If you talk about Henry to the butler he will tell you that he is looking for a secretary and
he (the butler) is in charge of finding one. He will test you. YOU NEED TWO MINIGAMES TO
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SOLVE IT (see MINIGAMES). Once it is solved, you get the official medal which identifies you
as the secretary of Henry the Navigant and the architect accepts to give you the blueprints.
8. You need a pen from a table to modify the landmarks in the blueprints.
9.
Once you give the modified blueprints to the butler, he tells you that the guard loves
music (he was a bard in his youth) so you might bribe him with a musical instrument.
10.
It turns out that the young enfant Juan Manuel is learning to play an exotic
oriental flute from Las Indias and his father Duarte seems pretty tired of his son playing that
awful sound. We ask him for his son’s flute (any excuse will do) and he happily gives it to us.
11.
We give the flute to the guard who in return gives us access to the royal
bedroom with a smile in his face.
12.
In the bedroom we grab a cameo from a dressing table with a portrait which
is pretty similar to the prisoner’s face. Who is this guy?
13.
We show the cameo to the butler getting the full history of a noble, cousin to
the king, who have lost his only son, kidnapped by the pirates thirty years ago and he has no
further descendants. Mmm, we talked to the prisoner before and he has told a similar
history of being raised as an orphan …
14.
We use cameo on the kingafter talking with the butler and we convince him
that this pirate is the lost son and only heir to his cousin. Whether this is true or no,t it is left
into the Fate’s hands, but the result is the same, the pirate is reprieved and welcomed to the
court.
15.
When Jack the Pirate hears this history he immediately thanks us for helping
him and gives us the location of the pirate hideout, after all he said -“the pirates kidnapped
me and lied about my past”.
And we have a cue! So we set sail to the next scene!
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MINIGAMES
Note: Each TEAM gets to do one of the minigames and then the buttler tells them that the
other team has to answer a question (the other minigame) so you are stuck there but you
can help them (through chat) to walkthrough until they reach the minigame and even help
them in solving it.
MINIGAME 1You want to become secretary of Henry to convince the architect. The butler
asks you to show knowledge regarding the court. Why is the left throne empty? You answer
that the queen died (after asking around maybe). And he asks: When? You have to look it up
in Wikipedia or whatever and introduce the date. (a dialog box is opened)
MINIGAME 2Same as minigame 1. He shows a painting of a child and asks: This was son
of the king and died when he was 10 years old. What was his name? Solved using
information from Internet.
OBJECTS
This list includes all the necessary objects. In order to create atmosphere, additional objects
might be added by the scripter from the artist’s depiction of the scene (if it is available). If
for some reason the art is not available at this point the scripter might add them by his own
initiative. In that case, the artist will take the scripter’s final version of the scene into
account to include them.

Throne room
o
Jail
o
Barred window (in the door of the jail)
o
Bedroom door
o
Empty throne
o
Table
o
Blueprints
o
Modified Blueprints
o
Pen
o
Flute (exotic)

King’s bedroom
o
Bed (it could be tiny to add humor to the scene)
o
Dressing table
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o
Cameo
3.3.3
Scene 2: Pirate ship
DRAFT IDEA: To recover the map you have to get into Captain’s cabin. There is a
scroll minigame which consists of avoiding the drunken pirates (slept due to rum overdose)
and in the Captain’s cabin we have to talk with his parrot until it stops repeating what we
say and gives away the place where the map is hidden.
In the end of the chapter a misfortune happens: the map somehow (a stroke of wind, a
seagull, etc) loses a piece of vital information. We have to rebuild it at the school of
navigation.
Intro Flash Animation:
(Night view over the sea - row boat appears in view. Our character is rowing the boat)
Animation using the engine:
View on the pirate ship's deck. Pirates are asleep, some of them snoring. The camera pans
over the ship from the middle to the front side of the ship. A line with a hook is thrown on
board and a little later our character climbs on board.
Additional details:
We use the same long cavalier perspective background as in the next scene.
Flash Animation:
(Night view
Description:night version of scenario 4’s ship. Also it is mirrored in cavalier perspective. We
can move the frontal layer of the hull up and down to simulate movement of the ship.
Maybe add sprinkles of water from waves too.
Characters:

Sick captain puking over the veranda.

Annoying parrot
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
Drunken pirates:

Animation of sleeping pirates, some with bottles of booze, some snoring, ...
Walkthrough
Get into captain's cabin talk with the parrot and get the map. We lose the part
referring to the island's location.
Find a key
Cargo area with a cooker (shabby place)
Minigames
Avoiding drunken sailors in scroll mode.
Naming parts of the ship (drag and drop names from a list to the parts of a depiction of the
ship)
3.3.4
Scene 3: School of navigation
DRAFT IDEA: As the coordinates seem missed in the map the two teams have to reconstruct
the position by means of techniques available in XVth century.
MINIGAME: NAVIGATION TEAM 1 How to use a Ballista (device used by Spaniard and
Portuguese pilots) to set up Latitude in a map
MINIGAME :NAVIGATION TEAM 2  Use knots/hour and time travelling to set up longitude
We can use this scene to give a view on academia in that time. To become a student you
need a recommendation, money. A weird professor or different kind of "typical" teachers.
One of the teachers can give information on how to use the ballista and how to calculate
knots and distances.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo%C3%A3o_Gon%C3%A7alves_Zarco
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagres_Point
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In 1419 Henry the Navigator, the second son of King John I of Portugal, established a naval
observatory at Sagres and summoned a Mestre Jacome de Malhorca to be its coordinator
navigational instruments:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrolabe
Intro
Provide some information on the importance of science and technology and cartography.
Introduce the school of navigation (School of Sagres)
Intro Flash Animation:
Fading images of maps and tools for marine navigation as a trigger for discoveries. Make kids
conscious that scientific research was important then already.
Animation using the engine:
/ game starts immediately after the image slideshow
Characters
Master Jacome de Malhorca (coordinator of school of navigation - famous cartographer)
João Gonçalves Zarco (adventurer, is there to exchange information with Master Jacome)
Scenes
Entrance with a garden or so in which you can overhear the introductary conversation.There
are renovation works going on.
Simple classroom stone/wood with view on the sea through the windows.
inspiration: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Laurentius_de_Voltolina_001.jpg
Laboratory filled with devices, maps and prototypes.
Walkthrough
You overhear a conversation between Master Jacome and Joao Goncalves about the lost
map story. Goncalves is desperate.
After the conversation the Master says "now i have to go teach" and dissapears into a door.
You can follow and you come into a classroom. Most students are sleeping or looking
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extremely bored. The teacher talks and throws pieces of chalk to some of the students
which aren't paying attention.
During the class you learn how to calculate knots.
You can have a conversation with a fellow student so you get some extra information and
the teacher throws a piece of chalk at you (which you need in a later phase of the game).
From conversation with student you learn this class takes a long time ("how long does this
class take?" "last night he forgot to take dinner and we were stuck here all day"). Student
can also give you his study book which has a drawing of the ballista.
You have to make the teacher stop class to get into the drawer. He only stops when the
school bell rings. The school bell is at the entrance, overseen by the reception clerk (who
also is in charge of ringing the bell). You have to convince the clark to ring it by manipulating
a sundial hanging or sitting in the hall. (you have to change it to 9pm - multiple options
possible - you need to have overheard the student complaining about the length of the
classes).
After class ends you get the chance to look into the teacher's drawer. You find chalk, a ruler
and a bottle of red Port.
You can find some tools and wood leftovers at the renovation site outside to build the
ballistina, using the ruler also..
Back in the lab you have to use the ballistina on some other simulation instrument (need
some more research on navigational instruments here (star maps? sky maps? astrolabe) ...)
to get the lattitude.
You go into the lab with you ballestina and talk to Joao. You ask him if there are any clues on
the position of the island. "the only thing i have is this astrolabe with unchanged position, go
ask the master if he can calculate the star position". You go to the master and he explains
everything. "If you have some chalk I can draw you the position of the star". Ballestina
Minigame pops up.
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In the lab there is also a compass - if you use the compass on the map you got from the
pirate ship the compass game triggers (draw a circle, combined with lattitude you find the
position of Madeira).
Outro animation
See Intro of next scene
Minigames
Minigame 1: using the ballista
Minigame 2: drawing circle depending on caluclated distance (knots/kms/speed/etc...)
3.3.5
Scene 4: Ship back
DRAFT IDEA:
MINIGAME DISCOVERIES  compete with passenger which is a sheer (Marisa la Pitonisa)
predicting the future in crystal ball (you have to say if it’s right or wrong)
Getting the ideas of why to move to Madeira (getting some land), the dangers of sailing,
preservation of food for long journeys
Historical information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madeira
right/left: port/starboard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scurvy
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Spain_and_Portugal.png
Intro
Intro Flash Animation:
Drawing of the map
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Animation using the engine:
King puts you in charge of coordinating the settlement because you brought back the map
Characters

Pilot (we can help him with navigation)

A few first settlers

Boatswain Duarte (manager of sailors)

Sailors

A prisoners

Gipsy sheer
Scenes
1. Getting into the ship (introduction)
2. In the ship
3. Island: start a first settlement. Description: beach with changeable background so you
can see the settlement grow.
Walkthrough
GOALS: reach the island Madeira and start a settlement
Storm is going on in the background. You ask about it to the pilot. "This storm is really
dangerous, we'd better avoid it". You need to get the boatswain to sail starboard. Moreover,
one of the best sailors got ill from scurvy and you need to help him by giving him vitamin C
fruit.
Find a barrel of oranges and lemons in the cargo area. The cargo is packed with barrels. One
of the poor people says she's a sheer and that she can help you if you help her first. She had
three visions of a possible future on Madeira and wants you to say which one is correct.
Possible topics: importance of sugar cane, who and when discovery of america, tratado de
tordesillas 1512, British occupation beginning 19th century, autonomy in 1976.
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The sailor can't eat the fruit because his teeth are really week from the scurvy symptoms.
You have to make a fruit juice in a jar (which can be found in the kitchen area).
A quarrel is going on between prisoners and noblemen. You have to talk to both parties and
discover what they need and have to find the solution. The poor and prisoners want rights
once they are there.
You talk to some stiff rich lady who says bad thing sabout the prisoners, you have to
convince her why it is important to get them to cooperate (win-win situation).
- try to convince her they need them:
"There's only a few of you so you really need people to grow crops and animals for food.
Bringing food by ship takes a loooong time and is very expensive".
"They are with more, they are stronger, if they start a mutiny you mind end up gatting
killed".
"If you can keep them happy they will be eager to work and produce whatever this new
settlement needs".
- try to convince the prisoners to cooperate:
"You can kill them but then the king will send troups and get you killed!".
"You will need the nobles to trade with other nobles".
"If you kill the engineers and the doctors there will be no one left to help and organise it
here" (importance of knowledge and guilds)
Once you get all parties to cooperate, the boat arrives at the island.
ISLAND
You are in charge. In your directory you have e.g. a team of woodworkers, a team of
prisoners, etc... You see the city develop in the background as you use the right tools on the
right elements..
fishermen> fish
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woodcutters on forests > beams > channels
channels> fields
prisoners on fields > food and weeds
we have settled.
Outro animation
Island is being developed. The age of discoveries has begun. Colonisation.America on the
map.
Minigames
Minigame (used twice): helping the sheer getting a clear vision of the future (look up info on
internet).
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3.4 Industrial Revolution Scenario
Master plan - description of the scenes
- layers of the background
Walk trough - step by step (what is happening in that scene).
Number of characters, number of objects.
Scenes:
1. Home – showing the conditions, teaching a skill
2. Cotton Factory - industrial revolution, business models, cost reducing method
3. Mine – organizing a workers’ union, a strike
4. Parliament - lobbing the lords to publish the law (Mine Act).
3.4.1
Scene 1:Home
Not a very beautiful place. Small apartment, dark, miserable, cold, dirty, no furniture.
Mother is at home working with a mop in her hand. 7 kids and father are coming home from
the factory. Father is very tired and falls asleep immediately. Communication will be
between mother, kids and the player.
Comment: Maybe for reducing the work of designers lets lover the amount of kids - one is
very small and thats the reason why mother is at home. The other one is bigger and working.
She will be the main target for communication - convincing here not to go to work.
I think there must be more than just one or two kids (let say at least three) in order to show
the fact of growing population (the demographic boom was also one of the causes for
industrial revolution).
Characters:
- Mother
- Father (goes to sleep)
- Kids
- Player
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- kids: do not want to go to work, want to go to school or play
- mother: ignoring the kids and is doing housework
- player: asks from mother why kids have to work
- mother: explains that school or playing is a waste of time, money is needed in order to feed
the kids, describes lousy living conditions in a certain manner specific to that era. Comment:
this may not fit with the overall strategy of the game. Usually the characters in Graphical
adventure game are passive and wait for player interaction
- players: offer kids options how to make their life easier:
- play – different side-games
- steal – show how it should not be done.
- homeworks – help mother
- ...
- teach some skill *- have to provide a correct answer (the correct answer is not provided
with the first selection). Comment: only one sidegame per scene is enough.
*When players are selecting an incorrect answer, mother starts to explain why they can't do
that:
- kids must have rest
- God will punish them
- mother is doing the work
- ... Comment: In graphical adventure the interaction will take place only
with player and one character. Others do not interrupt. E.g. while talking with kids, mother
does not start shouting or father don't wake up.
When the player selects the wrong answer several times, father will wake up and there is a
risk of getting beaten (randomly).
- random kid: asks instructions about some specific skill - this question can be random from
game to game.
- player: has to teach a skill - by solving the mini-game [a puzzle or a quiz (e.g. reordering
activities, filling in the blanks, making connections, ... but before that they have to google to collect information)]. When teaching fails - father wakes up and there is a risk of being
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beaten. If the teaching is successful - player is led to the other scene (in the morning
together with the kids). Comment: How the minigame will be activated? Is this one choice in
the communication list? Probably not. Is this some hotspot in the game. E.g stuff on the
table or on the floor? Yes? this can be spot for interaction with other teams. E.g. for
proceeding minigame should be solved by 2 teams.
Some additional mini-games - going outside, getting a goal, and making fire at home.
Solution for multiplayer - 2 skills are needed - one taught by 1 group and second by another.
– good idea.
3.4.2
Scene 2:Cotton Factory
Indoor picture. Loud noise. Lots of dust, machinery, ...
Kids have to weave, they are controlled by the owner. The rest of the kids are working in the
background.
Characters:
- Owner of the factory
- Kids (1 kid?)
- Player
One of the kids: tries to communicate with the owner Comment: skip this interaction
Owner: ignores
Player: asks from the owner why kids are working
Owner: explains his business model in an arrogant way.
Player: offers technical innovations - sidegames - puzzles or quizzes about engines and
equipment – how to put the machines together, how to make textile, how to place the yarn,
..., or making working conditions better. Instead of lime-wash you have to offer something
more decent
Innovation leads to the smaller need of working hands.
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Kids are sent home – the player is suddenly going through the dust and finds himself in
another scene.
3.4.3
Scene 3: Mine
Because the kid vas not longer needed in the cotton mill, she was sent to the mine.
Very bad working conditions, mine is full of coal dust, dark, narrow, ...
Characters:
- Owner of the factory
- Kids (2 diffetent kids?)
- Workers (one or more?)
- Player
Introduction: Player gets hurt from falling when pulling the trolly.
Owner: ignores the player
Worker: helps the player to go and breathe some fresh air, cleans the wound, gives cloth to
tie it up
Player: ask workers to:
- ruin the machines
- steal from the factory
- ...
- start a union *
Wrong answer:
- player is put in to prison - waiting time. I think it's the best solution.
- player is sent to Australia - game fails?
- there is a risk to get beaten, or given even more difficult job
- ...
Player: asks the union to:
- make speeches
- write a letter to government
- make a strike *
- negotiate with the owner
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3.4.4
Scene 4: Parliament
A big room full of light. Lots of people talking, going around. Lots of air. Player with a broken
arm goes around the house and looks at all the space. He finds a Member of Parliament who
has an armed guard next to him.
Caracters:
- Member(s) of Parliament
- Armed guard
- Kids (one kid?)
- Union members
- Player
The kids and the player are trying to get the attention of the MP, because the player has
broken his arm and wants to present his views on child labour to the MP. Kids are driven
away by the armed guard, but the player and union members are accepted.
The conversation is going on in the form of a mini-game, where there are questions and
possible answers (each union member suggests an answer) – if the player chooses the wrong
answer then he is also kicked out. It is in the form of a dialogue.
MP: asks what is the problem
Union members: each of them suggests an answer (coming as a bubble from their mouths,
e.g. children are mistreated, we are hungry, it is dirty in the mines, etc. there are lots of
deseases, children cannot read…)
Player: selects the correct answer, then the next round of questions-answers appear.
If the player selects continuously a wrong answer, the crowd is “kicked out“ (this happens
randomly) of the building and no law change is considered.*
If the player selects correct answers in a row then the MP starts considering taking the
proposals for the law into consideration.
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*In the case of kicking out from the building side-games could be considered in order to let
them back in again (facts about British Parliament, important addresses, etc.). If the player
gets the answers correct, then the way to the Parliament is open again. If not, he has to try
again.
The game ends where the player is back at home in the nice, clean environment. He or she is
happy and thinks it was all a bad dream when suddenly notices the broken arm...
Comment: This is not an minigame. This is typical framework for graphical adventure came.
Kicking out usually don't take place.
The side game can be formulating the Mine Act. This can be sorting out of correct sentences
or phrases from the longer list of text. Interaction with other team is needed. (I think it's a
good idea, maybe just a bit too difficult?)
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4 Evaluation Methodology
The serious game “Time Mesh” is a funded quasi experimental educational software project
which is being developed under the frame of a quality evaluation environment, Quantitative
Evaluation Framework (QEF) (Escudeiro, 2006), that measures system quality throughout its
development life cycle.
A simple question for any educational software should be,” can this product actually teach
what it is supposed to?” It is a simple question to ask, but often difficult to answer because
the product may have so many beguiling features. It requires the evaluator to recognize
his/her own view of the way in which students learn, to relate that view to the learning
objectives and to determine how and whether those objectives are carried out in the
software.
The application of QEF throughout the development life cycle of “Time Mesh” highlights the
flaws that are present in the current version at the time of evaluation allowing the
development team to focus on those flaws guiding the product to achieve the desirable
requirements.
4.1 QEF - Quantitative Evaluation Framework
QEF is a generic quality evaluation framework that evaluates the educational software
quality (ISO 9126 is the standard of reference) (Scalet et al, 2000) in a three dimensional
space. A dimension aggregates a set of factors. A factor is a component that represents the
system performance from a particular point of view.
a
f
e
Fig 1: Cartesian quality space
The quality q, of a given system is defined in this tri-dimensional Cartesian quality space, Q,
and measured, in percentage, relatively to a hypothetically ideal system, I, represented by
the coordinates (1, 1, 1). For each system being developed we will have to identify the
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importance of each factor to the dimension, pn. The dimension coordinate is them computed
as the weighted mean of these factors:
Dimension i=
p
n
 factorn  ,
n
  p   1 and
n
pn  0,1
n
Where n is the number of relevant factors for the dimension.
Each factor is evaluated by:
Factor n =
1
   prm  pc m 
 prm m
m
Where:
M is the number of valid requirements for the factor.
prm is the weight of the requirement m
pcm is the fulfillment percentage of the requirement m.
The dissimilarity between the system under evaluation and the ideal system is given by:
 Dim 
j 1  100 j 


D=
2
Finally the quality of the system is computed as:
Q = 1
D
, Q  0,1
n
or

q = 1 

D 
 *100 , q  0,100
n
The quality of a system is measured from the distance between the ideal system (projected
system) and the real system (final system).
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The system quality is in the inverse
a
proportion of the distance between the Ideal
IS
System (IS) and the Real System (RS).
D
RS
f
If D=0 Then Q=1
e
If D=maxim, Dmax =
n
Then Q=0
The measure of the system quality is obtained through a six steps process:
1st – Requirement classification; 2nd – Factor classification; 3rd – Result evaluation; 4th –
Dimension performance; 5th – Global deviation;6th – System quality
4.1.1
Requirement Classification
The ideal system has a set of requirements that indicates what the system must do.
We start by associating weights to requirements based on its relevance for that particular
factor, according to the following scale:
10 – Fundamental; 8 – Very Important; 6 – Important; 4 – Necessary; 2 – Optional; 0 –
Irrelevant
Dimension
Factors
Requirements
Pcm
Pcm
Pcm
Pcm
Pcm
Pcm
Fig 1: matrix of the factors
4.1.2
Factor Classification
Each factor contributes to the dimension value. This contribution is represented by a real
number, Pn , between 0 and 1, indicating the relevance of the factor to the dimension. The
dimension value is a weighted mean of its factors:
Dimension =
 p
n
 factor ,
  p   1 and
n
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n
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4.1.3
Result Evaluation
It is very important to validate the requirements, so that system performance can be
accurately evaluated. The matrix in fig 2 shall be fulfilled for every stage of the evaluation
process. Once it is completed thequality that the system exhibits at the evaluation instant is
automatically computed.
4.1.4
Dimension performance
The performance of a given factor is obtained from the requirements contributing to it,
according to:
Factor n =
1
   prm  pc m 
 prm m
m
The performance of a dimension is obtained from its factors according to:
Dimension =
 p
n
 factor ,
  p   1 and
n
4.1.5
n
pn  0,1
n
Global deviation
The global deviation is obtained as the Euclidean distance between our system coordinates
and the ideal system, whose coordinates are (1,1,1)
 Dimj 
j 1  100 
D=
4.1.6
2
System Quality
The system quality is finally computed by:
Q=1-

q = 1 

D
, Q  0,1
n
D 
 * 100 q  0,100
n
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We say that system quality is q% which means that the system is able to perform q% of its
initial specifications.
4.2 Alpha testing
The objective of an Alpha Testing procedure is to simulate an actual operational testing and
is performed by members of the development team that have not been involved in the
development of the particular features to be tested. Alpha Testing allows anticipating
internally problems that would only be detected by external testers in the Beta Testing
phase. This stage is more rewarding if qualitative data collection is used because it provides
richer information.
4.2.1
Protocol
1. For each scenario:
a. Identify participants (staff from partners) which have not been involved in the
development (at least 4 elements)
b. Have participants playing the scenario and trying to finish it
c. Participants should
i. Measure how much time it took to finish each scene
ii. Identify learning outcomes addressed. Check if they match watch was
proposed
iii. Identify other learning outcomes that should be addressed
iv. Assess if the game is motivating. Identify problems
v. Assess if the graphical environment / usability is adequate. If not,
identify the issues
vi. Report on the project forum
4.3 Beta testing
Beta testing comes after alpha testing and it is planned to release the game to a limited
audience outside of the consortium. The target group is composed of teachers familiar with
the subject and with the technology that can assess pedagogically and technically the
prototype so that further testing can ensure the game has no faults or bugs. In this stage a
mix of qualitative and quantitative information will be collected, because there is still
interest in receiving rich comments but there is already a relatively important number of
people evaluating the game that can provide statistically valid results.
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4.3.1
Protocol
2. For each scenario, each partner has to:
a. Identify participants (teachers from associated partners: at least 2 per partner)
b. Have participants playing the game and trying to finish it
c. Participants should
i. Measure how much time it took to finish each scene
ii. Answer the questionnaire
d. Interview the participants using the semi-structured interview guide
e. Report the results to the coordinator
4.3.2
Questionnaire
The questionnaire is meant to provide a quick data filling tool for the beta testers. This way
they are able to report immediately their impressions, just after finishing the scenario. It is
based on a mixture of adapting heuristics for evaluating playability of games (Desurvire,
Caplan and Toth, 2004), heuristics for usability evaluation for history educational games (Yue
& Zin, 2009) and questions based on the factors identified by (Garzotto, 2007) in the paper
“Investigating the Educational Effectiveness of Multiplayer Online Games for Children”.
Learning itself is not investigated in this questionnaire because it is aimed at evaluating with
adults. These adults may already have knowledge of the subject matter contained within the
game.
The Questionnaire was split into three Dimensions: Gameplay, Story, Mechanics and
Usability and is a 5 point Likert scale asking users to rate statements on a scale of 1 to 5
depending on how much they agree with a given statement. See Below.
Strongly Disagree
Neutral
1
3
2
Strongly Agree
4
5
Method of Use: To be handed to teachers who have played through the game or seen
someone play through the game. Teachers may have the game running in front of them if
desired to allow them to refer back to the game when answering questions. It is desired
teachers play through the game in order to be able to effectively answer questions in the
game play and story sections with a full overview of the game.
Game Play
1)
The game was enjoyable to play
2)
Activities that players carried out within the game were varied
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3)
The player tasks and activities were relevant to the narrative and story being told
throughout the game
4)
The overall goal of the game was presented early in the game
5)
The Short term goals and player tasks were clear throughout the game
6)
There was an informative introduction/tutorial that instructed players how to play
the game
7)
The game is enjoyable to replay
8)
There are multiple ways to win the game
9)
Players learn more about the story as gameplay progresses
10)
Players can divert from their main tasks/goals to complete other less important
tasks
11)
The game is ‘fun’ to play
12)
I found it difficult to progress at a single point in the game (i got ‘stuck’).
13)
The effects of the players actions can clearly be seen in the game environment
(examples)
14)
At the start of the game (insert first action here) This was obvious and it was clear
when i had done it
15)
There were rewards in the game that allowed me to customise my character
16)
The pace of the game was satisfactory
17)
I found parts of the game to be a good challenge
Game Story
18)
The overall storyline is linear and clear
19)
The storyline is interesting
20)
The storyline is relevant to the school’s curriculum
21)
The player can relate to the main character
22)
The storyline is unpredictable and the player is able to envisage different outcomes
23)
The Player feels as though the world is going on whether their character is there or
not
24)
The Player has a sense of control over their character and is able to use tactics and
strategies
25)
The player feels the outcomes of their efforts/actions are fair
26)
The sound in the game helps immerse the player in the environment
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27)
The graphics in the game helps immerse the player in the environment
28)
The game offers some kind of reward for successful players actions
29)
Players can relate to the main character (e.g. they are just like them, or they are
interesting to them)
Mechanics and Usability
30)
Audio and visual feedback is provided with each of the players actions
31)
Characters in the game behave as the player expects
32)
The player is aware of their progress throughout the game
33)
The controls of the game were easy to use and intuitive
34)
The game uses a familiar control system to control the main character
35)
The player was able to use shortcuts once they had learned the controls
36)
The player can easily start, load and quit their game
37)
The controls for the game were the same throughout the game
38)
The colours used in the game were consistent throughout the game
39)
Fonts and main character dialogue was consistent throughout the game
40)
The game menu was easily accessed in the game and was easy to understand
41)
Upon initially turning the game on the Player has enough information to get started
to play
42)
The help system (insert help system name here e.g. object highlighting or hints) was
satisfactory to help players when they got stuck
43)
The sounds in the game were relevant to the environment/action being performed
44)
The player could use the game without reading a manual
45)
The game control interface was non-intrusive to the player
46)
The graphics were recognizable to the players and it was clear what items did by
looking at them.
47)
There were elements in the game where players were able to gain a score (e.g. in
minigames)
48)
Any other comments on the game
4.3.3
Semi-structured interview
A semi-structured interview is a flexible method of research, allowing new questions to be
brought up during the interview as a result of what the interviewee says. The interviewer
should use the guide that is presented next to organize the conversation:
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Questions:

Does it work?

Is the content accurate and appropriate for target audience?

Is it easy to use and easy to learn to use?

Is it compelling / engaging for the target audience?

What are the learning goals?

How well do the learners achieve those goals?

What else are they learning?
Suggestions:

Prepare a tape recorder in advance

Conduct the interview in a quiet location

Ask for permission to use the recorder

Take auxiliary notes if necessary
4.4 Final Evaluation
For the final evaluation, the quality space, Q, aggregates, in the dimensions – Functionality;
Efficiency and Adaptability – a set of factors that measure the relevant characteristics of the
object being evaluated.
The Functionality dimension reflects the characteristics of the educational software related
to its operational aspects. It aggregates two factors: easy of use and content’s quality
The Efficiency dimension aggregates, in the case of educational software, four factors:
audiovisual quality, technical and static elements, navigation and interaction, originality and
use of advanced technology. Through this dimension we measure the system’s ability for
presenting different views on its content with minimum effort.
The Adaptability dimension is the aggregation of five factors: versatility, pedagogical
aspects, didactical resources, stimulates the initiative and self learning and cognitive effort
of the activities. Through them we can measure to what extend the scenario and system
content are effective – whether they are focused and able to present different instructional
design theories and different learning environment in a common platform.
The coordinates of a given system in our quality space, may be obtained through the
application of one of several aggregation forms. We will compute these coordinates as the
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average of the factors that contribute to it. The average is simple and gives the same
relevance to all factors. Quality dimensions are based on the following factors:
Dimension
Functionality
Factors
Requirements
Easy of use
R1: Does the student use the educational software without
having to read the manuals exhaustively?
R2: An on-line system exists to help the user overcome the
difficulties?
Content’s quality
R8: Is the information well structured and does it
adequately distinguish the objectives, context, results,
multimedia resources...
R9: Is the content validated? Has it no orthographic errors?
R10: Has the alert message been checked? Are there no
pervasive or negative messages and no racial or religion
discrimination?
R11: Is the content related with situations and problems of
student’s interest?
Dimension
Efficiency
Factors
Requirements
Audiovisual quality
R6. Is there no excess of information?
Technical and static elements
R7: Has it a rigorous scenario design which includes?
Navigation and interaction
R13: Does the game has a good structure that allows easy
access to activities?
R14-: Is the speed of communication between the program
and the user adequate?
R15: Is the game execution efficient and with no
operational errors?
R16: Is the navigation system transparent, allowing the user
to control actions?
Originality
and
use
of
Has the system been developed with originality?
advanced technology
Dimension
Adaptability
Factors
Versatility
Requirements
R3: The game is easily integrated with other educational
environments?
R4: Does it allow for configuration? (level, number of users on
line, language…)
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R18: Does it allow for new techniques and better learning?
Pedagogical aspects
R19: Does it allow for activities that keep the curiosity and the
interest of the students in the content, without provoking
anxiety?
Didactical resources
R20: Does it provide different activity types, concerning the
knowledge acquisition, that allow for different forms of using
the system?
R21: Does it provide help for students as tutoring actions,
guiding activities and reinforcements?
Stimulates
the
R22: Does it allow for students’ decisions concerning the tasks to
initiative and self
carry through, the choice of study module and the study of
learning
subject matter?
A questionnaire addressing these requirements will be delivered to students using the game.
4.5 References
Desurvire, H., Caplan, M., and Toth, J. A. 2004. Using heuristics to evaluate the playability of
games. In CHI '04 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (Vienna,
Austria, April 24 - 29, 2004). CHI '04. ACM, New York, NY, 1509-1512. DOI=
http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/985921.986102
Garzotto, F. 2007. Investigating the educational effectiveness of multiplayer online games
for children. In Proceedings of the 6th international Conference on interaction Design and
Children (Aalborg, Denmark, June 06 - 08, 2007). IDC '07. ACM, New York, NY, 29-36. DOI=
http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1297277.1297284
Yue, W. S. and Zin, N. A. 2009. Usability evaluation for history educational games. In
Proceedings of the 2nd international Conference on interaction Sciences: information
Technology, Culture and Human (Seoul, Korea, November 24 - 26, 2009). ICIS '09, vol. 403.
ACM, New York, NY, 1019-1025. DOI= http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1655925.1656110
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