1. Do Serious Games Work? Results from Three Studies
Some studies help
answer some of the questions now surrounding serious games-or games whose primary purpose is something other than entertainment, such as military training, education, physical therapy-and determine the relationship between the use of video games and learning as measured on standardized tests. More research is needed, but these findings provide some answers to both skeptics and supporters.
Recently I’ve been consulting with a customer on the design of a series of digital learning games for sales training. Most clients have done their research online about serious games, and find the whole gamut of samples, demos, etc. Clients typically have some thoughts about what they feel are serious games and whose game-play and mechanics they intended to emulate. Just one look at their collated ‘portfolio’ was enough to tell me that none of the content in the portfolio was really a serious game. What followed was the diplomatic squashing preconceived ideas about what serious games were in their (client’s) training context.
Abhijit Kadle | April 18th, 2009
We receive requests for information about game-based learning development services. Customers have determined that using digital games is a good choice, but aren’t quite certain about whether it’s a casual or serious game they need.
There are pronounced differences between casual and serious games. I’d like to delve a bit deeper into differences I see as being more important when deciding which way to go. The differences between casual and serious games seem to lie squarely in two domains: Instructional Outcomes, and Use of Technology.
We’ve been following GDC’s Serious Games Summit, and the Serious Game portal has just posted about emerging trends in the serious games market as evident from the summit presentations and discussions. You can view the article here.
