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Surely, You Can’t Be Serious: An Introduction to Serious Games

Surely, You Can’t Be Serious: An Introduction to Serious Games. Ben Katz Enspire Learning. Who are YOU?. This is not a rhetorical question. What are Serious Games?. A game with a purpose beyond pure entertainment. Is this a serious game?. Civilization. Categories. Games for Change

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Surely, You Can’t Be Serious: An Introduction to Serious Games

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  1. Surely, You Can’t Be Serious: An Introduction to Serious Games Ben Katz Enspire Learning

  2. Who are YOU? This is not a rhetorical question.

  3. What are Serious Games? • A game with a purpose beyond pure entertainment

  4. Is this a serious game? Civilization

  5. Categories • Games for Change • Advergaming • Games for Learning • Corporate Training Games

  6. Games for Change

  7. Advergaming

  8. Learning Games

  9. Corporate Games: A Case Study

  10. The Problem • No formal on boarding program • Employees distributed in dozens of countries around the world • Nobody knew what other people were doing • High turnover

  11. Bummer

  12. The Case • Research • Many Sun Employees are familiar with video games • Sun investing in video games (Project Darkstar) • Alternatives • Social networking (forums, wikis) • Standard e-learning

  13. That's our game! The Solution All of the above!

  14. Rise of the Shadow Specters • Objectives – teach new hires about Sun’s mission and core businesses • Puzzle platformer • Flash based (sorry, Java) • Engine built from scratch to facilitate combination of content with game mechanics (ex. special powers) and easy level editing

  15. Should I say it again? • MAKE THE MECHANICS FIT THE LEARNING (ex. Don’t just use a Wiimote for no reason) • Every game teaches you something • Don’t patronize your audience

  16. Step Five Figure out exactly what resources you need in order to create your game: • People • Financial Resources • Time • Did I say time?

  17. Three developers (Designer, Programmer, Artist) • 3 months original estimate – 6 weeks actual dev time

  18. Step Six Make a plan! • Prototype? • Alpha, Beta, Final – what are your actual deliverables • Playtesting • Who is responsible for what – on both sides

  19. A few lessons learned… • Systems requirements – the forgotten killer • Get QA people that KNOW games • Prepare your executives for scary new processes

  20. Prepare for the unexpected… Sun Ray required its own game Solution = make two games! Made the second type of game for different types of learners.

  21. To reiterate: • Identify the problem • Research the situation • Consider alternatives • Create objectives • Identify resources • Make a plan • ??? • Profit!

  22. Any questions? ben.katz@enspire.com

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