The overstimulated and under-qualified thoughts of a digital native trying to make sense of it all.
Education, Technology, Gaming, Social Networking, and a whole lot o' me.
This is one of the best stories I've read in a long time.
From BoingBoing... ------------------------- This is a picture of my amazing youngest son Evan. He's 13, he's
holding a game controller and looking at a glowing screen and he's
doing what he does a lot of -- diving into digital realms of
adventure.
His latest favourite game is Call of Duty - which he plays on-line
with his friends. Evan's wanting to play C of D was something of a
challenge for us. It's rated T and he's only just a teenager and
point and shoot first person games worry me some. Evan is
relentlessly reasonable sometimes -- he outlined why he wanted to play
the game and he was pretty upfront why he knew my "parent-sense" would
start tingling. So I had to be reasonable too. I looked at the game.
I've done a lot of research for military museums so I could tell that
the content was accurate -- but there was lots of shooting and blowing
things up. But there was a fair bit of that during World War II. So
it was undeniable that Evan was experiencing history and there was
this teamwork factor...
So we compromised. Well, sort of.
I asked Evan to google the Geneva Convention. Then he had to read it
and then we had to discuss it. This we did. So the deal is that Evan
has to fight according to the rules of the Geneva Convention. If his
team-mates violate the Convention then play stops and Call of Duty
goes away for a while.
We'll see how it goes, but Evan keeps his word. Especially about his games. -------------------------
There are a lot of things I love about the story of Evan and the Geneva Convention. For whatever reason, game controversy tends generate a firestorm of attention, particularly when it comes to the Media, Politicians, and certain watchdog groups. We try to ban them. Censor them. Plaster them with ratings and fine retailers for selling them. And in the process, we fail to sit back and look at whats really going on, and what kinds of opportunities we are missing out on, both as parents and educators (something I've written about before).
Hugh Spencer, the author of the BoingBoing piece, could have taken the game away because of its violent content (which clearly made him a bit uneasy as a parent). He just as easily could have looked the other way and done nothing at all (a much bigger problem with game violence, that for whatever reason, rarely enters the discussion).
But he did neither. He took an active role in the things his son was doing. He investigated the game content objectively. He thought about what he could do to help allieviate some of his concerns. He leveraged the power of a popular game and web 2.0 technology. And he created not only a family opportunity for discussion, but a powerful informal learning moment.
I havent played the newest Call of Duty myself, so I can't speak to how exactly abiding by the rules of the Geneva Convention (which, if meory serves, deals with the treatment of Prisoners of War) applies to its gameplay. But regardless - my kudos to Hugh Spencer for treating games, parenting, and learning with the thoughful attention they deserve.
There is nothing particularly new about teaching through song. I'm pretty sure that the Animaniacs "Nations of the World" (below) is the only reason why I was able to successfully pass a 5th grade African geography test. Hell I'm still singing the musical masterpiece that is They Might Be Giants "Days of the Week" song (work is the last thing on my mind!).
Though I have fond (and in the case of They Might Be Giants, inexplicably recent) memories of these sorts of jingles, there has always been a certain... I'll call it cheesiness to educational songs. Some might go so far as to call it lameness but that might be a bit unfair, given the age group that most of these sorts of materials are being created for. Songs like "Nations of the World" are for children - deigned to help excite, entertain, and educate all at the same time. So from a more adult perspective, they do come off as lacking a certain... sophistication. Of course this begs the question "why are there not comparable educational equivalents for older students?". Wouldnt we all like a catchy little tune to learn to? Perhaps something a bit more our age?
The short answer is "not everyone thinks so", but thats a rant for another time. The important thing is some people know better, and they're doing something about it. Take a listen (player may not load in all RSS readers)
Or perhaps a something more in line with economic principles will strike your fancy.
The group responsible for these songs is Rhythm, Rhyme, Results out of Cambridge, Massachusetts and their efforts are based on a very simple concept. "Textbooks alone have limited ability to engage students. Disengaged students often underachieve." And so they make educational rap music. "The Civil War" might not have the catchy beats of a Timberland produced track, or the lyrical smoothness of Kayne West's latest single. But you know what? For an educational song, its pretty damn good. And its actually palatable to someone over the age of 10. I took a fantastic class devoted to the Civil War in High School. I love military history. And I had a great instructor to boot. But no part of that entire class was as engaging as RRR's 3 minute song (which, I might add, I've listened to 4 times already since this morning),
Is educational rap a magic bullet? Most certainly not. Just as with Educational Games, Educational Music presents an opportunity to supplement - to reach new students, or impact learning in different ways than is possible with existing teaching techniques. But its great to see a company like RRR making an effort to bring music and education together for a slightly more advanced audience.
It might not be 2Pac, but its still good enough for my iPod. How about yours?
By now we're probably heard of at least one creative way that businesses are using Twitter to help improve their awesome quotient. So when I read that Infinity Ward (makers of Call of Duty Modern Warfare) were using Twitter to solicit suggestions for the next installment of the Call of Duty series, I found myself at about a 2/ 10 on the "this might be interesting" scale. But because I've been hard wired to click on anything that combines video games with social networking, I gave it a quick look. And I was quite pleasantly surprised.
You might have seen Twitter being used for business before, but what you (and by you I mean me) probably havent seen is Twitter being used quite like this.
Heres the scoop. Basically Infinity Ward asked a question on their site - "Name one thing you'd like to see in Modern Warfare 2". The reply button then kicks the user to Twitter and pre-fills their response with the #MW2 Hashtag. All of responses are then aggregated back on Infinity Ward's site. Interesting sure - but we're still meat and potatoes. We need a little flava flav!
And that "flav" comes in the form of delicious social ratings chedda'. Check out the bottom right of each tweet. Now we're getting somewhere.
The leaderboard button you can see in the screen shot then tallies the individual twitter users whose suggestions have earned the most votes, and shows each of the posts they've submitted with the MW2 Hashtag. Personally I feel as thought the leaderboard would be more effective if it ranked the suggestions based on votes, instead of the people who made those suggestions (under the system, the single best suggestion might not make the list if one person made several lesser suggestions). I'm also not sure if the dismissiveness associated with Twitter makes it the best tool for social rating. People to to hit and fade when it comes to Twitter, and don't usually take the time to sort through pages of old data. I.e. really good ideas could easily be overlooked by the masses if they happened to be posted at a really slow (or really popular) time.
But what I do love is how community outreach in this fashion really has an opportunity to create bonds between previously unlinked Call of Duty enthusiasts and between the player-base and the development team.
What Infinity Ward has done is also very reminiscent of Harvard's Live Question Tool - something we've casually adopted here at Penn State, and have been hoping to port over to our Movable Type platform. Does the casual, highly mobile, condense nature of a tool like Twitter make participation and social rating even more useful? Or will things get jumbled a bit too quickly? Only time will tell, but I'll be following Infinity Ward's progress with this little experiment with great interest.
Games, twitter, social ratings, business - its a little bit of everything. Gotta love that.
Better late than never right? I wanted to take a few minutes and share a few of the points discussed during the EGC's February 10 Virtual Worlds Lunch, which focused on Eve Online. We're hoping to record future sessions, but for the moment, my notes are the best you get =)
If this is the first you've heard of the Virtual Worlds Lunch, then a quick shameless plug! Roughly once a month or so, we (Penn State's Educational Gaming Commons) host a presentation/ discussion lunch which focuses on a particular virtual world (which includes massive multiplayer online games). About half of the time is devoted to a demo and basic overview of the environment, with the remainder of the lunch devoted to discussion. Basically its a great opportunity to learn a little more about virtual world environments, network, talk with like minded individuals within the Penn State community, and brainstorm potential educational or research opportunities. The meetings are open to everyone, and we even provide lunch, so if it sounds interesting, keep an eye on the gaming.psu.edu - the next lunch should be on the books soon! End plug =)
Now for a quick hitting review of Eve:
Eve Online is a space themed Massive Mutiplayer Online Game that has been around since '03 and is currently under the control of the Icelandic company CCP. A series of computer based missions can get you started, the majority of the game is focused on player vs. player combat, amassing wealth in an extremely intricate virtual economy, and eventually working with your corporation/ alliance to control regions of space.
Unlike games such as World of Warcraft, which partition users onto different servers, Eve is a singular online universe which spans several thousand star systems.
There are currently around 240,000 active accounts, with the most concurrent users clocking in at ~51,000 in February '09.
The game client is distributed for free online and available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. You can try out the game with a 14 day free trial. Standard subscription fees run $14.95/ month.
Players can choose from 1 of 4 playable races, each with 3 separate "bloodlines" which influences the starting skills and background story for your character. Additional customizations such as physical appearance and an RPG-like skill point allocation system are also available.
The guild in Eve is known as a corporation. Corporations form, not only for protection and expansion, but to to gain control over finite resources (ranging from rare and expensive ship building blueprints to physical regions of space).
Corporations can group together to form alliances. Alliances and corporations can then specialize in different areas such a mining, security, piracy, etc. To give you an idea of the scale, the largest alliance as this is being written is Goonswarm with 89 corporations and more than 6,300 members. Each of the top 10 alliances in Eve have more than 1,500 members.
Gameplay Playing Eve (at least early on) amounts to accepting and undertaking computer based missions which encourage either combat or exploration. Eventually, the computer missions fade, as mining, taking on contracts, or working to better the interest of your corporation become more paramount. Like many MMOs, playing alone will only get you so far - eventually working with others become key to growth and progression. However the core of Eve remains the same - amass wealth, continue to purchase bigger and better ships and components, and eventually achieve interstellar domination.
Managing the economy is the game within the game. For players not interested in combat or resource harvesting, there are a myriad of player created opportunities (some of which will be discussed later) such as banker, stock broker, contract manager, etc. That stuff will blow your mind =)
Interfaces Though graphically, Eve continues to hold its own, despite resting on a 6 year old core, its interface leaves much to be desired. For starters, Eve does not scaffold itself, giving the beginning player access to every tool available in the game from the moment you set foot into the universe. Without a scaffolded approach, the interface quickly becomes overwhelming, and is only partially intuitive. A beginners tutorial and computer based quests help to guide you through some of the basic functionality of the game, but your curiosity quickly outgrows Eve's helping hand, leaving you to an enormous amount of trial and error - in a bad way. For example, at the beginning of an early mission, my computerized agent recommended I upgrade my ships weapons, but neglected to tell me that my new weapon was kinetic, not energy based, and thus would require ammunition. My mistake was not realized until I dropped into an enemy system, and fired air at a squadron of well armed enemy ships, bent on killing me.
The game is also very mouse intensive, which can be extremely problematic for a new player. Space, in case you are not aware, is quite vast, and so when the game forces you to target an opposing ship by clicking on it (keeping in mind that both you and your enemy are moving, and distances are conveyed rather well) the experience is about as satisfying as trying to hit a grain of sand with a dart from 50 feet away... while intoxicated. I'm sure there are interface shortcuts or quick keys, but they were not readily apparent, which is, as we say in the bidness, no bueno. Take a look at the screenshot below - if it looks confusing, it is =) And you too could see a screen like this one, after about 10 minutes of game play.
The rest of the interface is somewhat windows-esk, presenting users with the familiar close, minimize, stretch, drag standards we've come to learn from most operating systems. It works, and it allows for a fair degree of interface customization, but its not particularly elegant and most certainly isnt pretty. And for some reason, everything is written in absurdly small print.
Oh, and I don't know how many stellar cartographers we have in the audience, but Eve's map system made absolutely no sense to me what so ever.
The Economy Though I mentioned earlier that amassing wealth is one of the tenants of Eve, the complexity with which that occurs is unlike any game I've ever seen. A few examples.
For those of you not familiar with MMOs, there is a process known as "vendoring" which basically means selling unwanted items to the computer instead of to other players. Vendoring items often offers speed and convenience, but will often yield less money than meticulously finding a human buyer who would be willing to pay more. In World of Warcraft for example, vendoring an item would look something like this:
In Eve online, vendoring an item looks more like this:
Though it may take glasses to read the small print, it doesnt to a Warton graduate to realize there is a lot more going on in Eve. Regional averages? Sales tax? Brokerage fees? Sounds almost... real worldly.
So what if you've like to sell to other players instead of the computer? Glad you asked. What you are looking at here is a price index table for a random product over a 3 month period (though the chart duration is variable based on user preference). Feel free to dissect the chart at your leisure, but lets just say this is intense. I had convinced myself that a Donchian Channel was a made up phrase... until I found out its actually a real economic term. And all of this information is available to every player interesting in selling or buying anything from anyone else. The result is an entire universe of players who must learn to navigate a commodity market in order to maximize their potential. And let me reiterate... this is what people do for fun.
Oh, and there is also an entirely player run Eve Stock Market. Yes, a real stock market. <head falls off>
Insurance In Eve, loss of property is a big deal. A band of roving pirates destroying your ship can wipe out months of effort in a flash. This metric not only helps to create a deep routed sense of investment (and encourages players to rely on each other) but it has also created a market for ship insurance. Purchased in 12 week increments, ship insurance can cover anywhere from 40% to 99% of your ships value in the event it is destroyed Of course the varying levels of coverage do not come without cost. Should you sell your ship, the insurance is non transferable, of course.
Contracts In all MMOs, agreements between players or guilds take place. However these agreements are almost always informal. Eve allows players to formalize these agreements in the form of a contract. Say you'd like for someone to transport a particular commodity from one point to another for you. In Eve, you create a contract, which stipulates the clear terms, payment for success, and even the collateral needed to take on the mission in question. But perhaps most interestingly of all is that at the end of the contract, both parties must decide on whether or not the contract was properly fulfilled or not. Though this is not tied to an official enforcement agency of any kind, it is tied to a reputation system (think Ebay). Voting on the success of a contract also allows a degree of flexibility in contract terms. For example if you agree to pay someone with a ship instead of cash (which was initially agreed upon) and the contractor accepts, the contract can still be considered successful. There are 5 types of contracts - auction, item exchange, courier, loan, and free-form (which is a misc type), each of which includes slightly different terms. Contracts can be issued privately between players, or publicly to give any interested party a chance to accept it. Contract templates can also be created, if you have a particular type of contract that is posted frequently. Contracts issued to or from corporations, are only considered valid if agreed upon by approved "contract managers" - the equivalent of an Eve corporate lawyer.
Banks Commodity trading, insurance, contracts, a stock market - sounds like we're just a banking system away from having a full fledged recreation of a real world economy here. Funny you should mention that...
Eve also has player run banks available to store and invest your money. Dynasty Bank, for example, offers players standard and limited access savings accounts, as well as 2, 3, and 4 month CDs which offer between 3-7% interest. And just like a real bank, the player run banks of Eve make money by investing holdings. Another Eve bank, EBank, maintains over 10,000 individual accounts with holdings of over 6 trillion ISK (in game currency). The banks even go so far as to put out annual reports. Take a look at this thing, and keep in mind, one more time, that this is someone people are doing for fun.
Player run banks do not come without risk, however. Earlier this yea, a financial manager for Dynasty bank took off for more than 80 billion ISK in investments, leading to a small run on the bank. But in Eve Online, its all just a part of the game. Not so different from the way things play out in the real world, is it?
Eve TV Starting in 2006, player vs player matches in one of Eve's annual tournaments were broadcasted, with analysis, through Eve Tv. For a sample of one of these broadcasts, check out the video below.
Obviously this doesnt quite meet the Todd Blackledge standard to which I hold all competitive event broadcasts (seriously, is anything better than Todd's Taste of the Town?) but I do think there are two important takeaways.
First off, if you've never taken the time to watch a coordinated MMO event, then it might surprise you just how much strategy, premeditation, communication, and on the fly decision making it takes to pull off a victory (regardless of whether or not the opponent is human or computer). The content may be fake, but the value in what you're seeing here is very real.
Secondly, this speaks volumes to the investment that the player community has in this game. These video are not being produced by CCP - they are of the community for the community. Voluntary strategic analysis. Hmmm...
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This has likely been an overloaded, incomplete (and very scattered) overview of some of the topics discussed during the Virtual Worlds Lunch on Eve Online. But I hope, whether you are a gaming enthusiast or not, you get a feel for some of the incredible complexity associated with this game - particularly when it comes to the economy. Hopefully you'll be hearing more about Eve and the EGC, as it is an area ripe for further educational exploration.
Digital storytelling has been all the rage, particularly in higher education over the past few years. Different people define the term different ways, but if its new to you, rest assured its exactly what it sounds like. Telling a story through digital means to humanize an idea - to build empathy and understanding.
I mentioned that the concept of digital storytelling has been a hot topic in HigherEd, but that doesnt mean that the corporate world has failed to take notice. We've all seen examples (whether we realize it or not), some of which have been more successful than others. But I just came across one of the coolest implementations of corporate digital storytelling I've ever seen - and I had to pass it on. Brace yourself though, its a little abstract. And it might just rock your world.
As you'll no doubt notice, this is not an English site, so if you require a bit of a walk through, click on the giant snowflake looking thing, and make sure you're speakers are on. Each of the little flying pods that follow represent a piece of furniture (which will appear in the top right when you roll over it). But more importantly, each of the pods represent a story. A story of inspiration. Of design. Of challenge. Of achievement. And each one is absolutely amazing. Most of the stories are actually delivered in English with Swedish (I think) subtitles, though there is at least one in Japaneses. But I'm not even sure language matters. I strongly encourage all of you to click around for a few minutes and explore ("tillbaka" is the back button that will return you to the main menu after each story).
For anyone out there who doesnt understand what digital storytelling means, or why this site is important, follow one more link for me. A link to the far more sterile, United States version of Ikea's site. How terribly sad, boring, and impersonal.
I could care less about furniture and I actively hate shopping. And yet I just spent the last 15 minutes on a Swedish site, totally enthralled (and whats more, ready to whip out my credit card on a moment's notice). Because for the last 15 minutes, it wasnt about shopping or furniture. It wasnt even about language or culture. Ikea was able to transcended all that and create an experience. An experience based on connecting people, and I for one loved every second of it.
Well done and absolutely brilliant, Ikea. This is how you change the game. And the possibilities are endless.
Since the days of the original Super Mario Brothers (if not before) this devilishly horrible mechanic has plagued video gamedom. I've tried for a long time to come up with a game dynamic that I loathe more, but to no avail. The jumping puzzle is the lowest of the low.
There are quite a few reasons I dislike jumping puzzles, though none of those reasons include warmongering or the fact that if said slowly, the word jump creeps me out just a bit. That and "moist". Yeeee! Anyway...
For starters, I'm all about flow when I game. Not necessarily flow as it has been presented by Csíkszentmihályi (though that is important too). Rather flow as in coherence. A sense that everything in a game works together to help build out the all important willing suspension of disbelief. Perhaps this overstates the case - but think of an actor's motivation for playing a part. What is your motivation for doing what you are doing? When you play Half Life, its fairly obvious why you are shooting mobs of angry aliens bent on killing you. And its even somewhat obvious why you might need to, at some point, jump over holes, or fire, or some other obstacle that involves jumping over. But, if I were Gordon Freedman, and I had to jump between really thin beams placed far away from each other, I'd consider strapping the gun onto my back and using my hands (you know, like a sane person) instead of trying to stick a landing that an Olympic gymnast would scoff at.
In all fairness to Half Life, there are (and were) clearly technological limitations to trying to build in a "put your gun away and desperately grab onto anything you can" mechanic. Half Life is a shooter, and jumping puzzles are a change of pace to try and provide varied experiences. It is clearly not a focus of the game, so I don't blame Valve for not investing in a "grab the stupid ledge" button. But by the same token, that destroys the flow of the game. The second you as the player ask yourself "why" and come back with an economic justification for programming resources, or a technical explanation for the impossibility of an in game action, you've ruined the flow. If you can't make the jumping puzzle work in the broader context of the game and its characters, just take it out.
Another problem I have with jumping puzzles is that they inevitably showcase (and magnify) any technical flaws in what might otherwise have been a solid game. Have you ever tried to land a difficult jump in a game where the controls arent tight and your "jump right" ends up being a backwards swan dive into a pit filled with panthers? Or where the camera takes a bad angle and you end up in mid-air unable to see yourself? Or where you realize, as you plummet to your death, 45 minutes from your last save, that the outcropping that you thought was a handhold is actually just a shadow in a really convincing shape and location. The Tomb Raider franchise is one of the few that really makes jumping puzzles work as far as the game world and the story are concerned. But the Tomb Raider games are also some of the most notorious for the aforementioned problems. Thats not a knock on Tomb Raider games - I'm actually quite fond of them. But jumping puzzles (and the environments and controls needed to facilitate them) are much more difficult to design than more traditional levels because there is a lot more that could go wrong. And if there is even the most minute problem with a game, jumping puzzles will almost certainly make it worse.
Lastly, and lets just be honest with each-other here, jumping puzzles are not fun. I won't speak for everyone on this, but at least for me, jumping puzzles are not compelling obstacles in and of themselves. When you engage a squad of enemy aliens, there is clear conflict, and a clear winner and loser. Every time they defeat you, it only adds to the intensity of the rivalry, and increases the thrill of eventually defeating them. A giant rock formation with loose vines is no enemy. I have no animosity towards it. No sense of competition or rivalry. Nor even the physical thrill associated with climbing a real mountain. If you ascend the peak, it is just over. And if I fail to ascend it, if you die and loose 20 minutes of progress, there is no tangible target upon which to release your frustration. One does not defeat the rock, because the rock was not there to be defeated. Its all very unsatisfying, and whats more, not particularly compelling.
With this long introduction as a backdrop, let us move to Prince of Persia (the 2008 edition). A game where you spend nearly all of your time jumping around hanging off... just about everything you can find. There are beautiful visuals (non photo realistic for once) and a simplistically enjoyable combat system, but by and large the game is about jumping puzzles. Its a good game, but lets not mix words here - there are control flaws, environmental flaws, and an entire game worth of largely contrived jumping puzzles (you do more jumping than walking, by a long shot).
Sounds like a recipe for Stubstyle disaster right? Well thats the funny thing. The jumping puzzles in Prince of Persia really aren't a disaster at all.
Because in Prince of Persia, you can't ever die.
Your character's partner in crime, Elika, serves as part sidekick and part guardian angel. No matter what you do, Elika's helping hand is literally always there to pull you out of the abyss and place you gently back on your last stable footing.
Without the fear of death, the stress associated with the typical jumping puzzles is made mute, and you as the player are free to explore and experiment with the game world to its fullest, completely and totally risk free. No frustrating ruined progress. No need to rage on the controls, the environment, or yourself. No need to fabricate conflict with inanimate virtual objects. Just painless gameplay. A limitless supply of do-overs. A jumping game free from the horrors of jumping puzzles. It sounds like a dream come true. And for a while, it is just that.
The problem is, despite the fact that immortality declaws the vicious jumping puzzle, it ruins the game.
There is something about death in games that, at least to me, is quite necessary. Something I don't think I ever fully appreciated until it was removed from the equation. Because in your average game, death is the only metric of consequence. Death is the only means by which to force your improvement. Death is a catalyst for learning.
Death is what forces you to take one final look at that "handhold" before you jump. Death is what teaches you to practice in safe environments before you step into the boss fight. Death is what teaches you to block, at least every once and a while. Death is what teaches you to save more than once every 3 hours. Because death is failure. Failure has consequences. And consequences make you better.
To render one's in game actions totally inconsequential (or perhaps, "even more" inconsequential, depending on your perspective) defeats the whole purpose of playing. It makes the game boring. It ruins the challenge, and waters down any sense of accomplishment. Is your enemy really your enemy if they can't hurt you? If you can't be beaten, what sense of gratification is there in victory? And though different in form, are your opponents really any different than the rock formation with its loose vines and total indifference to your existence?
Prince of Persia deserves a lot of credit for rewriting the script on gaming's public enemy #1. And it deserves a lot of credit for taking a risk with the most fundamental game mechanic of all. The thrill of victory cannot come without the agony of defeat. There is no such thing as fun, as accomplishment with frustration. Even if it means plummeting to our deaths now and again. Or perhaps because of it.
I've always enjoyed teaching. Though I've done a fair amount of guest lecturing and training over the past few years, I don't teach on a regular basis. Maybe at some point in the future. Thats not to say I'm good at it. Nor is it to say that I am anywhere near qualified to have any intellectual influence on the minds of young people. But these are technicalities not worthy of our time ;-)
As a result of this interest, I've spent a little time here and there thinking about what exactly I'd want to teach if I could design my own course from scratch. Though there are a myriad of topics I'd be interested in (tactical military history anyone?), you can rest assured that at some point, a class or two...hundred on video games has crossed my mind. As you can probably guess, thinking about such things sends me into "kid in the candy store" mode. And yet with all of the video game themed courses I've thought about, there was one area that never crossed my mind: teaching people how to play games. Not only have I thought about it, but I've never heard of anyone else thinking about it, much less doing it. At least up until a few days ago.
Ladies and Gentlemen, may I submit to you UC Berkeley's Advanced Starcraft Theory course. For your reading pleasure, allow me to offer you up a juicy mouthful of the course description.
This course will go in-depth in the theory of how war is conducted within the confines of the game Starcraft. There will be lecture on various aspects of the game, from the viewpoint of pure theory to the more computational aspects of how exactly battles are conducted. Calculus and Differential Equations are highly recommended for full understanding of the course. Furthermore, the class will take the theoretical into the practical world by analyzing games and replays to reinforce decision-making skills and advanced Starcraft theory. Class will start with lecture and usually include a special discussion topic having to do with the day’s lecture to inspire new and original thought. At the end of lecture, there may be time to analyze student-submitted replays to illustrate a point or to improve analysis.
Now before you and skeptical cat call shenanigans and wave pitchforks at the downfall of modern education, the course is offered under Cal's DeCal democratic education program, which allows students to teach classes in wide range of subject areas of interest to them. To give you an idea of some other DeCal courses, Cal students can enjoy "The Ethics of Star Trek", "Sex and the City and the Contemporary Woman", or "Alternate Realities: An Introduction to Phillip K. Dick". All DeCal courses are 1-2 credits, pass/fail. Crazy Cal liberals... Wait a minute <deep meaningful sigh>
Despite its lack of standing as a faculty facilitated course, and the fact that this course might very well be seen within the Cal community as a joke, it does make me stop and broaden my own notions of learning about games. Up until now, my mind has worked under the assumption that there is teaching about games, and games used to teach. But using a game to teach you about improving your performance in a game never seemed like something worthy of anyone's time - at least not anyone serious about teaching or learning.
Reflective gameplay exercises and invoking the readings of Sun-Tzu could very well be fluffy activities in a fluffy class. But... what if they arent? If don'e well, this course could actually make sense. Could actually be of value. And even *gasp* be academically rigorous.
Is it totally crazy? Maybe. And there might not be anything to take away from a course about improving your gameplay. But then again, there might just be something to it. Don't think in terms of making someone better at Starcraft, though perhaps that might be a side effect. But think of it in terms of teaching people to think, reflect, and theorize their play in a comprehensive way, akin to some of the research Constance Steinkuhler is doing. Hmm.
Maybe a course on becoming a better gamer isnt quite so crazy after all...
There are a lot of things I love about the story of Evan and the Geneva Convention. For whatever reason, game controversy tends generate a firestorm of attention, particularly when it comes to the Media, Politicians, and certain watchdog groups. We try to ban them. Censor them. Plaster them with ratings and fine retailers for selling them. And in the process, we fail to sit back and look at whats really going on, and what kinds of opportunities we are missing out on, both as parents and educators (something I've written about before).
