Playing to Learn: Video Games in the Classroom

Playing to Learn Ä Playing to Learn Video Games in the Classroom David Hutchison Foreword by James Paul Gee An im...

Author: David Hutchison

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Playing to Learn

Ä

Playing to Learn Video Games in the Classroom

David Hutchison

Foreword by James Paul Gee

An imprint of Libraries Unlimited Westport, Connecticut • London

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Hutchison, David, 1968Playing to learn : video games in the classroom / David Hutchison ; foreword by James Paul Gee. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-1-59158-492-6 (alk. paper) ISBN-10: 1-59158-492-2 (alk. paper) 1. Video games—Study and teaching. 2. Video games and children. I. Title. GV1469.3.H88 2007 371.33’7—dc22 2006037601 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 2007 by David Hutchison All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Reproducible pages may be copied for classroom and educational programs only. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2006037601 ISBN: 978-1-59158-492-6 First published in 2007 Libraries Unlimited/Teacher Ideas Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 A Member of the Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.lu.com Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984). 10

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All video game images provided by www.gamespress.com.

To Mr. Chips and to Master Chief

Contents Foreword by James Paul Gee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxi Advertising Campaign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 The students design a full-fledged advertising campaign for an upcoming or newly released video game.

Alternate History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 The students write an alternate history of the world that starts with a decisive change in the outcome of a historical event.

Arcade vs. Video Games . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 The students compare and contrast the social experience of playing video games in an arcade versus playing them at home on a video game console or PC computer.

Artistic Rendering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 The students create an artistic representation of a real-world scene.

Battleship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 The students assemble the materials for a classic game of Battleship, which they then play in pairs.

Best Kids’ Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 The students rank and review their favorite kid-friendly video games.

Body Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 The students discuss the relationship between body image and the physiques of both male and female video game characters. Discussion Article: Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Series by Ismini Boinodiris Roby

Book Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 The students review an academic or instructional book about video games.

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viii Ä Contents Branding the Box . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 The topic of branding is introduced to students who then compare and contrast the packaging of two or more PlayStation 3, Wii, or Xbox 360 titles.

Bully. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 The students discuss the ethical issues surrounding RockStar’s school-based video game titled Bully. Discussion Article: Video Games May Dull Shock at Violence by Miranda Hitti

Car Commercial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 The students create a car commercial using in-game footage captured from a driving game.

Car of the Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 The students design and outline the specifications for a tricked-out new car (or flying machine) of the future.

Chart Toppers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 The students track the video game sales charts over a one- or two-month period. They analyze and draw conclusions about the statistics they have collected.

Cheat Code Central . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 The students review a game’s cheat codes. They propose a revised set of cheat codes that would make the game easier and more fun to play for novices and recreational gamers alike.

Choose Your Own Adventure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 The students write a choose your own adventure story, a narrative with multiple pathways that can then be adapted for use in an adventure video game.

Composer Discography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 The students research the discography of an established video game composer.

Critiquing the Controllers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 The students compare and contrast the gamepad controllers that ship with the Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and Sony PlayStation 3 gaming systems.

Deadpan Dialog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 The students write a review of a video game focusing solely on the elocution of one or more characters’ dialog.

Contents

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Design Your Own Racetrack. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 The students use arts and crafts supplies to design a racetrack that features five or more geographic landforms.

Design Your Own Racetrack (Take Two) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 The students use a city map to design a sanctioned street race through an urban center. They identify road hazards, plot positions where protective barriers should be erected, and mark off cross streets that should be closed to traffic.

Do You Recognize This Voice? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 The students play a teaching game in which they listen to recorded excerpts of dialog from several video games. They attempt to guess which celebrity’s voice they are hearing. Discussion Article: Ethics in Video Game Journalism by Justin Hall

Don’t Believe the Hype . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 The students compare and contrast the previews and reviews of a video game. They look for evidence of hype in the previews for games that didn’t quite fulfill expectations upon their release.

ESRB Ratings Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 The students review the ESRB ratings system and suggest what changes (if any) they would propose making.

Ergonomic Audit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 The students conduct an ergonomic audit of the school’s computer lab. They present their findings to the student council, principal, and school staff.

Fact vs. Opinion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 The students analyze and parse one or more reviews of a video game for statements of fact and opinion. Discussion Article: Reality Bytes: Eight Myths about Video Games Debunked by Henry Jenkins

Fine Motor Count. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 The students tally the number of times one or more gamepad buttons are pressed during a gaming session. They then transfer this data onto a chart for further analysis during math class.

Fitness Regime . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 The students propose a series of fitness exercises for a leading video game or comic book character. Discussion Article: Exercise, Lose Weight with “Exergaming” by Star Lawrence

x Ä Contents Foley Effects Artist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 The students become Foley artists as they replace the sound effects in a video game with their own sounds derived from materials they have collected in and around their school and home.

Foley Effects Artist (Take Two) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 The students add Foley effects to their game creations and video productions. Discussion Article: Soaking Up the Media: Full-time Job for Kids by Miranda Hitti

For How Long Do I Play? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 The students track the amount of time they spend playing video games over a two-week period. They then analyze and perform calculations on the data they have gathered.

Game Invention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 The students design a real-world game or sport that they then teach others to play in a physical education class.

Gaming Budget. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 The students perform a cost-benefit analysis of the practice of buying versus renting video games.

Gaming Station. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 The teacher sets up a PlayStation 3, Wii, or Xbox 360 gaming station in the classroom that is to be used for educational purposes in the instructional program.

Graphical Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 The students conduct a graphical analysis of a video game. They critique the models, textures, lighting, shadows, and other graphical features of the game.

Historical Campaign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 The students propose a new mission for an existing World War II– or Vietnam-based wargame. They draw their idea from an actual historical campaign or scenario that occurred during the war.

Historical Place Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 The students compare and contrast historically accurate video game environments with photographs and descriptions of the same real-world settings. Discussion Article: The Convention for the Protection of Virtual Architectural Heritage by Mario Gerosa, with the collaboration of Sam Shahrani

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Historical Weaponry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 The students research the history of a weapon that is featured in a World War II– or Vietnam-based video game.

I Beg to Differ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 The students write a response to a negative review of a video game they enjoyed.

I Believe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 The students write an I Believe poem about video games that comprises ten belief statements. Discussion Article: Contradictions by Richard Bartie

Kid-friendly Grand Theft Auto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 The students take back the streets as they design a vibrant, kid-friendly city in which there are lots of things to do.

Lay of the Land . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 The students create a topographic map of a fictional battlefield that features several of the landforms they have studied in class.

Map of the World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115 The students use a wall map of the world to plot the real-world locations in which their favorite video games are set.

Music Critic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 The students critique the licensed musical mix that is featured in a video game.

New Multiplayer Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 The students brainstorm new multiplayer modes that comprise sets of gameplay rules and scenarios for a popular online wargame.

Newscast Production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121 The students study the structure of a traditional television newscast. They then apply what they have learned to the creation of a live newscast of their own that reports on the video game news of the day. Discussion Article: Why We Need a Corporation for Public Gaming by David Rejeski

Next Generation Console . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 The students pick a name and design a model for a next-generation gaming system. They also brainstorm a list of cutting-edge features that the system will support.

xii Ä Contents Open World Directions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 The students write out the directions for getting from Point A to Point B in an open world driving game.

Playing to Learn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 The stu dents brain storm and lead their own video game learn ing ac tiv i ties.

Poor Posture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132 The teacher presents a lesson on ergonomics in which a student volunteer demonstrates the proper posture for sitting at a computer.

Race Relations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134 The students discuss how different cultural groups are represented in video games.

Repetitive Stress Injury . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136 The teacher presents a formal lesson on repetitive stress injury to the class. Discussion Article: Protect Kids from Computer Injuries, Safety Council Urges by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

Researching the Credits. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 The students research a specific video game–related job and its role in the development of a video game title.

Researching the Credits (Take Two) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 The students browse the credits for one or more video games as a way of helping them to organize their own in-class game development studio into assigned roles and tasks.

Review Roundup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 The students compare and contrast two or more reviews of a video game. They write a review roundup that sums up the views of the critics plus their own insights.

Review of the Real World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 The students turn the notion of a video game review on its head and instead review the real world as if it were a video game. Discussion Article: Real Life: The Full Review by Greg Kasavin

Scary Stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 The students discuss what makes a story, movie, or video game scary. They then write their own scary story.

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Scooby-Doo and the Laws of Physics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 The students watch a half-hour Scooby-Doo Mysteries episode and count and/or categorize the number of times the characters —both friends and foes—do the impossible.

Serious Games Brainstorming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 The students brainstorm ideas for a new serious game that teaches the knowledge and skill set required by a particular profession. Discussion Article: Video Game Therapy: A New Frontier by Reuters

Spelling Dictation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 The teacher compiles a spelling list of video game-related terms.

Statistical Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162 The students analyze and discuss a number of video game–related statistics.

Strategy Guide Review. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 The students write and then publish a review of a video game strategy guide.

Strategy Guide Writing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166 The students author their own strategy guides for a full video game or a single mission from a favorite game.

Study of the Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168 The students write an essay that predicts what our world will look like in the future. Discussion Article: Laura’s Story by David Hutchison

Superhero Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172 The students design an original superhero character for a video game.

Surround Sound Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174 The students go outside and draw a directional sound-field map that plots the location of natural and human-made sounds coming from the front, rear, sides, and overhead.

Tactical Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176 The students write about one or more tactics they have successfully used in a video game.

Technological Progress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178 The students review the graphical features of three video games, respectively published this year, three years ago, and six years ago.

xiv Ä Conents Television Technologies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180 The students research the science behind the four major television technologies: CRT, LCD, DLP, and plasma. They report on the pros and cons of each.

Test Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182 The students design a science experiment in which their peers take the cars in a racing game for a test drive. They report on which cars have the best and worst control and handling according to the participants in the study.

The Gaming PC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185 The students design the casing for a custom gaming PC that optionally features a custom paint job, decals, neon lights, tattoos, and other embellishments.

The Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 The students interview their peers about their video game playing habits. They then draw tentative conclusions from the data they have gathered.

The Obituary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 The students write an obituary that recounts the life of a lead video game character who has died.

The Pitch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 The students prepare a proposal for a brand-new video game, which they then pitch to the class. Discussion Article: Bringing Back the Dream by Noel Llopis

The Rewrite. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194 The students rewrite the dialog for a cutscene in a video game that is in desperate need of improvement.

The Rewrite (Take Two) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195 The students rewrite a video game user review in an effort to improve its clarity and sentence structure.

The Stunt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 The students capture some in-game footage of their characters performing insane stunts on foot or in vehicles.

The Survey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199 The students design a video game survey, which they then administer to other students in the school.

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Ultimate Gaming Bundle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201 The students design an advertisement for the ultimate gaming bundle, consisting of a PC or console system and third-party hardware and games.

Urban Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 The students choose the location for a new city, which they then design from the ground up.

User Interface Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204 The students apply the principles of user interface design to their review of a game’s user interface, menu system, and/or heads up display (HUD).

Video Game Addiction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 The students research the topic of video game addiction. They decide on a list of criteria for determining whether someone is addicted to video games. Discussion Article: Doctor Claims 40 Percent of World of Warcraft Players Are Addicted by Jeremy Reimer

Video Game Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211 The students design a database for storing information about video games. They pretend they are opening a video game rental store and need to keep track of their inventory.

Video Game Debate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214 The students debate a controversial issue related to video games. Discussion Article: Massacre in Winterspring by Gabe Graziani

Video Game Reenactment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 The students reenact a key scene from a video game that boasts a strong storyline.

Video Game Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218 The students write a review for a video game they are currently playing. Discussion Article: Living in Oblivion by Jane Pinckard

Virtual Journal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222 The students write a series of journal entries that chronicle their virtual life in an online role-playing or open world video game. Discussion Article: Are Virtual Worlds the Future of the Classroom? by Stephanie Olsen

xvi Ä Contents Website Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 The students brainstorm ideas for a video game website that features content not typically found at existing websites.

Well-Balanced Diet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232 The students propose a set of four video games that provide a desired gameplay balance and variety of play.

World without Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234 The students reflect on the perceptual experience of playing a video game without music.

World’s Best Gamertag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235 The students are challenged to come up with the most creative Gamertag they can think of.

Afterword: Video Game Design in the Classroom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237 Activity List Sorted by Subject . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247

Foreword James Paul Gee The title of Steven Johnson’s popular book, Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today’s Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter (Penguin, 2006), nicely resonates with the conclusions reached by more and more research on young people: Popular culture today is more complex than ever, and, in some cases, it appears that young people are learning in more innovative and powerful ways out of school than in. Take language, for instance. One of the biggest predictors of school success is the size of a child’s early vocabulary and his or her ability to cope with the complex forms of language used in English literature, math, science, and other subject areas. Consider also, the text that follows, which appears on a Yu-Gi-Oh card. Yu-Gi-Oh is a card game involving quite complex rules. It is often played face-to-face against one or more players, sometimes in formal competitions, more often informally. It can also be played as a video game: Armed Ninja Card Type: Effect Monster Attribute: Earth Level: 1 Type: Warrior ATK: 300 | DEF: 300 Rarity: Rare Description: When flipped, destroys one magic card on the field. If this card’s target is facedown, flip it face up. If the card is a magic card, it is destroyed. If not, it is returned to its facedown position. The flipped card is not activated. This description is really a rule. It states what game moves the card allows. It contains, for instance, three straight conditional clauses (i.e., the “if” clauses). Note how complex the meanings are here: First, if the target card is facedown, flip it over. Now check to see if it is a magic card. If it is, destroy it. If it isn’t, return it to its facedown position. Finally, you are told that even if you flipped up your opponent’s card (which in some circumstances would activate its powers), in this case, the card’s powers are not activated. All of this is “logic talk,” a matter of multiple related “either-or” and “if-then” propositions.

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xviii Ä Foreword I have watched seven-year-old children play Yu-Gi-Oh with great expertise. They read each card. In deciding to trade a card, they endlessly debate its powers by comparing and contrasting it with the other cards. They discuss and argue over the rules using specialist vocabulary, syntactic structures, and discourse features. They log on to websites to learn even more and settle their disputes. The complexity of the logic and language that is central to Yu-Gi-Oh is also central to video games. Many video games are deep and difficult. Their gameplay is built on a cycle of hypothesize, probe the world, get a reaction, reflect on the results, and reprobe the world to get even better results. This cycle has much in common with experimental science. So, too, many video games encourage players to be producers, not just consumers, of popular culture. An open-ended game like The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is essentially a different game for each player. What happens in-game is largely determined by each player’s unique actions and decisions. To take this point even further, gamers can now “co-design” many games they play by “modding” them. Many game publishers encourage gamers to produce whole new scenarios or even whole new (albeit noncommercial) games using tools provided by the developers themselves (e.g., new civilizations in the Civilization series and new first-person adventure games using the Half-Life engine). Partly because of this, video games have become a major cultural force—one based largely on active problem solving—for young people (and many adults, too). Importantly, this includes girls and women, who today play video games in large numbers (e.g., females make up 52 precent of The Sims player base). As an industry, video games have as much influence on young people today as do movies. Indeed, video games generate as much revenue as movies. Although video games have not replaced reading (the activity from which video games take away the most time is television), they have changed the nature of the reading and writing activities in which many young people engage. Gamers can be found reading and writing at video game fan sites and forums and reading technical material and strategy guides on and offline. They write reviews and fan fiction and discuss the intricacies of games and other technologies with their friends. Sometimes—as in the case of a fantasy game such as Age of Mythology—young people are driven to ever wider reading and writing on topics not directly related to video games. It is in this spirit that Playing to Learn: Video Games in the Classroom finds its inspiration. This book is a testament to the wonderful learning opportunities that present themselves when the popular culture young people so value is integrated into the K–12 curriculum in a pedagogically sound way. Count this book as an innovative form of “multicultural education,” a place where the culture of school meets popular culture in a very fruitful and generative way.

References Johnson, Steven. (2006). Everything bad is good for you: How today’s popular culture is actually making us smarter. New York: Penguin.

Acknowledgments I am indebted to many people who played key roles in supporting the writing of this book. I would like to thank all of the teachers who have reviewed or tested the activities in this book. Their feedback and support has expertly guided the book’s development. I am grateful to Professor James Paul Gee of the University of Wisconsin, who kindly contributed the Foreword. I would also like to thank all of the scholars, journalists, and bloggers who so graciously contributed discussion articles to the book. The editors and production staff at Teacher Ideas Press and Libraries Unlimited skillfully handled the book at the publisher’s end and were a pleasure to work with. Finally, I thank my family who have been a constant source of support and encouragement throughout the writing process.

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Introduction This book is about video games—commercial video games played on Playstation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360 consoles, PC computers, and handheld devices, including cell phones. This book is also about teaching and learning in school. My basic goal is to bring together the seemingly divergent worlds of video games and education in a pedagogically sound way that turns playing—and studying—video games into an educational and thoughtful learning experience. Like all forms of technology, video games are cultural artifacts—albeit complex ones—that invite all sorts of study, discussion, and analysis in school. Some of this discussion is appropriately reserved for the notable downsides of some video games (e.g., violent gameplay), but there are also lots of pedagogical lessons to be learned in addressing the potential of video games to entertain, inspire, and teach. Many students are consumers of video games in that they play video games for extended periods of time each week, but how many young people are critical consumers of video games who actively reflect on the games they play, how they are made, how they are marketed, and how they can be improved? This book aims to turn young gamers into commentators on existing video games, as well as creators of new games. I see school as one of the last remaining formal institutions that can mediate popular culture by examining it closely, holding it to account, and even transforming it at times. Video games are in many ways harbingers of popular culture—some games even try to see into the future—so it is in a Marshall McLuhan–like spirit of media literacy that this book is written. This book isn’t about playing video games in school, but it is about interacting with them as pedagogical resources that can teach students about virtual worlds. That said, I don’t have grandiose visions of a Playstation 3 or Xbox 360 console on every student’s desk—although setting up a classroom gaming station is an activity you will find in this book. Instead, I envision a dynamic classroom environment in which one group of students is conducting a place analysis of a video game environment, while another group edits a movie that uses video game footage, and still another group draws up design plans for its own video game. Of course, the activities in this book can also be used quite successfully in more traditional classrooms, as “one off” lessons that all students complete together as a full class. This book is organized alphabetically by activity title. Each activity includes an introduction that sets up the context for the activity plus instructions on leading the activity in class. For nearly all of the activities, a number of modification and extension ideas are also provided. Each activity is cataloged by subject and grade level. A total of twelve subjects are covered in this book, including language arts, mathematics, science, social studies, history, geography, health and physical education, drama, music,

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xxii Ä Introduction visual arts, computers, and business. The book also features several contributed articles that are the perfect starting points for classroom discussions and debates about video games. Each is accompanied by follow-up questions. The book closes with an afterword that features advice for helping students to design their own video games. Finally, the book includes dozens of Web links, photographs, and data tables, all of which can be used to further augment student learning in the classroom. The teachers who have reviewed and tested the activities in this book have all reported excellent feedback (and plenty of enthusiasm!) from their students. I hope you, too, will find this book to be a valuable resource in planning video game–related lessons, activities, and class projects. Many of the activities that follow can also be adapted to work with other media, such as books, movies, and other forms of popular culture. Teachers and students are encouraged to share their own activity ideas and feedback with the author at the official website for this book (www. playingtolearn.org).

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Advertising Campaign Accompanying the roll out of all but the most modest video games is a significant marketing campaign that aims to attract the attention of as many gamers as possible. Video game publishers advertise online at video game websites, in print magazines, and, occasionally, on television. So too, almost every video game receives plenty of advance press. In addition to making early demos of their games available for gamers to download and play, publishers participate in prerelease interviews with game journalists and provide advance information for preview articles at websites and in magazines. Further, the prerelease demos on the DVD disks that accompany many video game magazines allow gamers to sample the promise of an upcoming title, weeks or months in advance. The are also opportunities for cross-promotion as games are marketed alongside movies, music albums, foods and beverages, and other games. Finally, there is word of mouth as journalists and gamers sound off about upcoming releases in podcasts and online forums. In this activity, the students design a full-fledged advertising campaign for an upcoming or newly released video game.

Activity Ask the students to monitor closely the marketing campaign for an upcoming video game in the months or weeks leading up to its release. Encourage the students to look for online banner ads promoting the title at various gaming websites, as well as full-page advertisements in print magazines. The students should also look for evidence of cross-promotions and tie-ins with other products and collect developer interviews and preview articles written by journalists who have been given an advance look at the game. As they review their research, ask the students to brainstorm a list of the many ways in which video games are advertised to consumers (e.g., Web advertising, preview articles, and cross-promotions). Next, ask the students to form small groups and choose another new or upcoming game on which to build a full-fledged marketing campaign.

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2 Ä Playing to Learn Assign each group a fixed budget and provide them with hypothetical pricing information for the various marketing strategies they have brainstormed. Using the budget available to them, assign students the task of planning either a broad-based or targeted advertising campaign that serves to promote their video game to consumers. Have each group present its marketing campaign to the class in the form of a poster board that discusses each facet of their advertising plans. In addition to a formal assessment, ask the students to provide constructive feedback on each other’s poster boards.

Discussion In planning their advertising campaign, encourage the students to pay close attention to: ¸ the purpose of the advertising campaign (e.g., to sell products or build brand

awareness)

¸ the target audience for the advertising campaign (e.g., age, education, gender,

and income level)

¸ the breadth of the advertising campaign (e.g., focused on a niche audience or

targeting a variety of magazines and websites)

¸ the length and timing of each advertising contract (e.g., for one day prior to re-

lease, for a whole week starting the day of release, or for several months in advance of release)

Most print publications and commercial websites provide general marketing information to potential advertisers at their respective websites. (Print magazines also list pertinent information about their circulation inside each issue of the magazine.) The actual costs of print and online advertisements are usually available on request. To lend this activity more authenticity, consider sending pricing requests to a few marketing contacts. As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to prepare an advertising slogan or tagline for the video game they are marketing. Similar to movies, most video games today are marketed using one or more taglines that prominently appear in print and online ads for the game. Although billboard advertising for video games in the real world is not uncommon, virtual billboard advertising inside the game worlds of video games is a relatively new phenomena. It is also somewhat controversial. Invite the students to discuss the merits of in-game advertising for video games and other products. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Business

Video Games in the Classroom

ü

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Checklist Video Game Marketing Strategies

¨ behind-the-scenes featurettes

¨ bundle deals ¨ cross-promotions ¨ developer blogs ¨ developer interviews ¨ fan competitions

¨ official websites ¨ online ads ¨ preorder deals ¨ preview articles ¨ promotional events ¨ prerelease screenshots

¨ fan site kits

¨ teaser trailers

¨ forum posts

¨ television ads

¨ game demos

¨ viral marketing

¨ gameplay videos

¨ word of mouth

¨ in-game advertising

¨ other

¨ magazine ads

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Alternate History Freedom Fighters was one of the most critically acclaimed third-person action games of 2003. Set in a modern-day New York City, Freedom Fighters tells the story of a young man’s rise from insignificance to underground freedom fighter as he leads other city residents in resisting the Soviet occupation of New York City. That’s right. Freedom Fighters is set in a modern-day but alternate universe in which the Soviet Union has won the Cold War and effectively rules the world. Accompanied by suitably ominous music, the following title screens precede the opening credits of Freedom Fighters: 1945: Soviet Air Force drops the A-bomb on Berlin, ending World War II in Europe. 1953: Britain reluctantly joins the Communist Block, the last European country to do so. 1961: Despite U.S. protests, mid-range nuclear missiles are placed in Cuba. 1976: The Soviet Union sends thousands of military “advisors” to Guatemala and Honduras. 1996: Mexican Communist Party celebrates disputed victory in presidential election. 2001: Foiled assassination attempt on the U.S. president. An unnamed foreign power is implicated. Yesterday: Reports of low-flying drones from all over the U.S.A. Government dismisses the sightings as weather balloons. In this activity, the students write an alternate history of the world that starts with a decisive change in the outcome of a historical event.

Activity Have the students create a timeline detailing the significant events they are studying in history class. Ask the students to flag those historic events for which the outcome, if dramatically different, would have changed the course of U.S. or world history. 4


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Now have each student pick a decisive event and choose an alternate outcome for the event (e.g., the Soviet Union lands a man on the moon before the United States). Have each student create a hypothetical timeline that traces the alternate history that might have unfolded had the alternative outcome actually occurred. Mount the timelines the students have created on a bulletin board. Have the students browse and offer feedback on the various timelines their peers have created.

Discussion Consider leading this activity in conjunction with “The Study of the Future” activity discussed elsewhere in this book. Instead of creating a linear timeline, ask each student to create a branching timeline (i.e., a flowchart) that highlights the multiple consequences of various outcomes for a single historical event. Discuss with students the notion of time travel as popularized in science fiction books, television shows, movies, and video games. What are the potential pitfalls of going back in time to change (for better or worse) the outcome of a historical event long ago? For an existential take on this activity, discuss the notions of fate, luck, and chance with students. How many of the major world events they have studied in class were, in their view, the result of luck, chance, or missed opportunities? How many were the result of decisive actions on the part of individuals, groups, and/or governments? Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: History

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FYI Top Ten List: Video Games in the Classroom

Here are ten top reasons why teachers should consider integrating video games into the classroom: 1.

Video games are controversial. Talking about them with students will foster intelligent debate and discussion.

2.

Video games are newsworthy. Hardly a week goes by that some news item about video games doesn’t appear in the mainstream press. And the Web abounds with video game blogs and editorials that can be discussed in class.

6 Ä Playing to Learn 3.

Video games demonstrate new ways of learning. Many researchers who explore the structure of video games argue that most are in fact learning systems that teach. Some of these researchers argue that video games are harbingers of a new way of learning—one that is immersive, interactive, and virtual.

4.

Video games are interdisciplinary. As this book shows, there are all sorts of interdisciplinary learning opportunities related to video games that cross nearly every subject area.

5.

Video games are future oriented. Many video games imagine future worlds that extend trends we see emerging in today’s world. Futuristic wargames imagine an insecure world. Certain strategy games imagine an ecologically depleted world. The issues such games raise are directly relevant to the challenges young people may face in the future.

6.

Video games are historical. Many video games aspire to recreate as an authentic historical experience as possible (of the Ancient World or World War II, for example). Such games are the perfect launching points for historical research and place analyses in schools.

7.

Video games are cultural. Many video games serve as societal simulations, complete with clan membership, cooperative ventures, working economies, and diverse cultural groups. Academics and young people alike are, for the first time in the history of our civilization, exploring the possibilities (and limits) of membership in a virtual community.

8.

Video games promote play. Many encourage experimentation and the testing of new ideas. Video games will never replace the sandbox and playground in the real world (nor should they), but they are already opening up new opportunities for young people to experiment with innovative forms of play, unrestricted by time and space.

9.

Video games are international. Playing online provides young people with an opportunity most would otherwise not have to (safely) interact with other young people and adults the world over.

10.

Video games are fun. They help make learning engaging and rewarding and school something to look forward to.

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Arcade vs. Video Games Although video game arcades can still be found in cineplexes and shopping malls around the country, their heyday as destinations where gamers congregate is long over. Arcades have been largely supplanted by the convenience of playing video games at home and the interactivity of playing them online. Yet there was a time in the 1980s that young people would spend their evenings and weekends (and, yes, sometimes their school days) dropping quarters into the likes of Space Invaders and Pac-Man and then, beginning in the 1990s, Double Dragon and Mortal Kombat. The experience of playing video games in arcades was inherently a social one and, for a time, a favorite pastime of young people. In this activity, the students compare and contrast the social experience of playing video games in an arcade versus playing them at home on a video game console or PC computer.

Activity Reacquaint students (as need be) with the notion of video game arcades as popular meeting places for gamers and young people to congregate and play together in the 1980s and 1990s. Now have the students create a two-column chart that lists the pros and cons of playing video games in an arcade versus playing them at home. Encourage the students to focus especially on the social experience of playing video games in the two settings. What social advantages does one setting hold over the other? What are the social limitations of each setting? If a player is not online, is playing video games at home inherently a “lonely” activity? What about inviting friends over to play? Does online gaming that is not face-to-face but over the Internet count as a social experience? How does adding voice communication to online multiplayer matches change the social experience of gaming? Can a first-person shooter be described as inherently social if the main aim is to frag (i.e., kill) every other player? Start with these questions but allow the discussion to move in various directions as the students begin thinking more deeply about the social nature of gaming.

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8 Ä Playing to Learn

Discussion In some ways, the immediacy of video game arcades lives on through the cyber gaming cafes that are now springing up in major city centers around the world. Cyber gaming cafes go a long way in restoring the face-to-face social experience of playing video games together, but only time will tell if they are just a fad or here to stay. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Artistic Rendering

Video game designers spend countless hours designing concept art for the environments, characters, and objects that will appear in a video game. This artwork was created for World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade.

Designing concept art, an artistic rendering of a scene, is often one of the first steps in bringing a real-world or imaginary location to life in a video game or movie. Concept artists may produce a half dozen or more variations of a scene (each showcasing various architectural motifs, textures, lighting, and/or weather conditions) for the production team to choose from. The final artwork that is picked then gets modeled in 3D design software so that it can be incorporated into the video game as a virtual environment for gamers to explore. In this activity, the students create an artistic representation of a real-world scene.

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Activity Provide the students with a photograph of an indoor or outdoor setting. Ask each student to study the photograph closely and then sketch or paint a representation of the scene. Encourage the students to pay close attention to specific details such as shapes, textures, patterns, hues, lighting, shadows, and depth of field. Each will play an important role when it comes time to model the scene in 3D design software. Once they have completed their designs, organize an art show in which the students show off their concept art to each other and a class of their peers.

Discussion This activity uses a photograph as the reference source for the students’ artwork. Consider having each student instead capture his or her own photograph of an outdoor scene that they wish to sketch or paint, or instead take the students outside and have them sketch or paint a landscape. Provide the students with a variety of artistic tools to work with, including pencils, paintbrushes, pastels, chalk, and charcoal. For a hi-tech variation on this activity, challenge those students who are experienced with 3D design software to create a virtual model of a historical or science fiction building. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts

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FYI Video Game Genres: The One-Minute Primer

Video games have traditionally been grouped into the following broad categories: Action games are typified by the popular first- and third-person shooter genres, which come in two varieties: fast-paced run ‘n’ gun shooters (e.g., Halo) and slower paced tactical games (e.g., SWAT). Strategy games (e.g., Civilization) also come in two varieties: turn-based and real-time. In both, players are given a grand-scale (usually top-down) view of a world in which they manage people, armies, armaments, and other resources. Platformer games (e.g., Pyschonauts) challenge players to traverse obstacles and solve puzzles. Role-playing games (e.g., World of Warcraft) immerse gamers in a persistent living virtual world in which they live, work, fight, and/or play over time. Role-playing games are most often played online, but some are single player. Casual games (e.g., Tetris) challenge players to solve puzzles using a rules-based system. Fighting games (e.g., Dead or Alive) pit players against boxing or


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martial arts opponents. Sports games (e.g., Madden NFL) aim for authenticity in simulating the on- and off-field action of football, baseball, hockey, and other sports. Rhythm games (e.g., Dance Dance Revolution) get gamers out of their seats to perform all sorts of dance moves. Driving games (e.g., Gran Turismo) simulate the experience of being behind the wheel in a fast-paced street, rally, or track race. Flight and other vehicle simulators (e.g., Flight Simulator) aim for authenticity in simulating the experience of travel. Finally, adventure games (e.g., Grand Theft Auto) play out an interactive story in which the gamer takes on the role of the lead character. Educational games that teach fall into the serious games category, as do virtual simulators that train military and emergency service personnel. Most video games feature both a single-player storyline plus a variety of multiplayer modes that allow two or more gamers to play competitively against (or cooperatively with) each other. The recent rise of massively multiplayer games (e.g., Second Life) has turned some video games into persistent virtual worlds that exist, change, and grow even when gamers turn off their computers. Many of these virtual worlds boast their own monetary systems, economies, commercial businesses, real estate ventures, and laws that govern the gameplay experience.

Ä Battleship

Turn-based strategy games, such as the ever popular Civilization series, are among the most popular video game genres. Gamers can play on their own against the computer, with a friend, or online against opponents around the world. Presented with a military or economic scenario that requires them to think ahead and make strategic decisions, players take turns as they attempt to out wit their opponents and win the day. Turn-based board games predate video games by several decades. Most people have fond memories of playing Monopoly, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, and other board games growing up. In many respects, these games are as popular as ever. They coexist alongside video games, which today seem to get all of the attention. In this activity, the students assemble the materials for a classic game of Battleship, which they then play in pairs.

Activity Battleship (www.hasbro.com) is a turn-based board game in which two players compete against each other. For this activity, each student will need a pencil plus two sheets of graph paper. The two players sit facing one another with a short barrier erected between them. They should be able to see each other’s faces, but the barrier should hide each player’s graph paper from the other player’s view. (Consider using a piece of poster board to construct a makeshift barrier.) Prior to beginning the game, the players label each axis on their graph paper with letters and numbers. They also plot the location of four “battleships” on one of their sheets of graph paper. Each battleship should be five units long and oriented horizontally or vertically on the graph paper. The game begins with Player 1 calling out a grid coordinate (e.g., “B3”). Player 2 responds by saying “hit” or “miss” to indicate whether the stated grid coordinate matches the location of one of Player 2’s battleships. If there is a match, Player 2 should cross out the called-out grid coordinate on her battleship-labeled graph paper.

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If the grid coordinate does not match, Player 1 marks the grid coordinate on her blank sheet of graph paper with a “M.” She instead marks the grid coordinate with a “H” if she has scored a hit. Keeping careful notes allows each player to keep track of the coordinates they have called out and thus strategically plan subsequent calls. In addition to responding with “hit” or “miss,” a player must also indicate when one of her battleships has been sunk (i.e., when the other player has called out all of the grid coordinates for a battleship). “You sunk my battleship!” is the standard phrase here. The gameplay proceeds with each player taking turns calling out grid coordinates. The game ends once all of a player’s battleships have been sunk.

Discussion Battleship is terrific teaching game for reinforcing the concept of grid coordinates in math and geography, but it is also a good example of what makes board games (and by extension, turn-based video games) so enjoyable. Following this activity, ask the students to reflect on the features of Battleship that make the game so fun to play. Battleship is just one of many board games that share much in common with video games. The classic game Snakes and Ladders is in many ways a forerunner of platformer video games, such as Psychonauts. Similarly, there are virtual editions of many popular board games, including, most notably, chess. Discuss with students the pros and cons of playing board games versus video games. Which do students prefer and why? Which offers players the better social experience? Is there something to be said for actually holding a board game in one’s hands versus the virtual nature of video games? Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Geography

Activity Quickie

!

Letter to the Editor

Ask the students to write letters to the editor. Have each student give their personal opinion about a current video game–related controversy that is being reported on by the press. Encourage those students who are interested to send their letters (with parental permission) to the local newspaper. (Language Arts)

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Best Kids’ Game It is a common misconception that virtually every video game is violent, focused on gangs or war, and chalk full of profanity and sexual innuendo. In reality, child- and family-friendly video games are much more common than the mainstream press would have the general public believe. Kid-friendly games include hundreds of edutainment titles plus various action/adventure games, such as the popular Harry Potter series. The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) website (www.esrb.org) lists the ratings for more than 12,000 video games and features links to a number of family-friendly video game websites on its parents’ resource page. As of this writing, more than 8,200 of those 12,000 video games have been awarded a rating of Early Childhood (3+), Everyone (6+), or Everyone (10+) by the ESRB ratings board. Several of these games are top sellers, and many have received excellent reviews in the gaming press. In this activity, the students rank and review their favorite kid-friendly video games.

Activity Provide the class with a list of recently published kid-friendly video games. Include games that have received an Early Childhood or Everyone rating from the ESRB ratings board. If possible, group the games by genre (e.g., action/adventure, racing, and sports). Ask the students to choose a favorite video game from the list or one that peaks their interest. If they have access to the video game they have chosen, ask them to write a review of the game. Alternatively, ask the students to read the print and online reviews for the kid-friendly video games they have chosen. Have them write a round-up review that summarizes what others have said about the title. Following this activity, ask the students to read (and peer edit) each other’s writing and work together to rank the games they have reviewed according to various criteria (e.g., hilarity, parent approval, and/or difficulty level).

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Discussion This activity can be easily adapted for use with educational games and software applications that fall outside of the video game categories reviewed by the ESRB ratings board. This activity can also serve as the starting point for a student run video game review site on the Web. Refer to the “Website Design” activity, which is discussed elsewhere in this book, for details. If you do establish a video game review site as part of your language arts program, consider contacting the publishers of the video games your students wish to review. Request complementary copies of these titles for review by the class. Even if your website doesn’t attract a lot of visitors, many publishers will be happy to support an online review that they can then link to from their own website. Those publishers that do will no doubt highlight the fact that these reviews were written by young people— the very audience to which the games are marketed. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Body Image

Overexaggerated and superhuman body physiques are the norm for both male and female characters in action games. The Quake IV fighter featured here is arguably more machine than man.

Like cartoon and comic book characters, many video game heroes (and heroines) feature exaggerated body types that are anything but typical. The various representations of Lara Croft, the popular comic book character, are a case in point. Lara Croft has appeared in several video games, and in each sequel her bodily form appears to have become ever-more sexualized, and her scantily clad dress (or lack thereof) ever more revealing. 16


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With muscles bursting out everywhere, many male video game characters also boast exaggerated body types. It is not uncommon for action games to feature “brutes” and “hulks” as enemy characters. So, too, the heroes gamers identify with look superhuman more often than not. But there are exceptions. With the growing popularity of games such as the Half Life series, casting the “everyman” (or “everywoman”) in a lead video game role is not as unusual as it once was. Nevertheless, superhuman bodies are still the norm and are likely to be so in action games for the foreseeable future. In this activity, the students discuss the relationship between body image and the physiques of both male and female video game characters.

Activity Lead a discussion about the underside of physical conditioning in sports and the fashion industry and the exaggerated representation of the male and female form in video games and comic books. Start off by showing the students selected pictures of some of the more extreme examples of video game character physiques. (Search for these images in the screenshot collections of various video game websites.) What commonalities do the students notice in terms of the physical attributes of these video game characters (e.g., overly muscular physiques and sexualized bodies)? Why might video game developers choose to exaggerate the torsos of their characters? Do gamers expect the characters they play to boast such extreme bodily forms? Lead the students into a discussion of the effects of exaggerated physiques on gamers’ perceptions of their own bodies and the ideal body type. How does the design of video game characters reinforce stereotypes about male and female beauty and the ideal body type? Might the idealized bodies gamers identify with (and inhabit) in video games cause some players to try and remake their own bodies in similar ways? What are the consequences and health risks for gamers who choose to do so?

Discussion This activity can lead into a wide-ranging discussion of closely related topics including body building, steroid use in sports, the representation of the female form in the fashion industry, and the dangers of bulimia, among other topics. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education


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Discussion Article Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Series

by Ismini Boinodiris Roby Lara Croft is the lead character of the popular action/adventure game series, Tomb Raider. She was first introduced to us in Tomb Raider I as the female answer to Indiana Jones. With a tantalizing British accent, Lara is tough, beautiful, intelligent, and physically fit with a killer instinct. She captured many gamers’ hearts early on. However, she has been aggressively marketed as a sex symbol, which has turned off many female gamers. Pros: In Tomb Raider I, Lara was portrayed as tough, smart, and beautiful, a character I really enjoyed playing. She was one of the first female characters that I had no problem relating to. I thought to myself, “Finally!” Cons: In Tomb Raider II and Tomb Raider III, Lara became an obnoxious sex object, more intent on stealing the hearts of men than relating to her female following. Her physique became more and more unrealistic as the series progressed. Her attitude became more deliberately sexual as well. I was very disappointed that in order to enjoy the positive attributes of Lara as a powerful female lead character in a fun game, I had to ignore the fact that she was obviously being marketed to 15-year-old boys. Overall: I wasn’t initially disappointed with this character. In Tomb Raider I, I think Lara worked well. In the rest of the series, she really needed an attitude change. The Look (6/10): Since Tomb Raider I, Lara’s physique has become more and more anatomically improbable (e.g., large breasts, an impossibly small waist, and long legs). Also, in Tomb Raider I, her outfits were not appropriate for the tasks she faced (e.g., going up into the snowy mountains in a pair of short shorts). Lara’s clothing is skin-tight and somewhat revealing. Overall, she is certainly attractive, but her appearance could have been toned down a notch or two. Attitude (8/10): Lara is as tough as Indiana Jones. She can take care of herself and take down her enemies and [the game] is adventurous and fun to play. Through the progression of the Tomb Raider series, I have noticed her becoming progressively tougher and sexier in attitude. Intelligence (10/10): Lara is quick-witted and lets people know that she is no fool. She is not to be taken lightly. Stance (7/10): Lara’s movement is very fluid and well modeled. She has some great action moves, is acrobatic, and can hold her own in many situations. However, some of the camera angles are objectionable. For example, when she is swimming, the camera zooms in between her legs. Obviously, that voyeuristic little detail was not designed to appeal to female gamers.


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Voice (8/10): Lara’s voice is very well done overall. Her British accent is appealing and suits her as the perfect romantic adventurer. Scripts (6/10): In many scenes, Lara speaks intelligently and succinctly. As the Tomb Raider series progressed, I became a little annoyed at her change of tone. In Tomb Raider III, when Lara is just about ready to take her clothes off and get into the shower, she says coyly, “Haven’t you seen enough?” That is something the Lara Croft from Tomb Raider I would never have stooped to. Marketing Effort (2/10): When Tomb Raider I hit the market, I really liked Lara Croft. I felt like I could relate to her Indiana Jones–style personality, intelligence, and confident attitude. It wasn’t until Tomb Raider II that the marketing people really went wrong in my opinion. They had the perfect action figure and her first job out in the “real world” of advertisements was—to steal your boyfriend. Despite Lara’s value as a female role model, more value was placed on the male market. The developers made her out to be a sex symbol and basically ignored the female market. About the Author: Ismini Boinodiris Roby is the Chief Editor and Cofounder of Women Gamers (www.womengamers.com). Source: Roby, Ismini Boinodiris. 1999. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider series. WomenGamers. July 28. URL: http://www.womengamers.com/dw/lara.php

Discussion Questions 1.

The above article was written in 1999. Several Tomb Raider sequels have been released since then. How has the character of Lara Croft faired since this article was written?

2.

What advice would you give to video game developers who wish to create a female video game character who is a strong role model for girls and women?

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Book Review Books about video games fall into several categories, including strategy guides, game development books, art books, and scholarly works. Of these categories, scholarly books and “how to” instructional guides on video game development are particularly appropriate for review in schools. In recent years, academic writers have discovered the research potential of video games. Some scholars study the sociological significance of video games in society in terms of issues of violence, video game addiction, membership in virtual communities, and demographic trends, among other topics. The dialectical relationship between video games and the psychosocial behavior of individuals is often of particular interest. Other scholars are more interested in the history of video games, including their origins as arcade games, through to the more recent rise of mobile and cellular games and beyond. The relationship between technological advances in computer technology and trends in video game design are of particular interest here. Still other writers explore the educational potential of video games. Some researchers focus on so-called serious games, which serve as training tools in schools, businesses, hospitals, and the military. Many of these writers see video games as ushering in a new way of learning for both adults and children. In this activity, the students review an academic or instructional book about video games.

Activity Invite those students who are interested to review an academic book about video games. A chosen book might explore the history of video games, the sociological significance of video games, the ethics of video games, the issue of violence in video games, or another video game–related topic. Here are a few suggestions of notable books for students to consider: Beck, Jock C., and Wade, Mitchell. 2004. Got game: How the gamer generation is reshaping business forever. Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press. Burnham, Van. 2001. Supercade: A visual history of the video game age, 1971–1984. Cambridge: MIT Press. 20


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Castronova, Edward. 2006. Synthetic worlds: The business and culture of online games. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Gee, James Paul. 2003. What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Grossman, Dave, and Degaetano, Gloria. 1999. Stop teaching our kids to kill: A call to action against TV, movie and video game violence. New York: Crown Publishers. Halter, Ed. 2006. From Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and video games. New York: Thunder Mouth’s Press. Herz, J. C. 1997. Joystick nation: How video games ate our quarters, won our hearts, and rewired our minds. New York: Little, Brown & Company. Johnson, Steven. 2006. Everything bad is good for you: How today’s popular culture is actually making us smarter. New York: Penguin. Juul, Jesper. 2005. Half-real: Video games between real rules and fictional worlds. Boston: MIT Press. Kent, Steven L. 2001. The ultimate history of video games: From Pong to Pokemon—The story behind the craze that touched our lives and changed the world. New York: Random House/Prima. Poole, Steven L. 2000. Trigger happy: Video games and the entertainment revolution. New York: Arcade. Prensky, Marc. 2006. Don’t bother me mom—I’m learning! St. Paul, MN: Paragon House. Rusel, DeMaria. 2003. High score! The illustrated history of electronic games, 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill. Shaffer, David Williamson. 2006. How computer games help children learn. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Taylor, T. L. 2006. Play between worlds: Exploring online game culture. Boston: MIT Press. Wolf, Mark J. P. 2002. The medium of the video game. Austin: University of Texas Press. As an alternative to this activity, encourage interested students to review an instructional book on designing video games. Each year sees new books released that focus on video game art, 3D modeling, game programming, map design, and other game development topics. A few of these books are specifically written with adolescents in mind. Others are indispensable to anyone who is developing a video game from scratch or designing maps or modifications for existing video games.


Discussion The Amazon website (www.amazon.com) is an excellent starting place for researching books about video games. Type in the keyword searches “video games,” “video games education,” “video game development,” “video game design,” and “video game research” and re-sort the book lists that are displayed by publication date to peruse the most recently published books. If your class has created a video game website, consider asking the publishers of video game books to send you complementary copies of one or more of their titles for review. Even if your website doesn’t attract a lot of visitors, many publishers will be happy to support an online review that they can then link to from their own website. Alternatively, a book review can be published in any number of user forums at popular video game websites or at the Amazon website. Some smaller websites even invite visitors to contribute featured reviews and editorial articles to the main site. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Branding the Box Video games are among the most branded products consumers can purchase. The packaging for PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360 games have much in common with each other, ranging from the case itself, to its color, and the various logos and information that can be found on the front and back sides of the product box. In part, this is because Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft keep such tights reigns on the licensing of their consoles. Packaging all of a platform’s games in a similar way helps to promote a console’s brand identity and to show off a plethora of similarly branded console games in stores. Because most retailers have dedicated sections for each gaming platform, this essentially creates a “wall of advertising” for each of the console manufacturers. In this activity, the topic of branding is introduced to students, who then compare and contrast the packaging of two or more PlayStation 3, Wii, or Xbox 360 titles.

Activity Introduce the topic of branding to students. Discuss its importance as a marketing strategy for manufacturers and service providers, as well as the generic techniques advertisers use to build up brand awareness in consumers. Now ask the students to identify the brands with which they are most familiar (e.g., Apple, Coke, McDonald’s, and Nike). Invite the students to do some Internet research on how these and other well-known companies have successfully marketed their brands to consumers. Next, discuss the topic of branding in relation to video games. Consider showing the students some photographs of the inside of a Circuit City, GameStop, or Wal-Mart store where console video games are prominently displayed. Introduce the notion of a “wall of advertising” as discussed in the introduction to this activity. Provide the students with the packaging for two or more PlayStation 3, Wii, or Xbox 360 titles. Ask them to compare each title’s packaging, looking closely at the front, back, and side matter. Ask the students to list the various ways in which each title’s packaging is similar to and different from the others. Ask the students to distinguish between the required and optional content on the packaging (e.g., the ESRB rating is required if a game is to be stocked by most retailers). Also ask the stu23

24 Ä Playing to Learn dents to list the different categories of content they find on the packaging (e.g., game name, cover image, marketing blurb, screenshots, platform logo, feature list, and UPC code).

Discussion Following this activity, brainstorm with students the various ways in which a video game console brand is supported and maintained (e.g., consistent design guidelines, a familiar logo, and third-party licensing requirements). As an extension to this activity, ask the students to design a template for the packaging of a video game that incorporates each of the categories of content they have listed above. The students should determine the layout of the template, how much space to devote to each content item, and the guidelines that should govern the choice of font, size of logos, other design elements, and so on. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Business

The box shots for most video games include the game’s title, tagline, platform compatibility, and ratings information, among other details. This pack shot is for the British edition of the game.

Ä Bully

Very few action/adventure games take place in schools. In 2006, RockStar, the developer of the controversial Grand Theft Auto series, set out to change all that. Their video game, Bully, is set in a reform school where players take on the role of a student attempting to navigate the complex social pressures of school life. Some of the preview articles (and screenshots) for Bully suggested that the protagonist might well be a hoodlum who regularly intimidates other students. Prior to its release, some of the critics of violence in video games singled out Bully as a game that should not be published. Bullying Online (www.bullying.co.uk), a British website that aims to reduce bullying in schools, also came out against the game. “This game should be banned,” a representative of the organization was quoted as saying. “I’m extremely worried that kids will play it and then act out what they’ve seen in the classroom.... Bullying is not a game by any stretch of the imagination.” Is Bully, as RockStar’s press release argues, simply about a “troublesome schoolboy” who “stands up to bullies, gets picked on by teachers, plays pranks on malicious kids, wins or loses the girl, and ultimately learns to navigate the obstacles of the fictitious reform school?” Or, is Bully, as critics have argued, a game that casts the player in the role of a bully who must beat up on other students to win the game? Upon its release, critics were nearly unanimous in their praise for Bully, and there was little in the way of negative press for the game in the days and weeks following its arrival in stores. In this activity, the students discuss the ethical issues surrounding RockStar’s school-based video game titled Bully.

Activity Discuss with students the controversy surrounding the game Bully. Ask the students to read a number of preview and review articles for the game plus news reports about the controversy surrounding the game. Some of the critics of Bully have called on the game to be banned. Do the students agree? What are the pros and cons of banning or censoring video games more generally? Are there some topics (or settings) that should never be featured in a video game, or should all video games, regardless of merit, be protected by free speech?

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26 Ä Playing to Learn Is the assignment of an ESRB rating of Mature (thus keeping it out of the hands of most young people) appropriate for certain games, or just another form of censorship? Should Mature-rated video games even be discussed in schools (as some of the activities in this book call for)? Debate the above and other ethical issues that arise from the discussion.

Discussion More information about the controversy surrounding Bully can be found here: ¸ http://www.gamespot.com/xbox/action/bully/news.html?sid=6130128 ¸ http://blogs.rockymountainnews.com/denver/freePlay/2006/08/bully_as_

social_metaphor.html

¸ http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/column_index.php?story=8448

Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Discussion Article Video Games May Dull Shock at Violence

by Miranda Hitti Got a video game on your holiday shopping list? New research shows a possible side effect of overloading on violent video games. The report recently appeared online in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. The study links violent video games to two things: aggressive behavior and less sensitivity to violent images. “These findings, along with other recent research, suggest that chronic exposure to violent video games specifically—and not just frequent playing of any video games—has lasting deleterious effects on brain function and behavior,” write the researchers. They included Bruce Bartholow, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the University of Missouri—Columbia’s Psychological Sciences department.


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Less Shock Value “Hundreds of studies have shown that exposure to media violence increases aggression,” writes Bartholow and his colleagues. “Media violence is believed to increase aggression, at least in part, by desensitizing viewers to the effects of real violence,” they continue. Bartholow’s team focused on violence in video games. They studied 39 healthy male undergraduates who were about 19 years old. The men reported how often they played video games and rated the violence of those games. Next, they took tests of their aggressiveness and sensitivity to violent images.

Grossed Out or Not? First, the men were shown a series of images while they wore caps studded with sensors to monitor their brain waves. Researchers were particularly focused on a brain wave that has been linked to negative and violent imagery. Some images were violent. For instance, one showed a man on a subway holding a gun to another man’s head. Others were neutral, including a picture of a man on a bicycle. A third set were disturbing but not violent, such as an image of a dead dog. The study showed less of the brain wave response in men who frequently played violent video games when the violent images were shown. Those men responded similarly to other participants when neutral and negative but nonviolent images were shown.

Punishing the Competition Next, the men were told they were competing against other participants in a computer test. The winners were told they could send a blaring sound into their opponents’ head sets. It was a setup, but the players didn’t know it. The games were rigged. They were designed to test each player’s aggressiveness. Fans of violent video games showed more aggression against their competitors.

More Work Ahead The study was the first of its kind, and it only included young male college students. There’s more work to be done on the topic, the researchers note. All tests were done in a lab. The study doesn’t show if participants behaved aggressively in their normal lives. In August, the American Psychological Association called for less violence in video and computer games sold to kids. However, experts noted that not all studies have tied violence to such games.

28 Ä Playing to Learn Sources: Bartholow, B. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, September 19, 2005, online edition. WebMD Medical News, “Psychologists Attack Violent Video Games,” August 19, 2005. About the Author: Miranda Hitti is a medical writer for WebMD (www.webmd.com). Source: Hitti, Miranda. 2005. Video games may dull shock at violence. WebMD. December 8. URL: http://www.webmd.com/content/article/116/112050.htm


In your view, do violent video games increase violent tendencies in gamers?

2.

What are the limitations of the study cited in the article? Suggest two or more follow-up studies that could yield even more information about the effects of video game violence.

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Car Commercial Car commercials are among the most well-produced advertisements to be found on television. They have to be. Advertisers pay tens of thousands (if not millions) of dollars for a single thirty-second commercial, depending on the program and time of day. In the typical car commercial, beautiful vistas and cinematography, dazzling special effects, a terrific sense of speed, and one or more driving stunts are all wrapped into a half-minute spot that also likely features a cutting-edge music track. Cinematographers, stunt drivers, composers, and other audiovisual professionals work together to create what is essentially a short film that encapsulates, in just a few seconds, the technical achievements to be found in many full-length motion pictures. In this activity, the students create a car commercial using in-game footage captured from a driving game.

Activity Challenge a small group of students to use the classroom’s project studio to create a thirty-second television commercial that captures the essence of a tricked out new car as featured in a favorite racing game. Have the students capture in-game footage of the car at rest plus full-motion video of the car driving at full speed in one or more racing events. Many driving games feature a replay mode that plays back footage from the most recent race. To capture as many camera angles as possible, encourage the students to capture as much replay footage as they can. Using a video editing tool, have the students import, edit, and sequence the footage they have captured and combine it with photos, stock video, and other media. Also encourage the students to add a soundtrack to their car commercial, as well as voiceovers, titles, special effects, and transitions between cuts. Once production on their car commercial is complete, host a formal screening for the class during which the students show off their thirty-second TV ad spot to their peers.

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Discussion As a lead-up to this activity, ask the students to rate, compare, or critique some of the car commercials that are currently playing on television. Ask the students to apply the principles of advertising that they have been learning in class as they evaluate the commercials under review. Which commercial is the most memorable? Which is the most unique? Which provides viewers with the most information about their potential purchase? Why might car companies prefer television spots over still advertisements such as print ads and billboards? As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to brainstorm a list of products (other than cars) that also make for memorable television advertisements. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Car of the Future

Most of the top racing games allow players to mod, tune, and tweak selected aspects of a car’s design, including its performance, handling, and interior and exterior aesthetics. This car is featured in Test Drive Unlimited.

The ability to customize a car is one of the most sought-after features in a racing game. Regardless of whether a driving game includes real-world licensed vehicles or fictional cars that are born out of the developers’ imaginations, gamers are eager to have the ability to tune, tweak, mod, and “pimp” a ride to make it their own. Customization options include visual upgrades to the exterior look of a car and performance tuning of a car’s engine, transmission, and other component parts. Because of the high cost of licensing real-world vehicles (or because the game will feature extensive damage modeling), many developers prefer to use fictional concept cars over licensed real-world vehicles that likely come with restrictions on their usage (e.g., no damage modeling allowed). In developing racing games, a team of designers may work for weeks (even months) designing each car in the game, meticulously crafting a vehicle’s body frame, exterior appearance, dashboard interior, handling characteristics, and so on. In this activity, the students design and outline the specifications for a tricked-out new car (or flying machine) of the future. 31


Activity Prior to leading this activity, ask a small group of students to research the wide variety of car tuning options available in two or more racing games (e.g., the latest title in the Forza Motorsport, Gran Turismo, Midnight Club, or Need for Speed series). Request that the students make a list of all of the available types of visual and performance upgrades that are available in the games and also group the upgrades into categories (e.g., exterior appearance, performance tuning, and breaking system). For the performance upgrades, also have the students write out a brief summary that describes the benefits of each. Once the upgrade list is complete, distribute it to the full class. Working in small groups, challenge the students to design a tricked-out new car that features some or all of the visual and performance upgrades that are listed on the handout. Optionally allow the students to also add upgrades not featured on the list (e.g., ejectable seats) plus new features that permit their car to fly through the air, float on water, and so on. In addition to listing the specifications for its tricked-out new vehicle, also have each group draw a scale model of its car. This mock-up should show off the car’s exterior appearance and, optionally, its interior dashboard view. Also ask each group to assign a sticker price to its vehicle. Once they are ready, have the students share their car designs with each other in the form of a poster presentation.

Discussion Car manufacturers publish slick marketing literature that shows off their cars’ designs, features, and underlying technologies. Consider having the students use this marketing material as a template for the layout of their own car design posters and pamphlets. Racing games are not the only sources of information that students can turn to in this activity. The students may also wish to browse the Internet for information about real-world concept cars and emerging car technologies (e.g., hybrid fuel systems). Follow up this research with a full-class discussion about the future of travel and what “cars” may look like twenty-five years from now. This activity can also be adapted to focus on aircraft, watercraft, and spaceships of the future. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts


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Activity Quickie

!

Place Analysis

Ask the students to perform a place analysis on an interior or exterior video game environment. Have the students critique the environment using a criteria list that the class has brainstormed together. Encourage the students to consider some or all of the following environmental qualities: ambience, beauty, complexity, fluidity, originality, realism, special effects, and so on. Also encourage the students to focus on the basic elements of design (e.g., form, texture, color, and lighting) plus the appropriate use of signage and other navigational assists. (Geography)

In addition to conducting place analyses of video game environments, students can design new levels for existing games. This is a screenshot of the level editor that ships with the PC edition of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

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Chart Toppers The NPD Group (www.npd.com) is one of several companies that track the sales of video games in North America and collect data on other industry trends and consumer buying and gaming habits. Their reports and the raw statistics the NPD Group collects are not free, but a number of video game websites, including Gamasutra (www.gamasutra.com), regularly publish stories that cite NPD data. Chief among these stories are monthly roundups listing the top-selling video games in North America. Among some of the recent reports the NPD Group has prepared are the following: ¸ a study that tracks how children and youth spend their leisure time, including

playing video games, watching television, participating in after-school activities, and playing outside

¸ a study that reports on the demographic and behavioral characteristics of mo-

bile gamers who play handheld and cell phone games

¸ a study that reports on consumer awareness of and interest in the next genera-

tion of video game consoles

¸ a study that reports on the demographic and behavioral characteristics of on-

line gamers as well as key shifts and trends in multiplayer gaming

These reports are just a few of the many studies available from the NPD Group and similar businesses that track industry and consumer trends related to video games and other products and services. These reports point to the various ways in which data can be collected, analyzed, and reported for scholarly and commercial use. In this activity, the students track the video game sales charts over a one- or two-month period. They analyze and draw conclusions about the statistics they have collected.

Activity Most of the major video game websites list the top-selling video games for each month or quarter. Some websites provide the dollar totals for retail video game sales (or the 34


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total number of copies sold). Others simply list the top-selling video games in rank order with no other details provided. Still other websites, including GameSpot (www.gamespot.com), track their visitors’ interest in particular games. At the bottom of the GameSpot home page is a regularly updated listing of the most popular video games at the site. At GameSpot, some of the most popular video game titles have not yet been released. Many are recent releases. Still others have continued to top the popularity (and sales) charts for weeks or months following their release. Ask the students to monitor the sales (or popularity) charts at a video game website over a few weeks or months. To help them keep track of the data, have the students design an electronic database or create a paper chart. With each update of the sales or popularity chart at a website, have the students update their own data set with the new statistics. Once the students have amassed five or more data sets, ask them to begin analyzing and discussing the trends (if any) that they see emerging. Is there a link between the top-selling video games and their popularity at the major websites? What is the relationship between a title’s peak level of popularity and its release date? Which gaming platform (or publisher) boasts the top-selling video game for a given month? What is the most and least popular genre of video games for a given month?

Discussion Sales in North America are one thing, but the three major gaming consoles (i.e., PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360) are also competing for market share in other regions around the world—especially Asia. As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to analyze the sales charts in a region other than North America. Are the top-selling video games in North America also the top-selling games in Britain, Japan, or Australia? If not, why not? What accounts for the different tastes of gamers around the world? Why are some video game titles only released in certain regions of the world (e.g., Japan) and not others? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Business


Data Table

Online vs. Offline Play The following data set is provided courtesy of the NPD Group (www.npd.com). It breaks down the playing of online vs. offline video games by age. Age

Play Offline (%)

Play Online (%)

13 to 17

33

67

18 to 24

38

62

25 to 34

41

59

35 to 44

40

60

Source: NPD Group. 2006.

Discussion Questions What trends (if any) can you glean from the above data set? Do the results surprise you? Turn this table into a bar chart or pie graph. Does representing the above data graphically make it easier to analyze?

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Cheat Code Central Cheat codes can save impatient gamers from endless frustration and restarts by unlocking unplayed missions or increasing a character’s stats (e.g., ammunition and health levels). Many a video game has been saved by its cheats. The unforgiving story missions in Driv3r, for example, were quickly bypassed by many gamers who entered a single cheat code and immediately had access by foot, car, and boat to the wide open cities of Miami, Paris, and Istanbul. Similarly, gamers who were anxious to explore the whole of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas from the outset of the game could enable a cheat that equipped the lead character with a jet pack. This in turn allowed players to traverse the road blocks that cut off certain areas of the game world early on. Other video game cheats improve a player’s fighting ability or equip them with a faster car. The cheats for some games unlock secret levels or characters. The cheats for other games, such as Call of Duty 2, enable gamers to play any of the game’s missions from the outset. In this activity, the students review a game’s cheat codes. They propose a revised set of cheat codes that would make the game easier and more fun to play for novices and recreational gamers alike.

Activity Ask the students to brainstorm a list of the most challenging video games that they have ever played. Are there cheat codes for these games? Have the students browse the cheat codes at the GameFAQs website (www.gamefaqs.com) to find out. For those video games lacking helpful cheat codes, ask the students to brainstorm a list of cheats that would make the games easier to play for beginners. In coming up with their cheat list, the students can be as creative as they wish. Their list can include the more typical cheat codes plus innovative cheat codes that are far less common (e.g., freeze the game and walk through the current level unhindered).

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Discussion Follow up this activity by asking the students to rank different types of cheat codes according to their value. For example, a cheat code that unlocks all of the missions in a video game is clearly more valuable than a cheat code that unlocks a new hairdo for the lead character. Here is a sample list of cheat codes for students to rank: ¸ unlock all missions ¸ give infinite health ¸ equip all weapons ¸ give power or speed boost ¸ unlock new character (or car) ¸ unlock secret level ¸ fly around current level ¸ walk through walls

Discuss with students the reasons some developers choose to ship their video games without cheats. One possible reason is that if a game is easy enough to complete with cheats enabled, most gamers may choose to rent, rather than purchase, the game. This results in far less revenue for the video game publisher. This is also the reason many cheat codes are only “leaked” to the Internet weeks or months following the release of a video game. Most cheat codes make a game easier to play. For a variation on this activity, ask a group of students to instead propose a set of cheat codes that make a game far more difficult to beat (e.g., no aim assistance, no health indicator, and tougher enemies). Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Choose Your Own Adventure As a young reader, long before the rise of the Harry Potter phenomenon, I was addicted to several book series: Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven mysteries, Franklin W. Dixon’s Hardy Boys series, Donald Sobol’s Two Minute Mysteries, and Edward Packard’s Choose Your Own Adventure books. In many ways, this last series is the printed word’s answer to video games—an interactive adventure book in which the reader has some say in the outcome. At the bottom of most pages in a “choose your own adventure” book is a prompt that asks the reader to make moral and plot decisions that then take him or her to a new page in the book. Here the story is advanced further and, at the bottom of the page, another reader decision awaits. In this activity, the students write a choose your own adventure story, a narrative with multiple pathways that can then be adapted for use in an adventure video game.

Activity Introduce students to the Choose Your Own Adventure series of children’s books. Assign them the task of reading one or two of these books. (You may wish to consider having the entire class read the same book independently and then compare notes on the different adventures they have had.) Discuss with students the structure of a choose your own adventure story. Introduce the terms: “branching storyline,” “decision tree,” “multiple pathways,” and so on. Tell the students that many video games (e.g., most role-playing games) also feature branching storylines in which the decisions a player makes early on have an impact on how a game’s story unfolds. Assign each student the task of writing a choose your own adventure story. Ask the students to present their readers with a plot choice at the bottom of each page (or paragraph) that takes the reader to a new page (or paragraph) in the story and which advances the plot in some interesting way. Remind the students that a choose your own adventure tale needs to be somewhat longer than a typical story because readers won’t read every page (or paragraph) in the story.

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40 Ä Playing to Learn Once their stories have been peer edited and finalized, have the students read each other’s choose your own adventure tales in class and/or contribute their stories to the school library.

Discussion As they plan their choose your own adventure stories, encourage the students to flowchart the decision trees that will form the basis of their adventure tales. This can be done offline using chalk and a blackboard (or cue cards and a bulletin board) or on the computer using brainstorming software, such as Inspiration (www.inspirationsoftware.com). Writing a choose your own adventure story is often one of the first steps in developing a video game that features a branching storyline. Discuss with students some of the next steps that they would need to take in turning their choose your own adventure tales into full-fledged video games. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Activity Quickie

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School Map

Have the students work together to create a map of the school on a large piece of paper. Have them take a tour of the school, adding and labeling each area of the school as they go. For an extra challenge, ask a student to use the 2D paper-based map the students have created to design a 3D representation of the school on the computer. Following this activity, discuss with students the role of a level designer in creating the maps for an adventure video game. (Geography)

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Composer Discography Video game soundtracks are increasingly garnering lots of attention from the press, fans, and discerning listeners. As a result of this attention, some video game composers are enjoying a growing fan base. As well, more-established movie and television composers are turning to video games for a new composing challenge. More than ever, there is a significant crossover between composers who write music for movies, television, and video games. In this activity, the students research the discography of an established video game composer.

Activity Introduce students to some of the more well known video game composers and soundtracks listed at Music 4 Games (www.music4games.net) and other video game music websites. Discuss each composer’s works and ask the students to brainstorm some of the more common challenges associated with composing music for video games versus films and television shows (e.g., the interactive and branching nature of the video game medium). Assign each student the task of researching the discography of a video game composer. Encourage the students to listen to their chosen composers’ works and search the Internet for further sources of information (e.g., biographies, interviews, and soundtrack reviews). Once their research is complete, ask each student to present his or her findings in the form of a written report or an oral or multimedia presentation that incorporates excerpts of the composer’s music.

Discussion To accommodate the interests of students who do not play video games, expand the scope of this activity to include movie and television composers. This activity can also include an assessment component in which each student judges the quality of a composer’s music, perhaps critiquing a composer’s most and least successful works. 41

42 Ä Playing to Learn Each student can also be asked to list the musical genres for which a composer is most known (e.g., choral, electronic, or symphonic). So, too, each student can list the instruments and sounds a composer most commonly uses. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Music

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Critiquing the Controllers Prior to bringing a new gaming console to market, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony each spend millions of dollars and countless months designing, testing, and tweaking the gamepad controller that will come bundled with their new gaming system. The size and feel of a gamepad—which will typically be held in a gamer’s hands for hundreds of hours over the lifetime of a product—is a key selling point for a console system. A gamepad’s design should be attractive, sleek, and ergonomic. Buttons should be easy to reach and press. Triggers should be responsive and the layout of the gamepad should be easy for gamers to learn and use. The gamepad should be comfortable to hold for extended periods of time. In this activity, the students compare and contrast the gamepad controllers that ship with the Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and Sony PlayStation 3 gaming systems.

Activity Working in small groups, ask the students to compare and contrast the experience of playing video games using the standard gamepads that ship with the leading console gaming systems. (Consider asking those students who own a video game console to disconnect and bring in, with parental permission, the gamepad that comes standard with the system.) Provide the students with an opportunity to hold each gamepad in their hands, press its buttons, and depress its triggers as they compare the design and feel of each controller. The students can keep free-form notes for each gamepad or instead complete a questionnaire that has been brainstormed in advance by the class. In evaluating the gamepads, the students should pay particular attention to 1) the size, weight, and feel of the gamepad in their hands; 2) the quality of the gamepad’s craftsmanship; 2) the design, layout, and ergonomics of the gamepad; and 3) the ease with which buttons and triggers can be reached, depressed, held down, and so on. Following the activity, ask the student groups to write a report detailing the results of their findings. Also ask each group to award a star rating out of five to each gamepad.

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Discussion In addition to the gamepads that ship with gaming consoles, there are also third-party controllers that gamers can choose to purchase separately. As an extension to this activity, ask the students to review one or more third-party controllers, taking price, performance, design, and overall value into consideration. In addition to gamepads, many PC and console games take advantage of other types of controllers, such as joysticks, steering wheels, and gaming mice and keyboards. As an extension to this activity, ask the students to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of using a joystick in lieu of a mouse and keyboard to control a flight simulator for example. Also consider holding a debate on the age-old controversy over whether a mouse or gamepad offers better control in a first-person action game. As an alternative to this activity, ask the students to critique the control interfaces built into handheld gaming systems or other devices such cell phones, MP3 players, and personal digital assistants (PDAs). As with video game controllers, the control interfaces on these devices are very often compact. Does the trend to make portable devices as small as possible have an impact on the ease with which these devices can be used? Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Computers

Hardware manufacturers spend many months fine-tuning the controllers for their next generation consoles. Sony originally intended to ship the above controller with the Playstation 3. The company later replaced this “boomerang” design with a more traditional controller similar to the one that ships with the Playstation 2.

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Deadpan Dialog In magazine and online reviews, narration and dialog are two of the most commonly criticized elements of video games. Indeed, some reviewers seem to take great delight in disparaging the poor voice work of both well-known and unknown actors (and pop stars) who unwittingly lend their voices to video games. Common criticisms include poorly written dialog, monotone speaking voices, poor voice inflection, and poor lip-syncing of an actor’s voice to his or her character’s lip movements and facial expressions. For those video games created in countries where English is not the first language (e.g., Japan), grammar and sentence structure may also prove problematic when it comes to the attention that is paid to doing a proper English translation. In this activity, the students write a review of a video game focusing solely on the elocution of one or more characters’ dialog.

Activity Introduce students to the term “elocution.” Ask them to identify the characteristics of effective speaking voices in plays, movies, television shows, and video games. Discuss the important elements of elocution, including enunciation, pronunciation, grammar, tone, inflection, emphasis, gesture, and other qualities. Ask each student to choose a favorite video game that features plenty of narration and/or dialog. Assign each student the task of critiquing one or more of the game’s speaking voices. Encourage the students to focus on the elements of elocution, which are important to video games. In presenting their findings, each student can choose to write a written report or instead prepare an audio review that features sample dialog outtakes from the video game itself.

Discussion After completing their reviews, ask each student to browse the Internet for online reviews of the video game they have critiqued. How many of these reviews also focus on the elocution of the game’s dialog and narration? Do these reviews concur with the student’s findings? 45

46 Ä Playing to Learn For a variation on this activity, refer to “The Rewrite” activity, which is discussed elsewhere in this book. Elocution lessons have played an important role in the history of education. In the nineteenth century, it was common for students to recite poetry, deliver speeches, sing songs, and give their answers to teachers’ questions in unison as a full class. With the notable exception of student speech competitions, elocution lessons are no longer prominent in schools. Discuss with students the merits of bringing elocution lessons back into the classroom in the form of poetry recitals and dialog readings. In addition to improving students’ speaking voices, elocution lessons can also enhance feelings of self-confidence and pride. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Drama

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Design Your Own Racetrack Driving games that are set on off-road racetracks take full advantage of abrupt changes in topography and landforms to vary the racing conditions and enhance the thrill of the ride. Although they may not recognize the landforms they traverse by name, most fans of racing games surely understand the emotional experience of driving 170+ mph over an overhang, down a mountain, or across a level plateau. Students study all of these and many other physical landforms in geography class, but it nevertheless remains a constant challenge for teachers to impress upon young minds the sheer diversity of physical geography that exists in the natural world. Asking students to imagine that they are racing over the very same natural landforms they are learning about in class is one way for physical geography to be concretized in schools. In this activity, the students use arts and crafts supplies to design a racetrack that features five or more geographic landforms.

Activity As part of a unit on physical geography, introduce the students to a variety of natural landforms, including some or all of the following: beaches, bluffs, canyons, caves, cliffs, escarpments, gullies, hills, mountains, overhangs, plateaus, ridges, river basins, valleys, and watersheds. To concretize the physical characteristics of these landforms, ask the students to brainstorm a list of adjectives that describe what it must be like to drive over or through each of these landforms at top speed. Next, have the students compile notes on each of the landforms. For each landform, their write-ups should include a definition and a top-down or cross-sectional diagram that the students have drawn by hand. As an exit project for the lesson, invite the students to work in groups and create an off-road racetrack that features five or more of the physical landforms they have studied in class. Ask each group to start by sketching their racetrack design on paper before proceeding to create a 3D model (or relief map) using various arts and crafts supplies, plasticine, 47

48 Ä Playing to Learn or modeling clay. (Alternatively, take the students outside on a wintry day and invite them to create their 3D racetracks in the snow.) Encourage the students to designate certain locations on their race track as experiencing various weather conditions such as rain, fog, snow, or ice. At the end of this activity, set aside some time for each group to present its 3D model to the rest of the class.

Discussion For a language arts extension to this activity, ask the students to write a descriptive caption to accompany their group’s model. The caption should focus on the sensation of driving on the racetrack they have created. For example, the students can indicate the locations on their track where cars pick up speed, lift off the ground, or slide dangerously around a tight corner. An increasing number of driving games allow players to design their own race tracks. The TrackMania series and Project Gotham Racing 3 are two such examples. Having completed this activity offline, consider asking those students who are interested to design a virtual racetrack that they can actually race on and share with others in class or over the Internet. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Geography

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Design Your Own Racetrack (Take Two)

Virtual racetracks come in all shapes and sizes. Some are based on realworld race courses, such as this view of the famous Nurburgring track as featured in Gran Turismo 4. Others are off-road race tracks or courses that are situated in the downtown core of a major city center.

It is the sheer sense of speed that makes racing titles one of the most popular genres of video games. Some racing games feature off-road courses over rough terrain, such a mud, sand, or snow. Others feature licensed racetracks such as the various Formula One and NASCAR circuits found throughout the world. Still others feature unsanctioned street races through city centers. These races, in particular, put the lives of the virtual drivers and pedestrians at great risk. They are also illegal in most jurisdictions. This activity focuses on sanctioned street races for which major city centers grant official permits. In the real world, sanctioned street races are planned well ahead with driver and spectator safety firmly in mind. Each year, a number of major city centers throughout the world play host to the Grand Prix and other sanctioned racing events. Course routes are planned well in advance, streets are blocked off, spectator viewing stands are set up, and protective barriers are erected. 49

50 Ä Playing to Learn Here, for example, are some the statistics for the (last ever) Molson Indy race held in downtown Toronto in July, 2005. (The Grand Prix took over the event in 2006.): Length: 2.824 km (1.755 miles) Direction: Clockwise Turns: 11 Estimated Top Speed: 300 kph (190 mph) on Lakeshore Boulevard Paving: 5,000 metric tonnes of asphalt (approximately 340 truckloads) Barriers: 2,000 steel-reinforced concrete barriers (each 12 feet long, 30 inches high, 20 to 24 inches wide, and 7,000 pounds in weight) Debris Fence: 11,000 feet (10-foot-high chain-link fence with three strand half inch steel cable) Spectator Fence: 19,000 feet (6-foot-high chain-link fence) Tire Walls: 1,600 feet (five tires high) Source: http://www.molsonindy.com/toronto/facts.php In this activity, the students use a city map to design a sanctioned street race through an urban center. They identify road hazards, plot positions where protective barriers should be erected, and mark off cross streets that should be closed to traffic.

Activity Introduce students to the topic of sanctioned street races. Clarify the differences between sanctioned and unsanctioned street races and the particular dangers (and illegal status) of the latter. Assign students the task of researching sanctioned street races on the Internet. Ask them to focus particularly on the layout and features of the Grand Prix racing circuits (www.grandprix.com) that are constructed each year in major city centers around the world. Working in small groups, each of which has been provided with a city map, ask the students to map out their own sanctioned race course through the downtown or industrial area of their hometown or the nearest urban center. Each group should choose a location for their street race and carefully plot its course. Next, have the groups use a large sheet of paper to create a detailed map of their race course. Ask them to draw and label the city streets and note the location where protective barriers and viewing stands should be erected and cross streets blocked off. The students should also note potential road hazards and add a scale and key that includes information about the length of the track, the number of turns, and other details.


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Discussion This activity can be assigned as part of a larger urban planning unit in which the students are asked to design a city from the ground up. Refer to the “Urban Planning” activity, which is discussed elsewhere in this book. The official Grand Prix racing website maintains a detailed history of every Grand Prix racing circuit in the world, including those which are no longer in existence: http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/gpecira.html In browsing these listings, ask the students to pay special attention to the descriptors that give details about the locations, turns, track length, and other features of each circuit. (Students will also no doubt note how dangerous a Grand Prix race can be because many of the entries also provide details on some of the most memorable accidents that have occurred on the tracks.) Following this activity, discuss with students the differences between sanctioned and unsanctioned street races. Flag the important safety issues that are raised by unsanctioned races through city streets. Unsanctioned street races are illegal for important public safety reasons. Talk with students about these reasons and consider having them read a news item on the tragic consequences that can result from street races that injure or kill. Why, despite the risks, do some racers insist on competing in unsanctioned and illegal street races? Invite the students to discuss this and related questions. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Geography

Activity Quickie

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Photo Analysis

Download and print out a screenshot from a video game. Ask the students to perform a photo analysis on the screenshot. Have them look deeply into the photo for hidden details. Have them look around the periphery of the photo to determine what might be happening just outside the boundaries of the image. Ask the students to hypothesize what might have happened just before the screenshot was captured and what might happen next. As a follow-up to this activity, provide the students with two similar looking screenshots. Challenge them to spot the subtle differences. (Visual Arts)

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Do You Recognize This Voice? Many well-known celebrities routinely lend their voices to video game productions. They may record a character’s dialog or narrate the story. Many of these voices are recognizable to students, who routinely hear the same celebrity voices in movies, on television, and in music. In this activity, the students play a teaching game in which they listen to recorded excerpts of dialog from several video games. They attempt to guess which celebrity’s voice they are hearing.

Activity In advance of this activity, record a series of dialog snippets from video games that feature celebrity voice talent. Divide the class into two teams and run this activity using a quiz show format in which each team scores a point for each correct answer. Play a dialog snippet for Team A and ask them to guess which celebrity’s voice they are listening to. For bonus points, players can also guess to which video game the snippet belongs. Correct answers score a point and the chance to identify the next dialog snippet. Incorrect answers result in a loss of turn. Once all of the dialog snippets have been heard or the allotted time has run out, tally the results to determine a winner.

Discussion Consider adapting this activity into a Jeopardy-style trivia game in which each team’s knowledge of video games is tested. This activity can also be adapted into a group project for students. Invite a group of students to create a flash-card-like activity center (or computer game) that, in lieu of posing questions, instead plays sound clips of character dialog. Challenge players to identify which celebrity’s voice they are listening to before moving on to the next audio clip.

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As an alternative to this activity’s video game focus, instead record a series of television commercials that rely on celebrity voice talent to narrate the advertisement. Ask the students to guess which celebrity’s voice they are hearing. As a follow-up to this activity, discuss with students why some Hollywood celebrities are happy to do commercial voice work and pitches overseas (e.g., in Japan) but not in the United States. Lead a debate with students in which they discuss the ethics of actors doing video game or commercial voice work for products they have not used or don’t endorse in real life. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Drama

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Don’t Believe the Hype Video games are among the most hyped products available for purchase. For months (if not years) many video games receive prerelease press well in advance of arriving in stores. Print magazines and websites feature preview articles that highlight the promise of what is to come. Game developers give interviews to the press and talk up their unreleased games at trade shows. Gamers speculate about upcoming releases in video game forums. Video game trailers, in-game footage, and playable demos are posted on websites and distributed on disk to magazine subscribers. By the time a video game is actually released, most of the keeners who intend to purchase the game probably know just about everything there is to know about the game they’ve been tracking for months. In this activity, the students compare and contrast the previews and reviews of a video game. They look for evidence of hype in the previews for games that didn’t quite fulfill expectations upon their release.

Activity Ask the students to each choose a video game that received plenty of attention in advance of its release but that underperformed when it arrived on store shelves (i.e., the game was poorly reviewed and/or did not sell well). Now assign each student the task of writing a comparative essay that looks closely at the press their chosen game received in the weeks and months leading up to its release versus the reviews the same game warranted once it found its way into gamers’ and reviewers’ hands. Encourage the students to look for evidence of unwarranted hype in the preview articles they read. Is there evidence that the writers of some preview articles were merely repeating the marketing points fed to them by the developers of the game? Were the writers of some preview articles able to actually play early versions of the game and, if so, did they fairly report on the game’s pros and cons? Did certain games get a “free ride” because of the reputation or influence of the game’s developer in the video game industry? Did the writers of preview articles clearly demarcate their own opinions from those offered by the developers in interviews and press releases? Assess the essays the students write using the depth of their critique and analysis as important criteria. 54


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Discussion As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to compare the preview and review articles for a video game that out performed expectations and became a sleeper hit. Why did this particular title take off? What features of the game were players most attracted to? What lessons can be drawn from the unexpected success of this game? Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Discussion Article Ethics in Video Game Journalism

by Justin Hall The video gaming industry has come a long way. Starting with the simple Pong game three decades ago and evolving into lavishly drawn interactive epics, the scale of games and the size of their audience has grown exponentially, with sales in the billions of dollars and major multinational corporations clamoring for a piece of the action. But despite these signs of a fast-growing industry, the print and online publications that cover video games often employ fans who unwittingly make poor ethical choices. The first print magazine covering video games, Electronic Games, was co-founded by Bill Kunkel in 1981. Kunkel describes those early days in a recent interview: “To an extent, we were cheerleaders for the industry—we loved these games, we wanted to see more of them, we wanted to keep writing about them.” Not much has changed in the past 20 years. Game publications and websites still mostly employ low-paid hobbyists who are easy targets of lavish marketing events that encourage inappropriate ties between game makers and game critics. These unwholesome relationships were put under the spotlight by an article in the Los Angeles Times last August, “Gamers’ Perks or ‘Playola’?” by Alex Pham. In an interview with the Online Journalism Review, Pham said she was motivated to write the piece when she discovered that game journalists “get to do outrageously fun things.” She noted that software publishers arranged for journalists to shoot guns, skydive, and race cars—all under the pretense of researching video games.

Into the Breach I recently attended a game industry junket hosted by Ubisoft to promote their Tom Clancy military-industrial techno-thriller video games. Editors and writers from a wide range of game industry and mainstream media were invited to the Presidio, a defunct military base in San Francisco. There, we had a chance to play the latest games,

56 Ä Playing to Learn mingle with some of the game developers, eat delicious sandwiches and drink at an open bar. And a lucky few of us were chosen to “undergo real counterterrorist operative training” from a decorated federal marshal and close-quarters battle instructor. One game on display, Rainbow Six 3, included a portion modeled after part of the Presidio—we were going to play that level in real life. We were suited up in flak jackets and received air rifles loaded with plastic pellets. In small groups, we were sent out to storm a building, shoot hostiles, liberate hostages and neutralize a dirty bomb. It was an event lifted straight from the screen and real-life game action. The other journalists, all men, all looking under 35, were psyched. And when I left in an unmarked white van in a black suit with a black gun and a black Rainbow Six 3 balaclava over my head, preparing to move through a darkened building with broken windows lead by a gruff middle-aged SWAT team member, shooting terrorists with glowing plastic pellets, I was completely enthralled as well. Credibility Junkets are nothing new in entertainment journalism. Writers covering the movie industry are invited to nice hotels to confer with stars over expensive meals. Pulitzer-prize winning film critic Roger Ebert says that when he first started working at the Chicago Sun-Times, reporters would accept any trip they were offered. Now, he says he pays his own expenses when attending industry events. Aaron Boulding, editor in charge of IGN’s Xbox coverage, defends the professional standards of his writers and editors. IGN is a conglomeration of websites, each devoted to a specific video game console. Boulding says he allows his editorial staff to go on publisher-funded trips and junkets. The site’s policy, he said, is to let each staffer manage their own conduct: “We all have training and enough experience to know better—we lose our credibility if it becomes obvious that we’re biased.” Boulding argues that readers ultimately decide the proper level of journalistic integrity. If a publication pads its scores, favoring publishers, then fans will see that they have been lead astray and will seek authority elsewhere. Gregory Kasavin, executive editor of GameSpot, a multi-platform game news and reviews site, said that the economics of video games places reviewers in a touchy position. “Who cares about a movie review,” he notes. “If you saw something bad, you lost two hours and 10 dollars, tough luck. Most video games cost more than $40 or $50, while the systems sell for more than $200. With games, the stakes are a lot higher.” There were two editors from GameSpot at the Tom Clancy party, but GameSpot’s product reviews were written by freelancers. Kasavin says that GameSpot does not allow game reviewers to attend promotions for products they are writing about. “Our reviewers are completely distanced from the developers and publishers,” he says. “They have no other goal than to scrutinize a product and decide whether it’s worth recommending to people who spend money and time on games.” Not all product promotions involve SWAT team training, sports cars or parachuting. Most are a simple invitation to a game development studio, an ordinary office where editors sit with game developers and check out the latest products over soda pop.


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Kasavin says he works to keep reviewers from these events as well, fearing that such familiarity has the potential to breed a conflict of interest. Unethical behavior, he says, “happens much more subtly. People become friends with people in the industry and then give more favorable coverage to their products.” Interviews with game developers yield insights into game production. But more often, these casual events feed into previews of upcoming titles. These preview pieces are typically breathless, upbeat, and nearly always positive. Some editors think this is only fair. IGN’s Boulding says, “up until a game is released, it has the potential to be perfect.” Game publishers trust certain publications to handle their upcoming games with this kid-glove approach. Any player can write a review of a game, but only sanctioned media outlets have access to games before they are available to the public. Brokering these agreements falls upon an untoward mix of editorial and promotions. Los Angeles Times reporter Michael Cieply, who writes about the film industry, says that within entertainment journalism there are junket-driven celebrity stories, coverage that is generally favorable by unspoken agreement, and just-the-facts coverage that doesn’t take any perks from publicists or publishers. Between this, Cieply says, there is a place of compromise, where major magazine cover stories are decided between editors and publicists, where photos and text might be subject to consent by handlers. He favors uncompromising entertainment journalism. Speaking of publicist-managed reporting, he says “people who get on those bandwagons cheat themselves and cheat their readers.” While introductions and access can make for good coverage, editorial-promotions relationships can cause writers to neglect their role as critics and arbiters of game quality. A recent example of the rift between readers and reviewers came with the arrival of one of the game industry’s most highly touted titles. The Sims Online married a hot concept—multiplayer online gaming—to The Sims, the best-selling PC game series of all time. In addition, it was designed in part by Will Wright, one of the game industry’s most renowned developers. All of this combined into a rich maelstrom of hype. The Sims Online was featured on the cover of the November 25, 2002 issue of Newsweek and GameSpot posted a 13-page behind-the-scenes feature. Mainstream press and hardcore game publications touted The Sims Online as the first mass-market online game. Then the reviews came out. A meta-rankings site that compiles review scores from professional game reviewers ranked The Sims Online at around seven out of 10. But user reviews on the Amazon website, scored The Sims Online at around four out of ten. Fortunately, Internet readers have easy access to multiple viewpoints. Sites like GameRankings or MetaCritic give review overviews, listing scores and blurbs from a wide variety of game critics. Researching through Web search engines or meta-rankings sites like these offers users a wider range of sources, including game criticism from nonprofessional sites. One leading example of this is GameCritics, an independent game commentary site offering reviews that are among the most thoughtful on the web. Run by two high school

58 Ä Playing to Learn friends from New York, GameCritics is establishing a middle ground between the junket-fed hardcore game review sites and the general audience reviews published on newspaper Web sites. There is a place for interviews with game developers and journalistic exploration of game culture outside of products. Strong separation between reviews and party-fueled, influence-peddled previews is a good way for game journalism to develop meaningful ethical standards. Then we might see more game industry coverage written, as Ebert put it, “without benefit of the insights gained from free buffets.” Fortunately, low-cost publishing on the Internet is fueling the development of independent game criticism, generated by writers with only brains, experience, and a desire to play better games. About the Author: Justin Hall is a freelance writer and the Managing Editor of Game Girl Advance (www.gamegirladvance.com). Source: Hall, Justin. 2003. Ethics in video game journalism. AUSC Annenberg Online Journalism Review. April 10. URL: http://www.ojr.org/ojr/ethics/1049994303.php


Which video game magazines and websites do you trust the most to provide accurate and fair-minded reviews? What is it about these magazines and websites that makes them trustworthy?

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If you ran a video game review site, what policies would you put into place to maintain high standards of journalistic integrity?

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ESRB Ratings Review Established in 1994, the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) is the organization in the United States that rates and classifies commercial video games according to their content. The ESRB website (www.esrb.org) describes the organization as “a non-profit, self-regulatory body that independently assigns ratings, enforces advertising guidelines, and helps ensure responsible online privacy practices for the interactive entertainment software industry.” Although neither the ESRB nor U.S. federal law at present restricts the sale of violent video games to children, the major players in the video game industry have taken it upon themselves to submit their video games voluntarily to the ESRB ratings board, which then rates them, assigning each a rating symbol and content descriptor. This information is then prominently displayed on most marketing materials for the game and on the game packaging itself. The purpose of the ESRB rating system is to help parents and other consumers make informed purchasing decisions about the video games they buy for themselves and others. The seven rating categories are as follows: ¸ Early Childhood ¸ Everyone ¸ Everyone 10+ ¸ Teen ¸ Mature ¸ Adults Only ¸ Rating Pending

Each of these ratings categories is defined, along with the ESRB content descriptors, at the ESRB website. In this activity, the students review the ESRB ratings system and suggest what changes (if any) they would propose making. 59


Activity Introduce students to the role of the ESRB ratings board in the United States. Discuss with students the quotation that opens the introduction to this activity. What does it mean, and why is it important that the ESRB be a “non-profit, self-regulatory body that independently” rates games? Invite the students to browse the ESRB website. The site features information about the seven rating symbols, the many content descriptors, and the ratings process. As part of its mandate, the ESRB does much more than simply rate games. These functions are also discussed at the site. In addition to reviewing the FAQ and other information at the ESRB website, invite the students to search the site for the ESRB ratings for their favorite video games. Are the results what they expected or are the students surprised? Once the students have finished researching the ESRB ratings system, lead a discussion with the class in which the students discuss the merits of the ESRB ratings system, ways in which it could be strengthened (or weakened), and other changes the students feel should be made.

Discussion Do some of the students in the class play violent video games that are rated Mature or Adults Only? This is the burning question that will probably come up during the course of this activity. Consider asking the gamers in the class to review the ESRB ratings for the video games they have recently played. Then conduct an anonymous survey to find out how many students have played Mature or Adults Only rated games. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Social Studies


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Data Table

ESRB Ratings by Platform Console The following table breaks down the total number of ESRB rated titles (as of August 21, 2006) by platform and rating. (Not all platforms are included.) Console

Early Childhood

Everyone

Everyone 10+

Teen

Mature

Adults Only

Total

PC

194

3810

59

1538

604

19

6224

Playstation 2

1

588

67

569

236

1

1462

Xbox

0

360

42

381

193

1

977

GameCube

1

313

33

213

46

0

606

GameBoy Advance

3

808

39

95

9

0

954

DS

0

138

31

23

1

0

193

PSP

0

85

27

62

21

0

195

Source: ESRB. 2006.

Discussion Questions The data in the table was collated by searching the ratings database at the ESRB website (www.esrb.org). Use the data to determine a market share for the GameCube, Playstation 2, and Xbox consoles. Now compare these results with the PC platform. Next, determine the total percentage of video games that are appropriate for children aged 8, 12, and 16 to play. What ratings patterns can you glean from the above data as you compare the PC vs. console platforms and the console versus handheld platforms (i.e., the GameBoy Advance, DS, and PSP)?

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Ergonomic Audit In their book, The Child and the Machine (Key Porter, 1998), Armstrong and Casement cite this example in support of their argument that not enough attention is paid to ergonomics in schools: While visiting a computer lab with my daughter and her grade two class, I watched while the children got a crash course in the use of various software programs. Although the chairs swiveled and were adjustable, they had clearly been made for adult bodies.... Missing from the lesson was any guidance on correct hand and body posture at the keyboard. No one mentioned that the chairs were adjustable and could be made more comfortable for children of different sizes.... The equipment was completely out of proportion for virtually the entire group of seven-year-olds. Consequently, all of these children spent the morning with their heads tilted upwards at the screen in a posture designed to put strain on the spine and give them sore necks. (p. 154) For budgetary and efficiency reasons, most elementary schools purchase or repurpose generic furniture that is then used in computer labs to seat multiple grades of students of various ages. Yet there is growing awareness of the need to design workstations, chairs, and other furniture that are ergonomic and adjustable to accommodate students of various heights and builds. Consider, for example, the redeployment of traditional desks and other furniture to serve as computer tables in schools. Many schools spend thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars annually to equip their computer labs and classrooms with the latest computer hardware and software, but the tables on which this equipment sits are often an afterthought. Although computer labs are today used by both younger and older students for increasing amounts of time each year, the desks on which this equipment is placed are often of fixed height, putting the computer keyboard, mouse, and monitor at an awkward angle for those students who are too short or too tall to work comfortably at the computer for extended periods of time. In this activity, the students conduct an ergonomic audit of the school’s computer lab. They present their findings to the student council, principal, and school staff.

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Activity Invite an older group of students to conduct an ergonomic audit of the school’s computer lab. Ask them to take whatever factors they deem to be important in evaluating the ergonomic conditions of the lab. Here are some key questions: 1) Does the lab have fixed seating, or can the chairs be raised and lowered to accommodate the varying heights of the students? 2) Can the mice be moved to accommodate left-handed computer users? 3) Is there enough room and cord length for users to manipulate the mice and keyboards comfortably? 4) Can the monitors be easily raised, lowered, and tilted to adjust to the sight lines of users? Answers to these and other questions can be used as the basis for a written report that can then be presented to the student council, principal, and school staff with recommendations for improving the ergonomics of the computer lab.

Discussion This activity is an example of how social action leading to social change can provide students with a sense of empowerment. Real and positive change can result from this activity if school officials take seriously and act on students’ findings. In conducting their audit, the students may choose to limit their investigation to traditional ergonomic issues or instead broaden their analysis to include the lighting, temperature, and noise conditions of the computer lab. This activity is similar to an environmental audit of a school. In an effort to promote environmental awareness among students and staff and to lower levels of consumption and energy use, a growing number of schools are conducting environmental audits that track the flow of energy and waste products through the school. In addition to promoting energy efficiency, such initiatives also have the potential to promote an environmental ethic in students and staff. With the support of outside agencies, the students, teachers, and custodial staff track energy use patterns related to the flow of energy and waste products (e.g., disposed paper and food scraps) through the school. Results are then tallied, and an environmental action plan is put into place that may involve recycling, composting, energy and material use reduction, and other environmentally friendly reforms. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

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Fact vs. Opinion Reviews of video games proliferate the Internet. Some are written by professional journalists who work for respected print magazines or websites. Others are written by casual gamers who contribute their thoughts to video game forums and user review listings at GameSpot (www.gamespot.com) and other websites. Some reviews are in-depth. Others are far too short. Some reviews are well written. Others appear to have been assembled with very little care. Reviewers express their opinions in support of or against a video game. Often these opinions are backed up by evidence, but sometimes they are not. In this activity, the students analyze and parse one or more reviews of a video game for statements of fact and opinion.

Activity Assign students the task of parsing one or more reviews of a video game. For each of the opinions in a review, ask the students to look for specific evidence in the review that backs up the author’s opinion. Ask the students to flag those opinions that are supported by little or no evidence. Consider having the students complete a two-column chart for this activity. The first column will list the opinions the students find in the reviews they read. The second column will list the associated evidence the students find in the reviews to back up the author’s opinions. Following this activity, have the class discuss the quality of the reviews they have read more generally. Did the students find most of the reviews to be well written and argued? If not, why not? What common mistakes did the reviewers make? How could the students avoid making similar mistakes when writing their own video game reviews?

Discussion Use this activity as a vehicle for reinforcing the differences between overt bias and opinion that is backed up by fact. Solid reviews rely on the latter, but occasionally reviewers instead reveal a bias for or against a particular video game, series, or genre irrespective of the merits of the game itself. 64


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Ask the students to look for evidence of bias in the reviews they read. Which video game magazines and websites do the students trust the most to offer fair and balanced reviews that are free of bias? Which do they trust the least? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Discussion Article Reality Bytes: Eight Myths about Video Games Debunked

by Henry Jenkins A large gap exists between the public’s perception of video games and what the research actually shows. The following is an attempt to separate fact from fiction. 1.

The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence. According to federal crime statistics, the rate of juvenile violent crime in the United States is at a 30-year low. Researchers find that people serving time for violent crimes typically consume less media before committing their crimes than the average person in the general population. It’s true that young offenders who have committed school shootings in America have also been game players. But young people in general are more likely to be gamers—90 percent of boys and 40 percent of girls play. The overwhelming majority of kids who play do not commit antisocial acts. According to a 2001 U.S. Surgeon General’s report, the strongest risk factors for school shootings centered on mental stability and the quality of home life, not media exposure. The moral panic over violent video games is doubly harmful. It has led adult authorities to be more suspicious and hostile to many kids who already feel cut off from the system. It also misdirects energy away from eliminating the actual causes of youth violence and allows problems to continue to fester.

2.

Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression. Claims like this are based on the work of researchers who represent one relatively narrow school of research, “media effects.” This research in cludes some 300 studies of media violence. But most of those studies are inconclusive and many have been criticized on methodological grounds. In these studies, media images are removed from any narrative context. Subjects are asked to engage with content that they would not normally consume and may not understand. Finally, the laboratory context is radically different from the environments where games are normally played. Most studies found a correlation, not a causal relationship, which means the research could simply show that aggressive people like aggressive entertainment. That’s why the vague term “links”

66 Ä Playing to Learn is used here. If there is a consensus emerging around this research, it is that violent video games may be one risk factor—when coupled with other more immediate, real-world influences—which can contribute to anti-social behavior. But no research has found that video games are a primary factor or that violent video gameplay could turn an otherwise normal person into a killer. 3.

Children are the primary market for video games. While most American kids do play video games, the center of the video game market has shifted older as the first generation of gamers continues to play into adulthood. Already 62 percent of the console market and 66 percent of the PC market is age 18 or older. The game industry caters to adult tastes. Meanwhile, a sizable number of parents ignore game ratings because they assume that games are for kids. One quarter of children ages 11 to 16 identify a Mature rated game as among their favorites. Clearly, more should be done to restrict advertising and marketing that targets young consumers with mature content, and to educate parents about the media choices they are facing. But parents need to share some of the responsibility for making decisions about what is appropriate for their children. The news on this front is not all bad. The Federal Trade Commission has found that 83 percent of game purchases for underage consumers are made by parents or by parents and children together.

4.

Almost no girls play computer games. Historically, the video game market has been predominantly male. However, the percentage of women playing games has steadily increased over the past decade. Women now slightly outnumber men playing Web-based games. Spurred by the belief that games were an important gateway into other kinds of digital literacy, efforts were made in the mid-1990s to build games that appealed to girls. More recent games such as The Sims were huge crossover successes that attracted many women who had never played games before. Given the historic imbalance in the game market (and among people working inside the game industry), the presence of sexist stereotyping in games is hardly surprising. Yet it’s also important to note that female game characters are often portrayed as powerful and independent. In his book, Killing Monsters, Gerard Jones argues that young girls often build upon these representations of strong women warriors as a means of building up their self confidence in confronting challenges in their everyday lives.

5.

Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them. Former military psychologist and moral reformer David Grossman argues that because the military uses games in training (including, he claims, training soldiers to shoot and kill), the generation of young people who play such games are similarly being brutalized and conditioned to be aggressive in their everyday social interactions.


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Grossman’s model only works if: ¸ we remove training and education from a meaningful cultural context ¸ we assume learners have no conscious goals and that they show no resistance

to what they are being taught

¸ we assume that they unwittingly apply what they learn in a fantasy environ-

ment to real world spaces.

The military uses games as part of a specific curriculum, with clearly defined goals, in a context where students actively want to learn and have a need for the information being transmitted. There are consequences for not mastering those skills. That being said, a growing body of research does suggest that games can enhance learning. In his recent book, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, James Gee describes game players as active problem solvers who do not see mistakes as errors, but as opportunities for improvement. Players search for newer, better solutions to problems and challenges, he says. And they are encouraged to constantly form and test hypotheses. This research points to a fundamentally different model of how and what players learn from games. 6.

Video games are not a meaningful form of expression. On April 19, 2002, U.S. District Judge Stephen N. Limbaugh Sr. ruled that video games do not convey ideas and thus enjoy no constitutional protection. As evidence, Saint Louis County presented the judge with videotaped excerpts from four games, all within a narrow range of genres, and all the subject of previous controversy. Overturning a similar decision in Indianapolis, Federal Court of Appeals Judge Richard Posner noted: “Violence has always been and remains a central interest of humankind and a recurrent, even obsessive theme of culture, both high and low. It engages the interest of children from an early age, as anyone familiar with the classic fairy tales collected by Grimm, Andersen, and Perrault are aware.” Posner adds, “To shield children right up to the age of 18 from exposure to violent descriptions and images would not only be quixotic, but deforming; it would leave them unequipped to cope with the world as we know it.” Many early games were little more than shooting galleries where players were encouraged to blast everything that moved. Many current games are designed to be ethical testing grounds. They allow players to navigate an expansive and open-ended world, make their own choices, and witness the consequences. The Sims designer Will Wright argues that games are perhaps the only medium that allows us to experience guilt over the actions of fictional characters. In a movie, one can always pull back and condemn the character or the artist when they cross certain social boundaries. But in playing a game, we choose what happens to the characters. In the right circumstances, we can be encouraged to examine our own values by seeing how we behave within virtual space.

68 Ä Playing to Learn 7.

Video game play is socially isolating. Much video game play is social. Almost 60 percent of frequent gamers play with friends. Thirty-three percent play with siblings and 25 percent play with spouses or parents. Even games designed for single players are often played socially, with one person giving advice to another holding a joystick. A growing number of games are designed for multiple players—for either cooperative play in the same space or online play with distributed players. Sociologist Talmadge Wright has logged many hours observing online communities interact with and react to violent video games, concluding that meta-gaming (conversation about game content) provides a context for thinking about rules and rule-breaking. In this way there are really two games taking place simultaneously: one, the explicit conflict and combat on the screen; the other, the implicit cooperation and comradeship between the players. Two players may be fighting to death on screen and growing closer as friends off screen. Social expectations are reaffirmed through the social contract governing play, even as they are symbolically cast aside within the transgressive fantasies represented onscreen.

8.

Video game play is desensitizing. Classic studies of play behavior among primates suggest that apes make basic distinctions between play fighting and actual combat. In some circumstances, they seem to take pleasure wrestling and tousling with each other. In others, they might rip each other apart in mortal combat. Game designer and play theorist Eric Zimmerman describes the ways we understand play as distinctive from reality as entering the “magic circle.” The same action—say, sweeping a floor—may take on different meanings in play (as in playing house) than in reality (housework). Play allows kids to express feelings and impulses that have to be carefully held in check in their real-world interactions. Media reformers argue that playing violent video games can cause a lack of empathy for real-world victims. Yet, a child who responds to a video game the same way he or she responds to a real-world tragedy could be showing symptoms of being severely emotionally disturbed. Here’s where the media effects research, which often uses punching rubber dolls as a marker of real-world aggression, becomes problematic. The kid who is punching a toy designed for this purpose is still within the “magic circle” of play and understands her actions on those terms. Such research shows us only that violent play leads to more violent play.

Sources Entertainment Software Association. 2003. Top ten industry facts. http://www.theesa. com/pressroom.html Gee, James. 2001. What video games have to tell us about learning and literacy. New York: Palgrave. Grossman, David. 2000. Teaching kids to kill. Phi Kappa Phi National Forum. http://www.killology.org/article_teachkid.htm


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Heins, Marjorie. 2002. Brief Amica Curiae of Thirty Media Scholars (submitted to the United States Court of Appeals, Eight Circuit). Interactive Digital Software Association et al. vs. St. Louis County et al. http://www.fepproject.org/courtbriefs/ stlouissummary.html Jenkins, Henry. 2002. Coming up next: Ambushed on “Donahue.” Salon. http://www. salon.com/tech/feature/2002/08/20/jenkins_on_donahue/ Jenkins, Henry. 2002. Lessons from Littleton: What Congress doesn’t want to hear about youth and media. Independent Schools. http://www.nais.org/pubs/ ismag.cfm?file_id=537&ismag_id=14 Jones, Gerard. 2002. Killing monsters: Why children need fantasy, superheroes, and make-believe violence. New York: Basic. Salen, Katie, and Zimmerman, Eric. 2003. Rules of play: Game design fundamentals. Cambridge: MIT Press. Sternheimer, Karen. 2003. It’s not the media: The truth about popular culture’s influence on children. New York: Westview. Wright, Talmadge. 2002. Creative player actions in FPS online video games: Playing Counter-Strike. Game Studies. December. http://www.gamestudies.org/0202/ wright/ About the Author: Henry Jenkins is the Director of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program. He is the author of Fans, Bloggers and Gamers: Exploring Participatory Culture (NYU Press, 2006). Source: Jenkins, Henry. 2004. Reality bytes: Eight myths about video games debunked. KCTS/PBS. August 23. (Courtesy of Video Game Revolution, KCTS Television, copyright 2005.) URL: http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolution/impact/ myths.html


Does the author effectively counter the argument that violent games produce violent people?

2.

Identify and then debunk an additional myth about video games that is not covered in the article.

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Fine Motor Count A great deal of dexterity of finger movement is required to play most video games well. In a typical gaming session, players will depress a control element dozens, if not hundreds, of times—pushing, pulling, and otherwise “mashing” buttons, keys, triggers, joysticks, and directional pads on gamepads, keyboards, and other game controllers. In this activity, the students tally the number of times one or more gamepad buttons are pressed during a gaming session. They then transfer this data onto a chart for further analysis during math class.

Activity Ask three or four student volunteers to come to the front of the class. Invite one of the students to play a favorite console video game for a set amount of time using a PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, or similar controller. This activity can also be completed using a handheld gaming device. The other student volunteers are to monitor closely the finger movements of the player. Each is responsible for counting the number of times a specific button is pressed. Have the students record the final button count on a tally chart the class has prepared in advance of the activity. Repeat the activity two or three times to accumulate multiple results. The tallied results can be discussed, compared, graphed, and otherwise manipulated by the class. For example, the students can total the number of presses for each button in order to determine which is the most and least used. The students can also use the data they have collected to calculate the average number of button presses per minute.

Discussion Repeat this activity with games that belong to a variety of genres (e.g., action, driving, and fighting games). Tally and compare the results for each genre. Prior to leading this activity, ask the students to give their hypotheses as to which genre will have the lowest and highest fine motor count.

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This activity can also be adapted to take into consideration for how long a button is held down. For example, it is common in driving games for the accelerator button to be held down for extended periods of time, sometimes for the duration of an entire race. Discuss with students the various types of fine motor movements required by video games and the ergonomic challenges posed by each: quick button presses, held down buttons, quickly repeated button presses (known as “button mashing”), pushing controls up, down, left, or right, holding down multiple buttons at the same time, and so on. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Math

Hardware manufacturers are constantly experimenting with new controller innovations. Nintendo’s Wii controller, for example, features motion control over the gameplay. Swing the controller to hit a golf ball. Flick the controller to cast a fishing line.

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Fitness Regime Many young people look to sports, television, movies, video games, and comic books for roles models. In their fantasy lives, some children aspire to attain the same heroic status that the leading characters in these various pursuits have achieved. Many sports heroes and leading video game and comic book characters are in prime physical condition. No doubt they maintain a rigorous fitness regime to keep themselves in such good shape. In this activity, the students propose a series of fitness exercises for a leading video game or comic book character.

Activity Ask each student to choose a favorite sports, television, movie, video game, or comic book character or other role model who is in excellent physical condition. For the person they have chosen, assign students the task of putting together a physical fitness regime that will keep the character in prime physical condition. The exercises the students come up with should target at least three or four muscle regions of the body and include a variety of movements. The students can choose to focus on strength, stamina, speed, and so on. The exercises they choose can be fairly generic (e.g., running) or unique and creative (but safe). Have the students share their exercises with each other. Ask each student to demonstrate to the class one or more of the exercises they have come up with. Alternatively, ask each student to teach one of their exercises to the class.

Discussion Optionally, ask each student to perform the exercises they have come up with once daily over a two-week period. Using a tracking chart, ask the students to focus on improvements to their strength, stamina, and/or speed as they monitor more general improvements to their health and physical well-being.

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For a humorous take on this activity, invite the students to propose a series of fictional exercises that especially suit the special powers sported by their favorite video game or comic book superheroes. For example, a student may propose a series of flying exercises to improve Superman’s speed and stamina. Another student might propose a variety of acrobatic web slinging exercises to improve Spiderman’s abilities. As a follow-up to this activity, consider leading the “Body Image” activity, which is discussed elsewhere in this book. This activity focuses on the underside of physical conditioning in sports and the exaggerated representation of the human form that is often found in video games and comic books. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

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Discussion Article

Exercise, Lose Weight with “Exergaming”

by Star Lawrence As the beeps and whistles emanate from the family room, are you afraid Junior is going to develop thumbs the size of bananas and a belly to match? According to Judith Sherman-Wolin, exercise specialist with the UCLA Center for Human Nutrition and author of Smart Girls Do Dumbbells, dietary guidelines may come and go, but the one constant is exercise. Over half of Americans don’t get enough (now pegged at 30 minutes to an hour a day), and a quarter of us are total taters. But—get this—what if playing video games did provide some exercise? Some do! It’s a new trend called “exergaming” or “exertainment.” The jam-packed hit of this year’s Consumer Electronics Show was a “Cardio PlayZone,” featuring some of the new workout and movement video contraptions.

Dance Dance Revolution DDR, as its many aficionados hiply call it, runs on the Xbox platform. This started out as an arcade game, played on a floor display, sort of like an amped-up Twister. The system is loaded with catchy tunes and can be calibrated to different levels of intensity as the players dance to the pattern, either individually or competitively. When the manufacturer, Konami of Japan, migrated it to the PlayStation in April, 1999, 3 million copies flew off the shelves. “I am familiar with DDR,” Cedric Bryant, Ph.D., chief exercise physiologist for the American Council on Exercise, tells WebMD. “My four boys play it. It can be strenuous and can really get your heart rate up. It has different levels of intensity.” (Reportedly, there is even a module for the Lawrence Welk—make that Rod Stewart—set.)

74 Ä Playing to Learn Nicktoons Movin’ Sherman-Wolin once was asked to do an energy expenditure study on Nicktoons Movin’, a game played on the PlayStation 2 EyeToy platform. “I tried it,” she says. “It was fun.” Atop the TV is a motion-sensitive EyeToy USB camera that allows players to sort of “jump inside” the game. The games and characters are based on Nickelodeon characters and “hosted” by SpongeBob SquarePants. Up to eight players wildly move their arms to fix Cosmo and Wanda’s fishbowl, go for a drive with Mrs. Puff, help Timmy smash robots, go bowling with SpongeBob, and other cartoonishly entrancing activities. Did smashing virtual robots really up the heart rate? Sherman-Wolin says yes. Fifteen percent of kids aged 6 to 19 are overweight, she notes. If sitting still and watching TV consumed 16 calories an hour for the average 55-pound 8-year-old and standing only expended 20 calories, sweating with the Spongester burned 50 calories. “I liken it to Ping Pong,” she says. “You are sort of standing there and sort of moving at the same time.”

Golf Launchpad In this one, back off, kiddies, you use your own golf clubs to play 800 of the most challenging golf courses in the world. The USB game controller package runs on the PC and Macintosh platforms and is coming to PlayStation. Tiger Woods gaming software is included, and it can also be used with Microsoft’s Links. You play on a mat filled with sensors and hit a real (tethered) golf ball with your own clubs. The company which produces it, Electric-Spin Corporation, is located in Canada, and thus far the product is available in the United States only online or at Edwin Watts golf shops, although it is expected to go wider shortly. After you purchase the product, you can use the serial number to download special analysis software that scopes out your swing. Is playing virtual golf real exercise? “I have been a golf pro for 20 years,” sales manager Shawn Clement tells WebMD, “and I can tell you that if you hit a golf ball for an hour, it’s a tremendous workout.” Walloping the ball uses 200 muscles, he notes. And if you unplug and walk the course and carry the clubs, it’s as good exercise as cycling.

Kilowatt “My whole body strained to keep a Gran Turismo 3 race car on the road. If I had this in the gym, I would play it every day,” claims one user of Kilowatt, a whole-body gaming system from Powergrid Fitness in Laurel, Md. Kilowatt is a hefty $800 machine with a four-foot joystick (they call it a steering stalk). It runs ordinary video games but really makes you apply body English. According to a


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white paper a sports medicine physician prepared for the company, the stalk is adjustable to different levels of resistance (intensity). The basic benefit (besides fun) is isometric exercise—the flexing of muscles without joint movement, meaning it’s low impact. According to Bryant, anytime you turn yourself into the joystick, you are getting exercise. When one set of muscles fatigue in fast, competitive play, the body will automatically seek other positions to work other groups to avoid losing the game, so a range of muscles is flexed. In one study, heart rate went from 77 at rest to 123 on the Kilowatt (in fit, college-aged males). Regular, thumbs-intensive video gaming bumped heart rate only two points. Again, according to the company-sponsored white paper, if a 170-pound male played video games using the Kilowatt for 40 minutes a day for five days a week, this would result in an expenditure of 680 calories. Played once a day for a week, this would burn off more than a pound of fat. Would the average person keep it up? Well, many average people do keep up playing video games every day. This is just a harder (more beneficial) way to do it.

Last Word Despite his sons’ propensity for video dancing, ACE’s Bryant says he does not allow video games during the week. “We use them as a bit of a carrot,” he says, “for academic as well as activity reasons. Kids tend to be creative and want to move and be active.” He suggests parents not just throw one of these more active games at kids and think their exercise needs are fulfilled. “You can use it to get kids to do other exercises,” he says. “Many kids are competitive. If they want to get to the next level on one of these, suggest more strength or stamina training such as jumping, running, and hopping.” Running and playing? Like we parents used to do as kids? “I think parents need to teach kids what it’s like to run around outside,” he says. “Play Capture the Flag. It’s back to the future.” If you do that, maybe Junior will move over and let you take the stalk. Sources: Judith Sherman-Wolin, Exercise Specialist, UCLA Center for Human Nutrition; Author, Smart Girls Do Dumbbells. Cedric Bryant, Ph.D., Chief Exercise Physiologist, American Council on Exercise. Shawn Clement, Sales Manager, Electric-Spin Corp., Woodbridge, Ontario. About the Author: Star Lawrence is a medical journalist based in the Phoenix, Arizona, area. Source: Lawrence, Star. 2005. Exercise, lose weight with “exergaming.” WebMD. Jan. 18. URL: http://www.webmd.com/content/Article/99/105236.htm?pagenumber=1



Do you agree with the article’s conclusion that “exergaming” can provide some (but not all) of the regular exercise that children require? Why or why not?

2.

Is “exergaming” a temporary fad or here to stay?

Ä

Foley Effects Artist Foley artists record many of the sound effects that we hear in movies, television shows, and video games. Sounds such as a person walking in high-heel shoes or a door creaking open are recorded after filming (in postproduction) so that dialog, sound effects, and music can be edited and mixed separately. The hallmark of Foley work in the golden age of Hollywood was the radio dramas and first nonsilent films of the early twentieth century. Foley artists would often record their sound effects on sound stages that afforded them plenty of freedom of movement and lots of storage space for all of the (often bulky) materials they were apt to use to create sounds. A segment of a film would repeatedly play over and over again in full view of a Foley artist who would then precisely time and record the Foley effects for the movie. Common effects included kissing the back of one’s hand to simulate two people kissing, thumping watermelons to simulate a punch, and clapping coconut shells together to simulate horses hooves. Among the first Foley artists was Jack Foley (1891–1967), from whom the title of Foley artist is derived. In this activity, the students become Foley artists as they replace the sound effects in a video game with their own sounds derived from materials they have collected in and around their school and home.

Activity In advance of this activity, record some video game footage of an action scene into a computer. The class will play back this footage repeatedly (and silently) as they experiment with adding their own Foley effects. Begin this activity by introducing students to the role that Foley artists play in the production of films, television shows, and video games. Emphasize the four primary tasks of a Foley artist: 1) exploring the world of sound; 2) collecting materials that simulate real-world sounds; 3) creating new and interesting sounds; and 4) recording sound effects for films, television shows, and video games.

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78 Ä Playing to Learn Play back the video game footage you have captured, first with sound and then without. Brainstorm with students a list of sound effects that should accompany the footage. Pay close attention to objects colliding, doors opening, and other motion and collision elements. Over the course of the next few days, ask the students to experiment with the auditory properties of items in the world around them, including school, home, the outdoors, and other places they routinely visit. Ask the students to collect those items that best simulate the sound effects needed for the video game footage they have watched in class. Once all of the Foley materials have been assembled, play back the video game footage without sound. Invite the students to use the materials they have collected to re-create the sound effects that accompany the footage. Optionally record the sound effects for dubbing into the video itself. Be prepared for this activity to lead to numerous outbursts of laughter and hilarity. This is meant to be a fun and enjoyable activity, one that brings the class together as a community of learners and musicians.

Discussion In lieu of asking the students to bring in materials from home, instead ask them to use their voice, hands, and body to simulate the sounds they wish to create. This can be particularly effective for younger students or students who are struggling with the timing of the Foley effects. Alternatively, consider asking the students to use their voice, hands, and body to simulate the Foley effects before collecting and experimenting with real-world materials in a subsequent lesson. For a high-tech version of this activity, refer to the “Foley Effects Artist (Take Two)” activity that follows. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Music

Activity Quickie

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Storyboard Sequence

Provide the students with a randomly ordered series of screenshots captured moments apart from the same gameplay action. Now ask the students to perform a photo analysis on the screenshots as they put them back into the correct order. Next, have each student create his or her own storyboard sequence and then challenge a peer to put the screenshots back into the correct order. (Drama)

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Foley Effects Artist (Take Two) Foley artists record many of the sound effects that we hear in movies, television shows, and video games. Sounds, such as an explosion in space or a door slamming shut, are recorded after filming (in postproduction) so that dialog, sound effects, and music can be edited and mixed separately. A big part of a Foley artists’ work is exploring the world around them—listening, auditioning, and collecting materials that illicit unique, interesting, or familiar sounds. Although Foley artists also rely on prefabricated sound libraries, many spend considerable time exploring and recording sounds in the real world. Some even go to the far corners of the Earth to find just the right sound. Still other Foley artists work with sound design specialists to create entirely new sounds by combining, distorting, and otherwise morphing existing sounds using a computer synthesizer. In this activity, the students add Foley effects to their game creations and video productions.

Activity Prior to introducing this activity, invest in a sound effects library for your school or classroom’s project studio. You may wish to purchase an inexpensive sound effects CD or DVD library or a software tool that generates and modifies raw waveforms or sampled sounds. Some suggestions are provided in the discussion section that follows. Discuss with students the role that Foley artists and sound design specialists play in the making of a movie, television show, or video game. Without sound effects, a video game might well seem lifeless and unrealistic. Sounds effects add excitement to the gameplay and reinforce and punctuate the action occurring on screen. Encourage the students to use the sound effects library that you have provided to augment their own video game and movie productions. Similar to television sportscasts, commercials, and movie and TV productions, sound effects can be used as transitional elements between scenes or as Foley effects for motion and collision elements in the footage itself. Also encourage the students to use the provided sound design tools to create new sounds, particularly for space and fantasy themed video game titles.

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Discussion The study of Foley effects is a great way to introduce students to musical synthesis and sound design techniques using hardware- or software-based tools that generate unique and innovative electronic sounds. Students can experiment with the principles of sound design by manipulating samples and waveforms, adding special effects, and layering and modulating the sounds they create. No longer do music teachers need to invest in expensive hardware synthesizers. If your project studio is powerful enough, you can instead purchase a software synthesizer that allows students to experiment with sound design techniques on a Macintosh or Windows computer. Absynth (www.native-instruments.de) and X-Treme Effects (www.ilio.com) are two popular sound design tools for professionals, but there are also less expensive alternatives aimed at consumers, including GarageBand (www.apple.com) and SONAR (www.cakewalk.com). For a non-tech take on the work of Foley artists, refer to the previous activity, “Foley Effects Artist.” Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Discussion Article Soaking Up the Media: Full-time Job for Kids

by Miranda Hitti Many American kids are growing up with media as a constant companion. “Young people today live media-saturated lives, spending an average of nearly 6.5 hours a day with media,” says a new Kaiser Family Foundation report. That equals about 44.5 hours per week, as much as a full-time job, says the report.

Kids’ Media Use The study looked at a wide range of media including TV, music, computers, and video games. TV and music were the top media sources among kids and teens. Interactive media came next, followed by reading. Here’s how each source ranked, with participants’ average daily hours: ¸ TV: 3 hours (nearly 4 hours with DVDs, videos, and prerecorded shows) ¸ Music: 1.4 hours


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¸ Computers: 1 hour (not counting schoolwork) ¸ Video games: 49 minutes ¸ Reading: 43 minutes (books, magazines, and newspapers not required for

school)

When it comes to TV, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends no more than one to two hours of quality TV or videos for older children per day, and no screen time for children under 2 years. The Kaiser Family Foundation’s report is based on a national sample of 2000 children aged 8–18 years. Participants filled out anonymous written questionnaires detailing their media use on the previous day. Additional information came from media diaries kept for a week by nearly 700 young people. Researchers included Stanford University communication professor Donald F. Roberts, Ph.D., who has studied children and media since the 1960s. Roberts has also served as an educational consultant for some children’s TV programs and helped develop the rating and parental advisory system adopted by the computer game industry.

How Many Media Devices Are in Kids’ Homes? The children and teens in the study had many ways to access the media. The typical participant lives in a home with: ¸ 3.6 CD or tape players ¸ 3.5 TVs ¸ 3.3 radios ¸ 2.9 VCRs/DVD players ¸ 2.1 video game consoles ¸ 1.5 computers

Almost one in four live in homes with five or more TVs. In 63% of the kids’ homes, the TV usually stays on during meals. The TV is left on most of the time—even if no one is watching it—in half (51%) of the kids’ homes, says the report.

Race, Class Gaps Most children of all major ethnic and socioeconomic groups had Internet access at home. However, some gaps remain.

82 Ä Playing to Learn For instance, 80% of white participants had Internet access at home, compared with 61% of black youth. In addition, about half (54%) of kids going to school in communities with average incomes of less than $35,000 per year go online daily, compared with 71% of those from communities with an average income of more than $50,000 per year.

Wired Bedrooms Many of the participants had media equipment in their bedrooms: ¸ 68% had a TV ¸ 54% had a VCR/DVD player ¸ 49% had a video game console ¸ 31% had a computer in their bedroom

Media Multitasking Kids and teens often dabble in more than one type of media at a time, says the report. For instance, they may play music while reading, or go online while also keeping an eye on the TV. “Given that about a quarter (26%) of the time young people are using media, they’re using more than one medium at a time, they are actually exposed to the equivalent of 8.5 hours a day of media content, even though they pack that into less than 6.5 hours of time,” researchers write. The Foundation says it’s not sure how multitasking affects kids. “Kids are multitasking and consuming many different kinds of media all at once,” says Drew Altman, Ph.D., president and CEO of the Kaiser Family Foundation, in a news release. “Multitasking is a growing phenomenon in media use and we don’t know whether it’s good or bad or both.”

How Do Kids Divide Up Their Time? Here’s how the participants spent the rest of their time on an average day: ¸ Hanging out with parents: 2 hours, 17 minutes ¸ Hanging out with friends: 2 hours, 16 minutes ¸ Physical activity: 1 hour, 25 minutes ¸ Hobbies or other activities: 1 hour ¸ Talking on the phone: 53 minutes


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¸ Doing homework: 50 minutes ¸ Working at a job: 35 minutes ¸ Doing chores: 32 minutes

Most Participants Say They’re Happy, Active “Contrary to most expectations, it does not appear that spending time with media takes away from the time children spend in other pursuits,” says the report. “In fact, it seems that those young people who spend the most time using media are also those whose lives are the most full with family, friends, sports, and other interests,” the report notes. Most of the kids reported being largely happy and well adjusted. However, the 18% who ranked lowest in “contentedness” spent more time with media (nine hours and 44 minutes of total daily media exposure, compared with about eight hours for other kids). That doesn’t mean that the media is to blame for those participants’ discontent. The study also showed no difference between the amount of time the kids said they spent in physical activities between heavy and light TV users. That was also true for those spending the most time with all media and those spending less time with media. However, other research has indicated that media may be linked to kids’ weight problems, inactivity, violence, and other issues. The results suggest that families may watch TV together. Is that quality time? The study isn’t sure. “It’s unclear how much real interaction occurs between parents and their children when they’re watching TV together,” says the study. “Young people who live in homes where the TV is left on during meals or is simply left on most of the time are less likely to say they talk to their parents about problems than other kids.”

Rules Aren’t Always Established Just more than half (53%) of the participants said their families had no rules about TV watching. Another 46% said their families have some rules, but only 20% said those rules are enforced most of the time. Of the study’s youngest participants—aged 8–10 years—55% said there were TV rules in their homes. It can be tough to keep up with kids’ media use. Not sure where to start? The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) offers these tips for parents: ¸ Make a media plan. Schedule media times and choices in advance. ¸ Set media time limits. Try using a timer.

84 Ä Playing to Learn ¸ Set family guidelines for media content. Check content ratings and parental

advisories. Help children and teens make appropriate choices.

¸ Be clear and consistent with children about media rules. ¸ Keep TVs, VCRs, video games, and computers out of children’s bedrooms.

Instead, place those items where you can be involved and monitor their use.

¸ Make media a family activity. Whenever possible, use media with your chil-

dren and talk about what’s presented.

¸ Encourage kids to ask questions about media messages. Discuss and compare

media messages to the values you want your child to learn.

¸ Look for media “side effects.” For instance, notice any increase in night-

mares, aggressive behavior, poor school performance, increased eating of unhealthy foods, smoking, drinking, or drug use. Media may—or may not—be a factor, but it helps to be aware of all possible influences, including media.

Sources: Kaiser Family Foundation, “Generation M: Media in the Lives of 8-18 Year-Olds.” News release, Kaiser Family Foundation. American Academy of Pediatrics, “Media Guidelines for Parents.” About the Author: Miranda Hitti is a medical writer for WebMD (www.webmd.com). Source: Hitti, Miranda. 2005. Soaking up the media: Full-time job for kids. WebMD. March 10. URL: http://www.webmd.com/content/Article/101/106496.htm?pagenumber=1


Review the many statistics that are cited in this article. Which one surprises you the most? Which one surprises you the least?

2.

Consider recreating the survey for your classmates to complete. Then compare the results with those given in the article.


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Data Table

Playday Survey The table below comprises part of the results for a survey that was commissioned by the Children’s Play Council in the United Kingdom. Conducted in July 2006, the survey polled more than 500 children aged 7–14. The children were asked “If you had the choice, would you rather play a computer game or ….” Here are their responses, broken down by age and gender. Response

Male

Female

Age 7–10

Age 11–14

Total

Hang out with my friends outside

73

118

57

133

191

Play with water/ swim

35

63

60

38

98

Build a den

39

11

33

17

50

Get dirty/muddy

16

12

16

12

28

Climb trees

13

12

15

9

25

Go to the woods/forest/fields

11

9

9

12

20

Play in the playground

5

6

6

5

11

Other outdoor activity

30

13

14

30

43

I would rather play a computer game

54

17

48

23

71

Don’t know

2

4

5

2

6

Source: Children’s Play Council. 2006. Play, naturally: Survey of children’s views. London: Children’s Play Council.

Discussion Questions Analyze the results in the table. How does video game playing fair in comparison to the other recreational pursuits? Are there recreational activities that are not covered by the above question? If so, list them. Could the survey be improved in other ways? Design and administer your own survey to some of the students in your school. How do the results of your study compare with the results of this British study?

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For How Long Do I Play? Many parents are concerned about the amount of time their children spend playing video games, watching television, and/or using the computer. Asking students to track the amount of time they daily devote to these activities can help them to become more aware of their routines even as they learn mathematical and research skills. In this activity, the students track the amount of time they spend playing video games over a two-week period. They then analyze and perform calculations on the data they have gathered.

Activity As a full class, create a chart that the students will use to track the amount of time they spend playing video games each day over a two-week period. The tracking chart should ideally be a table that comprises eight columns across and three rows down (refer to the data table that follows for an example). In the first row of the chart, have the students write out the days of the week followed by the heading “Total.” Also include a blank line outside of the chart where the students can indicate their gender. Using the tracking chart they have created, ask the students to track the amount of time they spend playing video games each day over a two-week period. (You may first need to secure the permission of parents and guardians prior to collecting this data. It is also advisable to collect the data anonymously—i.e., don’t have the students write their names on their individual tracking charts.) Ask the students to use the timer on a wristwatch to keep track of the number of minutes they spend playing video games each day. At the end of the day, the students should record the total number of minutes they’ve spent playing video games in the appropriate box on the chart. At the end of each week, have the students total the number of minutes for the whole week. Once the data collection is complete, randomly redistribute the tracking charts to the class. Either have the students analyze the charts they have before them or instead have the class compile a master chart to analyze together. Here are some key questions the students may wish to ask as they analyze the data: 1) On which day did the students play video games the most? On which day did they play the least? 2) What was the average daily playing time for video games each week? 3) Did the students spend more time playing video games on school days or weekends? 4) 86


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Did the boys spend more time playing video games than the girls? If so, how much more time? Consider having the students write out their hypotheses to these questions prior to collecting the data. Also consider having the students graph the results of their data analyses into bar, line, and pie charts.

Discussion This activity can be adapted to work with other leisure activities such as television viewing, computer and Internet usage, eating, reading, playing outside, spending time with friends, participating in organized sports, practicing a musical instrument, and so on. Indeed, the students could track more than one activity at a time and then compare the results. As they complete this activity, discuss with students the importance of maintaining anonymity in the study. There are likely to be one or more students in the class who play video games a lot more than the rest of the class. There are also likely to be students who never play video games. These and other students may not wish others to know about their playing habits. Protecting a person’s privacy is arguably the most important obligation a researcher has. That’s why it is important to delete the names of students from the collected data prior to sharing and analyzing it. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Math

Data Table

Video Game Playing Tracking Chart Fill in the following chart over a two-week period as you track your video game playing time. Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Gender: ___ Female ___ Male

Fri

Sat

Sun

Total

Total: _________

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Game Invention At their heart, many video games are all about rules of play and moving around set game worlds. In these and other ways, video games have much in common with real-world games and sports that have their own rules of play and game worlds where the action takes place (e.g., soccer fields and baseball diamonds). There is even direct crossover between sports and video games. Baseball, basketball, football, hockey, and other sports simulations are among the most popular video games on the market. In this activity, the students design a real-world game or sport that they then teach others to play in a physical education class.

Activity Lay out examples of all of the various types of sports equipment stored in the school’s gymnasium. Challenge the students to work in small groups to create a brand-new sport or game that uses some (or none) of this equipment. Working together, each group should determine whether their new game is individual- or team-based, the playing field for the game, the rules of play, a scoring system, and other details. Additionally, each group should name its new game. As the students design their new game, encourage them to consider the attributes of both sports and video games that make for effective gameplay (e.g., set boundaries, clear goals and objectives, fair rules of play, and increasing levels of complexity and challenge). Once the students are ready, have each group share its new game with the class. Optionally, have the class play the game and then provide the game’s designers with feedback to help them fine-tune the rules of play.

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Discussion As an extension to this activity, ask the students to brainstorm the characteristics of a good game. A game should be fun and challenging (but not too challenging), active, relatively easy learn (but difficult to master), safe, and rewarding. The rules should be clear to all and, above all, fair. What other characteristics of good games can the students think of? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

Activity Quickie

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Exercise Games

Ask the students to play test two or three exercise-based video games that require players to move and/or dance as they play the game (e.g., Dance Dance Revolution). Have the students report back on the health benefits of each, focusing particularly on improvements to their gross motor abilities and cardiovascular systems. (Health and Physical Education)

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Gaming Budget As with DVDs, there are many gamers who take great pride in building a personal library of the video games they own, but also many other gamers who are content to rent video games for a few days and then return them to the store. Renting a video game costs a lot less than purchasing it outright, but gamers who purchase a game do have the luxury of playing it whenever they wish (even on a whim) without having to leave their home to rent the game a second or third time. In this activity, the students perform a cost-benefit analysis of the practice of buying versus renting video games.

Activity Distribute a worksheet to the stu dents that in cludes vari ations on the following scenario: John has discovered a new video game that he really likes. It costs $49.95 to buy and $4.95 to rent for three days. John is pretty sure that he is going to enjoy the video game and will want to play it repeatedly over the next few months. John can buy the game outright or rent it several times. If he buys the game outright, he will be able to sell it back to the store as a used game. However, the game will depreciate in value by 10% each week. Propose three purchasing, renting, or buy-back options that John should consider. Now choose the best option and give your reasons for choosing it. Using this or a similar scenario, have the students determine for how many days John would need to play the video game to make purchasing it outright a more cost-effective decision than renting it for three days at a time. Also ask the students to debate the best time to sell back the used game. Selling the game a week after it has been purchased will earn John the most money, but he will only have a short period of time to play the game. On the other hand, if John waits too long to sell back the game, it will have lost most of its value.

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Discussion Following this activity, ask the students to brainstorm their own math scenarios. The students can draw on all sorts of video game statistics, including leaderboard rankings, racing time trials, and personal high scores. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Math

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Gaming Station Computers are playing an increasingly important instructional role in many schools across the United States. Most school districts spend many hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of dollars annually, purchasing desktop computers and other hardware and software for school labs and individual classrooms. Increasingly, school districts are also investing in laptop programs in which teachers and students are provided with purchased or leased portable computers. Some schools are equipping their staff and students with personal digital assistants (PDAs) in lieu of desktop or laptop computers. As this book argues, there is also much to be learned through video games. Video games can, of course, be purchased for Macintosh and Windows computers, but there are also many gaming titles, some with considerable educational potential, that are only available for console systems. In this activity, the teacher sets up a PlayStation 3, Wii, or Xbox 360 gaming station in the classroom that is to be used for educational purposes in the instructional program.

Activity A number of the activities in this book require students to have ready access to a desktop computer or video game console. Some of these activities can be completed at home where some (but not all) students have access to such systems, but if a teacher’s aim is to promote a collaborative, hands-on learning experience within the classroom, setting up an in-class gaming station may also be warranted. It will certainly be innovative. Ideally, a gaming station will be positioned close to a computer workstation and connected to the computer via a video and audio cable. This will allow gameplay footage to be captured. (The computer screen can also double as a monitor for the gaming station if the appropriate video adapter is used.) Devote enough space to the gaming station so that two or three students can collaborate around it at the same time. Consider requiring the students to use stereo headphones (surround-sound headphones can also be used) so as not to disrupt other classroom activities.

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As with the computer workstations in a classroom, it is absolutely critical that the ground rules for use of the gaming station be clear to all and that they be seen as fair and worthwhile by the students. As a general rule, the gaming station should not be used as a reward for students. Quite the contrary, a student should have a sound educational reason for signing up to use the classroom’s gaming station. Valid reasons may include the need to 1) capture video game footage or screenshots, 2) review a game, or 3) collect data about a video game. For those gaming consoles that do not support multiple accounts, there should also be a rule in place that only the teacher may delete (or overwrite) saved games. This will avoid instances in which students inadvertently delete each other’s progress in a game. Prior to establishing a permanent classroom gaming station, consider testing the feasibility of this idea by setting up a temporary gaming station as one of several activity centers for a short unit on video games. If the gaming station is a hit, establish a permanent gaming station that the students can rotate through for the duration of a term. Ideally, the students will soon learn to manage their own time with a gaming station, only using it when they need to, for sound educational purposes, in completing the activities in this book for example.

Discussion A gaming station is one of several possible computer workstation configurations worth considering. Others include a scanning workstation for scanning text and photos into a computer, a science workstation with an attached digital microscope and science probes, a video workstation for capturing, editing, and exporting digital video footage, and a music workstation that features a MIDI keyboard, microphone, and sound library. Also consider setting up a publishing workstation that features a quality color printer for outputting the final drafts of student writing, complete with artwork. These and other specialized workstations can be located in individual classrooms or common spaces, such as the school’s computer lab or library. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

Activity Quickie

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Car Tuning Guide

Ask a student who is fascinated with cars to write a car tuning guide for a racing game that helps players to upgrade and tune their vehicles. The guide should include text and photos plus clear explanations for each of the performance parts that gamers can install and tweak. (Language Arts)

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Graphical Analysis

As this screenshot from Crysis shows, video games are becoming ever more photorealistic and lifelike as graphics technologies grow more powerful. The next revolution in computer graphics could well be holograms and virtual-reality systems.

Cutting-edge visual effects are at the heart of many successful video games. Indeed, a game can succeed or fail in large measure because of its graphical prowess alone. The very best games boast realistic outdoor and interior environments, highly detailed building and character models, complex textures, and authentic lighting, shadow, and particle effects. In this activity, the students conduct a graphical analysis of a video game. They critique the models, textures, lighting, shadows, and other graphical features of the game.

Activity Have each student choose a recently released video game that features either cutting-edge or absolutely terrible graphics. As they play their chosen games, encourage the students to focus on a game’s visuals. Ask them to conduct a graphical analysis of the video game’s environments, characters, buildings, visual effects, and other graphical features. 94


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As they conduct their analyses, the students should pay close attention to a game’s models, textures, lighting, and particle effects. Are the game’s graphics impressive, terrible, or just plain average? Are the character animations realistic or stilted? Are the game’s environments destructible or fixed in place? Do the lighting, shadow, and reflective effects add a sense of realism to the game? Do the characters’ facial expressions look realistic? Have the students write a report on their findings.

Discussion As they complete their graphical analysis, also encourage the students to take the system requirements for the PC games they review into consideration. Graphically impressive video games nearly always require extra system resources, such a fast computer and/or a cutting-edge graphics card. Are the graphical bells and whistles a particular game promises worth the extra expense? Does the Windows Vista operating system, with its support for DirectX 10 graphics, far out pace what was possible with Windows XP and DirectX 9? As an extension to this activity, ask the students to research the graphical features boasted by one or more of the leading video game engines, such as Havok (www.havok.com), OpenGL (www.opengl.org), and RenderWare (www.renderware. com), or the embedded engines used in popular first-person shooter games such as Doom, Far Cry, Half-Life, Quake, and Unreal. If the students were to develop a no-holds-barred professional video game from the ground up, which of the engines would they most likely choose to use? Have the students determine the licensing costs for their chosen engine by searching the game engine listings at the DevMaster website (www.devmaster.net). Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts

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Historical Campaign World War II and the Vietnam War are very popular settings for wargames. More than a dozen World War II video games have been released in recent years, and 2004 was in many ways the year of Vietnam with no less than three Vietnam wargames hitting store shelves within weeks of each other. With each new release, the challenge for game developers is to keep their period shooters fresh. To this end, World War II games have led players through the occupied villages of France, challenged gamers to root out snipers in built-up cities such as Stalingrad, pitted players against each other in the desert regions of North Africa, and landed gamers in the middle of the D-Day invasion, among other scenarios. Have video games milked all they can from World War II, the Vietnam War, and other historical campaigns? Some video game journalists would seem to think so, but just then another World War II or Vietnam game comes along that ups the ante with a new take on a historic battle. In this activity, the students propose a new mission for an existing World War II– or Vietnam-based wargame. They draw their idea from an actual historical campaign or scenario that occurred during the war.

Activity This activity is ideally completed as an exit project for a history unit about World War II, the Vietnam War, or another historical conflict. Having researched several of the most famous battles that occurred during the war, challenge the students to work in pairs as they flesh out a gameplay scenario that is set during the war they have studied. Possible scenarios for World War II include: the Invasion of Poland, the Battle for France, the Battle of Britain, the North African Campaign, the Balkans Campaign, the Eastern Front, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Stalingrad, the Italian Campaign, the D-Day Invasion, and the Battle of the Bulge. As they research their gameplay scenarios, encourage the students to collect information related to the location(s) of their chosen battles; the weapons, vehicles, and technologies deployed; the chronology of the battles; the number of soldiers engaged, killed, and injured; and other pertinent information. 96


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Most World War II video games focus on the heroism of the American, British, German, and/or Soviet forces. As they choose a scenario to focus on, encourage the students to foreground the contributions of soldiers from other nations, such as Australia, Canada, and China. To close this activity, have the students prepare poster boards that explain the gameplay scenarios they have come up with. Require each poster board to include a map of the theater of operations, information about each side in the conflict, a chronology of the battle, a list of the weapons used, and other relevant information.

Discussion Although World War II and the Vietnam War are by far the most popular settings for historical wargames, there are also many other conflicts that could make for compelling video game titles, including World War I, the Korean War, the Gulf War, and the War in Iraq, as well as various UN peacekeeping operations around the world. A few of these conflicts have been chronicled in lesser known video games, but many others (e.g., the Korean War) have not. As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to propose a brand-new video game that is set in a historical or present-day conflict that is as of yet untapped by game developers. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: History

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Historical Place Analysis

For the Brothers in Arms series of World War II video games, the developers accurately modeled the farmsteads, villages, and built-up areas of the period. They also aimed for authenticity in the soldiers’ uniforms and weapons.

Some video games are set in puzzle worlds all their own, while others take place in fantasy environments in some far off distant future. This activity focuses on video games that are set in historically accurate real-world locations that aim for authenticity in the game world in which the player is immersed. One such game is the critically acclaimed Brothers in Arms series, a Mature-rated World War II tactical shooter franchise that is set in the actual French villages and countryside where allied and axis forces engaged each other in battle. In planning the Brothers in Arms games, the developers combed the National Archives in search of old photographs, maps, and first-person accounts of the French towns and farmsteads they intended to model. The terrain of the actual villages was also surveyed in person by a team of designers. Online previews of the first Brothers in Arms game show comparative before and after photos of the original buildings and the near identical buildings modeled in the game itself. In this activity, the students compare and contrast historically accurate video game environments with photographs and descriptions of the same real-world settings. 98


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Activity Provide the students with a selection of screenshots from a World War II video game that strives for authenticity in terms of its virtual environments. Also provide the students with actual photographs of the battlefields, cities, villages, and countrysides where World War II was fought. Many World War II photographs are readily available online and in books. Ask the students to perform a comparative analysis of the historical photographs and the video game screenshots. How accurate are the screenshots to the real-world environments they are modeled after? Are the types of buildings and structures in the screenshots in keeping with the types of buildings and structures found in the historical photographs? Do the architectural styles and material makeup of the real-world and virtual environments match up? Is the choice of textures for the video game environments appropriate for the locations? Perform the comparative analysis as a full class, or instead ask the students to form small groups and present their findings to the class along with the accompanying visuals.

Discussion This activity can be adapted to focus on other military conflicts such as the Vietnam or Gulf War, as well as non-war video game scenarios. In addition to studying a selection of historical photographs, ask the students to perform a comparative analysis of historical and modern-day photographs of the same or similar settings. Ask the students to list the similarities and differences they see in terms of the types of structures, architectural styles, design motifs, building materials, and other visual elements. How has the historical setting changed in the intervening years? How has the size and material makeup of the buildings changed over time? What evidence, if any, remains of the historical setting in the modern-day photograph? Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: History

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Discussion Article

The Convention for the Protection of Virtual Architectural Heritage

by Mario Gerosa, with the collaboration of Sam Shahrani Since the Renaissance there has been a strong desire for ideal cities and imaginary architecture. They often were idealistic and utopian visions that traced new directions for architecture. Some were avant-garde architectural projects, while others reflected the social aspirations of a particular culture.

100 Ä Playing to Learn From the painting of La città ideale in the Urbino Palazzo Ducale to the drawings of Lequeu and Sant’Elia, these paper and canvas representations of architecture tell us a great deal about a historical period. Now there is a new form of ideal architecture, that of video games, either single player or multiplayer networked video games. This architecture is not physical and indeed is immaterial but these constructions are not completely imaginary, as they can be considered a form of architectural drawings. In a certain sense, they exist as real architecture, but not on a normal physical plane. They exist only inside the computers that run them, and the storage media that contain their data. In particular, in the last decade many new synthetic worlds have been born, the so called MMOG (Massively Multiplayer Online Games) and MMORPGS (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games). In these new worlds one can find many new forms of architecture. Some are based on designs that recall the architectural forms of real life; there are also worlds of a wholly original style. For this reason, they are original and evolutionary expressions of art and must be preserved. In fact, in these worlds, there is an intense and chaotic urban development, largely uncontrolled by any form of authority, and there is the risk that architecture and environments created to populate these worlds will disappear and be lost forever. At first glance, the architecture of synthetic worlds is more abstract than the paper blueprints and representations of traditional architecture, but in fact they are just as real, because people live in and interact with these constructs just as they do in the real world, though in a manner reflecting the differences between real-world and syntheticworld. Traditional drawings and representations of imaginary architecture are not inhabited, and thus are static beyond changes that the original designer may make. The virtual architecture of video games, particularly MMOG’s, either are or have the potential to be constantly evolving. The architecture of single player games is also dependent on the people who play them and subject to modification and addition by these same players. Here is a crucial point: some will say that we don’t need a convention for the protection of the virtual architectural heritage because video games are already collected by some institutions that keep a copy of every video game published, similar to movies, etc. There is, however, a strong difference: here we don’t refer to the video game itself as a whole creative product, but rather to the architecture and environments contained within the video games. They represent valid and new aesthetical forms that reflect the spirit of our time. They are also an example of the new directions taken by contemporary architecture. A central concept for the architecture of video games is that they are part of the action. They live together with the characters. They are often theatrical architecture, with traps, moving walls, and pitfalls etc. They respond to every move of the player: in that way, they are living, organic creatures. But they also live because they are visited, admired and interacted with by people.


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The first problem is to determine what architecture and environments are worthy of being preserved. In fact, not all the architecture of video games is interesting, and we must define some aesthetic rules. These rules do not necessarily need to reflect the rules applied to art and architecture in the real world. It is a whole new form of architecture, with its own chronology and some new typologies. The architecture of video games is not necessarily the same as that of the physical world. In general we find some fairly divergent architecture. Here are some of the most recurring architectural typologies: ¸ offices ¸ scientific laboratories ¸ space bases ¸ fortresses ¸ caverns ¸ warehouses and other storage facilities

Definition of the Virtual Architectural Heritage For the purposes of this convention, here are the properties to be preserved. Monuments: All buildings and structures of artistic interest. In this group there are: houses, hotels, resorts, discos, bars, nightclubs, mad doctors’ laboratories, regeneration points, teleporters, labyrinths, space bases, air conditioning systems, churches, and castles etc. Sites: Areas that are topographically definable and have a special interest either for social or artistic reasons or for the gameplay. We should consider initially documenting designated sites with high-quality screenshots from multiple angles. We should also include, if necessary, information on where in-game the screenshots were taken. Ideally, we would also seek to collect raw models, textures, and other data for the structures, allowing closer study on demand, outside the context and gameplay limitations of a specific game. The ideal solution would be to create a sort of “digital architecture museum,” wherein people could walk around and through exact recreations of the digital architecture.

Formation of a Scientific Committee for the Protection of Virtual Heritage We should define a scientific committee to determine an aesthetic for video games, so that people can understand and evaluate what objects and environments are really interesting architecture. This international committee could include art historians, architects, game designers, and video games art directors.

102 Ä Playing to Learn Identification of the Heritage The scientific committee will also prepare an inventory of the most relevant places, architecture, and environments in MMOGS, a sort of atlas that will be constantly updated. We should not limit ourselves just to the structures that exist within a game world, but also include the entire gamespace. That is, if it’s part of the world architecture, be it landscape, structure, model, creature, or sound effect, we should endeavor to recreate and capture it.

End of a World In the case of a virtual world that is closed by the developer or publisher, a digital archive of the virtual environments of that world should be prepared, allowing recreation of the world on non-official servers for the purpose of study. Alternately, a program could be developed that would allow exploration of the world itself on an individual computer without the need to connect to a larger world. There should also be as much documentation made of the “live” world as possible, including movies and screenshots with descriptions. The protection of single player worlds is more straightforward, since all that is needed is a valid and up-to-date copy of the game. In order to facilitate this, when a game reaches a certain age, a non copy-protected version of the title should be made available to archivists, allowing for the distribution and play of the title when it is no longer a competitive commercial product and/or the agreed upon time limit after release has passed. About the Authors: Mario Gereosa is the Editor-in-Chief of Architectural Digest Italy and the author of Mondi Virtuali (Castelvecchi, 2006), a book about virtual worlds. Sam Shahrani is a Master’s candidate at Indiana University. Source: Gerosa, Mario and Shahrani, Sam. 2006. The convention for the protection of virtual architectural heritage. Mario Gerosa Blog. July 7. (Abridged) URL: http:// mariogerosa.blogspot.com/2006/07/convention-is-back.html


Do you agree with the authors’ view that society should preserve the digital architecture found in video games? Why or why not?

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What are some of the challenges that archivists might face in preserving the digital worlds of video games?

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Historical Weaponry

As graphics technologies grow ever more complex, so does the intricacy of the weapon and vehicle models featured in historical wargames. This Panzer Tank is drivable in Call of Duty 3.

As every gamer knows, weapons lie at the heart of any good shooting game. Some video games boast futuristic weapons that are born solely out of a developer’s imagination. Other games focus on contemporary or near-future weapons that are currently in use (or being prototyped) by military forces around the world. Still other games aim for authenticity in their choice of historical weaponry. Video games that are set during World War II, for example, likely feature the M1A1 Carbine and Browning Automatic Rifle that were in common use by U.S. forces at the time. Similarly, Vietnam-based video games are likely to feature the AK-47 and M60 Machine Gun, as well as various devices for rigging jungle-based booby traps.

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104 Ä Playing to Learn Not only should the historical weaponry in video games look just like their real-world counterparts, they ideally should also function in much the same way. For example, a rifle’s simulated weight, handling, and recoil should be similar to that experienced by soldiers who handled the gun in the real world. Moreover, the rifle’s ammunition capacity, reload time, rate of fire, and weapon’s range should be as realistic as possible. In designing authentic video games, many developers field test the actual weapons that will be featured in the game. This gives them a real-world feel for what it is like to hold a pistol, rifle, or machine gun and fire off several rounds. In this activity, the students research the history of a weapon that is featured in a World War II– or Vietnam-based video game.

Activity As part of a unit on World War II or the Vietnam War, ask each student to research a weapon that was in common use during the war. Each student can choose a historical weapon that is featured in a favorite World War II– or Vietnam-based video game or instead pick a weapon from a list that has been provided by the teacher. As part of their research, ask each student to classify the weapon they have chosen (e.g., sidearm, rifle, or explosive device), draw and label a scale model of the weapon, and list the weapon’s properties, including its weight, ammunition capacity, reload time, rate of fire, range, and so on. If all of the students fill out the same template, a reference book can be created that lists the details for all of the weapons that were in common use during the war. This book can then be used a shared resource for further research on the war in class.

Discussion In addition to small arms weapons, encourage the students to research large vehicular weapons such as tanks, airplanes, and submarines. Keep in mind that Allied and Axis forces relied on different weapons during World War II. Encourage the students to research the weapons used by each side in a armed conflict. Following this activity, ask the students to perform a comparative analysis of the historical weapons they have researched and their modern-day equivalents, as used today by military forces around the world. Are some of the weapons that were in common use during past wars still in use today? What new weapons have recently been introduced to the battlefield, and what advantages do they hold over the aging weapons they replace? Use this activity as a launching point for a discussion about the nature of warfare during World War II or the Vietnam War compared with today. New and emerging technologies related to robotics, telecommunications, and satellite surveillance are changing the way modern wars are fought. Discuss with students the merits of these technological developments. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: History

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I Beg to Differ

Most video games fail to surpass the hype that precedes their release. Gears of War, the 2006 winner of many Game of the Year awards, is a rare exception.

Have you ever read a video game or movie review and concluded that the reviewer has no idea what he or she is talking about? It is sometimes surprising how widely divergent opinions can be when it comes to movies, games, books, and many other things as well. In this activity, the students write a response to a negative review of a video game they enjoyed.

Activity Ask the students to each choose a favorite video game that has not faired too well in the eyes of critics or other gamers. Assign each student the task of reading the print and/or online reviews for their chosen game, including the often candid user reviews in online forums. Ask the students to write a response to one or two of the negative reviews they have found. Their response should address each of the criticisms made by the reviewers. A 105

106 Ä Playing to Learn student can choose to challenge each criticism (and offer contrary evidence to support their opinion) or instead concede the point. This activity can be completed as an open-ended writing assignment or instead require the students to complete a worksheet that comprises claim and response sections (e.g., “reviewer’s criticism” and “student’s response”) for each of the negative points in a review.

Discussion This activity can also be reversed. Ask each student to write a review response for a video game they loath but that has received stellar reviews in the press. Most video game websites, such as GameSpot (www.gamespot.com), invite gamers to contribute their own reviews and/or provide feedback in response to a website’s official review of a video game. Following this activity, encourage those students who are interested to submit their review responses to the user forums of the original websites that published the reviews they are critiquing. In the days that follow, ask the students to track the responses to their review in the online forums. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Ä I Believe

Although not as popular as they once were, values clarification activities were once commonly used to teach social studies. Students would be asked to reflect on their personal beliefs and values as they made decisions about hypothetical moral dilemmas or ranked a list of values according to personal priority. This activity is a carryover of the values clarification approach. It asks the students to brainstorm a list of personal beliefs related to video games. In this activity, the students write an I Believe poem about video games that comprises ten belief statements.

Activity If the candid comments in online user forums are any indication, many gamers have strong beliefs about video games. So do many non-gamers. Ask the gamers and non-gamers in your class to each write an I Believe poem that expresses their personal beliefs about video games. An I Believe poem has ten lines, each of which begins with the phrase “I believe …” Have each student complete each of the ten phrases with a personal belief statement about video games. Following this activity, ask the students to present their I Believe poems to the class. Do the students share a common set of values when it comes to video games, or is there a wide divergence in the kinds of belief statements the students have expressed?

Discussion Here is an example I Believe poem that you may wish to share with students: I believe there should be cheats for every video game. I believe we should be able to save our progress at any point in a video game. I believe movies that are inspired by video games should be outlawed. I believe video games can have both positive and negative influences on gamers.

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108 Ä Playing to Learn I believe students can learn a lot from video games. I believe teachers should be encouraged to talk with students about video games in class. I believe kids should be encouraged to write about the video games they play. I believe kids should be encouraged to design their own video games. I believe gamers should play video games for no more than one hour a day. I believe in turning off my video game console and going outside to play. To extend this activity further, ask the class to group the dozens of I Believe statements they have written into categories. What is the most popular I Believe category? What is the least popular? Have the students tally and graph the results of their categorization efforts and then perform more statistical analyses. In addition to video games and other “consumptive” practices, I Believe poems can also focus on topics that have a somewhat more redeeming value, such holiday beliefs (e.g., Thanksgiving), moral values (e.g., helping others), and efforts to promote world peace (e.g., learning about other cultures). Here is an example I Believe poem that expresses such sentiments: I believe in learning about the world around me. I believe in watching the news every night. I believe in promoting dialog across cultures. I believe in protecting the environment and other species. I believe in helping others less fortunate than myself. I believe in getting to know people from other nations. I believe in protecting religious freedom around the world. I believe in peaceful protest as a means for social change. I believe in war only as a last resort. I believe in considering how my actions today will affect future generations. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Social Studies


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Discussion Article Contradictions

by Richard Bartie Here’s something that’s been bothering me for a while about computer games in general and virtual worlds in particular. For many years, suggestions have been made by politicians and in the media that there is a link between the playing of computer games and the committing of acts of real-world violence. They feel that if you play a violent computer game, it teaches you to be violent in real life. Game-savvy people like us will typically regard these opinions as founded on ignorance and argue that they should not be given credence. One of the larger sub-branches of game research concerns educational gaming. Its premise is that kids don’t always like traditional teaching methods, but they love games, so we should design games that help teach them things. That way, learning will be fun, so children will want to learn. Now, isn’t there a contradiction here? On the one hand, we’re saying that no no no, games don’t teach people all those bad things, but on the other hand we’re saying that yes yes yes, games do teach people all these good things. Can we really sustain both of these positions? Is there something about how games teach (or how people learn) that genuinely does separate desirable from undesirable results? Or are we changing our story depending on whether we’re being threatened with banning or being promised kudos? About the Author: Richard Bartie is the author of Designing Virtual Worlds (New Riders, 2003) and a regular contributor to the Terranova blog (www.terranova.blogs. com). Source: Bartie, Richard. 2005. Contradictions. Terranova. June 3. URL: http:// terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2005/06/contradictions_.html


Do you agree with the author’s view that there is a contradiction in how video game proponents judge the positive versus negative influences of video games?

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How can the contradiction identified by the author be resolved? (Hint: Check out the Henry Jenkins discussion article located elsewhere in this book.)

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Kid-friendly Grand Theft Auto Open world games (sometimes referred to as “sandbox games”) are one of the most popular genres of video games. They typically feature non-linear gameplay, the ability to roam the game world freely any way the player chooses, unscripted interaction with non-player characters (NPCs), and a living, breathing city, countryside, or fantasy environment to explore. Sadly, many of the most popular open world video games—most notably the infamous Grand Theft Auto series—are inappropriate for children. Many feature overt sexual themes, gang violence, drug use, and excessive profanity. Some even reward assaults against the police. Not surprisingly, such titles are among the most controversial video games on the market. Yet that doesn’t mean open world video games per se can’t be appropriate for children. Just the content and gameplay needs to change—not the open world format that defines the genre. Instead of recklessly driving cars around the city, students can be tasked with the challenge of biking or skateboarding around town, all the while paying attention to the rules of the road (and getting penalized for not doing so). Similarly, students can take on odd jobs, such as returning a library book in record time or making change at the corner store. In this activity, the students take back the streets as they design a vibrant, kid-friendly city where there are lots of things to do.

Activity Discuss with students (in a general way) a few of the controversies surrounding the Grand Theft Auto series and other open world video games that feature overt violence and illegal activity. Alternatively, introduce students to a few of the open world driving games that are somewhat more appropriate for a younger audience (e.g., The Simpsons: Hit & Run). Also introduce students to the open world gameplay mechanics that are featured in such titles. Players can go anywhere; travel by foot, car, motorcycle, boat, or plane; enter buildings; interact with other characters; complete various side missions; take on challenges; and find secrets hidden throughout the gameplay world.

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Tell the students that it is time for them to take back the streets. Invite them to suggest ways in which RockStar (the developer of the Grand Theft Auto series) and other video game developers can adapt the gameplay they have honed so well for adult gamers to suit the fun things that kids like to do. Working in small groups, ask the students to brainstorm as many gameplay tasks as they can think of that would suit a kid-friendly version of an open world game.

Discussion Here are just a few of the kid-friendly open world tasks the students might wish to consider: ¸ following the rules of the road as they bike from one end of the city to the

other

¸ skateboarding in designated skateboard parks around the city ¸ visiting a restaurant, fashion store, or hair salon ¸ planning the quickest (or safest) route from Point A to Point B ¸ buying candy and making change in a corner store ¸ visiting a bank to deposit or withdraw their allowance ¸ managing a budget for their purchases ¸ borrowing a book from the public library ¸ taking on the role of a firefighter or paramedic in putting out a fire or helping

someone who is injured

¸ playing a pick-up game of basketball or street hockey ¸ delivering newspapers or other items to various locations in record time ¸ picking up a list of ingredients for a meal they will cook ¸ playing hide and go seek ¸ building a tree house or fort ¸ running a marathon through the city streets ¸ trading baseball cards, comic books, and other collectables ¸ cleaning up their bedroom in record time

112 Ä Playing to Learn Following this activity, consider sending the list of kid-friendly open world tasks the students have brainstormed to RockStar and other publishers. Have the class prepare a cover letter that politely requests a reply. Your students may be surprised by how appreciative the developers are of the feedback and suggestions they have received. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

Grand Theft Auto is arguably the most controversial and infamous video game franchise ever. With legions of fans, it is also one of the most popular and commercially successful.

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Lay of the Land Military geography is a subdiscipline of geography that gets very little attention in K–12 schools, even though it presents teachers with a natural bridge between the physical geography curriculum and the historical battles students study in history class. Military geography focuses on the important role that landforms, water systems, soil conditions, and weather all play in military engagements. (There are also branches of cultural and political military geography.) As commanders plan and carry out their military campaigns, they need to take the lay of the land into consideration lest their forces get bogged down in a fight by hostile geographic conditions. Physical landforms and river systems also provide transportation routes, natural cover and concealment, overwatch and surveillance positions, as well as rally points where units can meet up and camp. All of these factors are essential, not only to the planning of battles in the real world, but also to the design of wargames, including first-person shooters and military strategy games. To navigate an engagement area successfully, players need to know the lay of the land, what natural features provide the most effective cover and concealment, and the best overwatch positions. Game developers also need to take these points into consideration as they design the maps for a wargame. In this activity, the students create a topographic map of a fictional battlefield that features several of the landforms they have studied in class.

Activity As part of a physical geography unit, assign small groups of students the cumulative task of designing a topographic relief map of an unpopulated fictional location. Ask the students to create a labeled two-dimensional contour map or a three-dimensional relief map using plasticine or modeling clay. Their maps can include hills and mountains, flatlands, vegetation and brush, forested areas, wide open spaces, water bodies, and other topographic features. As they create their map, ask the students to look at the map from the vantage point of a military commander. How might a commander take the lay of the land into consideration in planning offensive and/or defensive military operations? Encourage the students to take into account the need for cover and concealment, safe approach routes, 113

114 Ä Playing to Learn ideal surveillance positions, fresh water sources for drinking, and other geographic considerations. Once they have created and labeled their relief maps with the names of each landform and the military purposes to which each might ideally be put, ask the students to share their topographic maps with the rest of the class.

Discussion Discuss the hobby of wargaming with students. Although virtual wargaming is a subgenre of turn-based and real-time strategy video games, traditional wargamers instead opt to play out the historical battles they recreate on the real-world battlefield models they design and build (often in the basements or spare bedrooms of their homes). Each and every quadrant of the terrain is carefully reconstructed as are the soldier figurines, trees, brush, and buildings that populate the battlefield. Traditional wargaming is truly a labor of love that often requires years of devotion and plenty of patience. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Geography

Most strategy games feature a top-down view of the battlefield action. In Command & Conquer: Generals, players need to take both the built and natural environments into consideration when repositioning units on the battlefield.

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Map of the World

The city of Las Vegas, as envisioned by Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Vegas, is a relatively new setting for an action game. Other popular U.S. destinations include Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco.

Some video games are set in puzzle worlds all their own, while others are set in fantasy environments in some far-off place or future world. This activity focuses on a third category—video games that are set in real-world locations around the world. Popular real-world locations for video games include the cities of Los Angeles and New York, as well as London, Paris, and Tokyo. Every continent (including Antarctica) has been represented in some way in one or more video games. Indeed, many video games take players to a wide variety of locales as the missions progress. This helps to vary the environments in which the gameplay occurs. In a single action game, for example, missions may take place in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and elsewhere. In this activity, the students use a wall map of the world to plot the real-world locations in which their favorite video games are set.

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Activity Mount a wall map of the world on a bulletin board in the classroom. Over the course of the school year, ask the students to use thumb tacks to pinpoint the cities, regions, and locales where the real-world action in the video games they play occurs. Label each thumb tack with the name of the video game with which it is associated. For those video games that take players to multiple destinations over the course of the game, use a piece of yarn to connect the various destinations in the order that players travel to them. At the midpoint of the school year (or once a variety of locations have been plotted on the wall map), have the students form small research groups. Assign each group the task of researching one of the plotted locations on the map. For the location they are researching, ask the students to focus on several of the major themes in physical and human geography, such as topography, climate, resources, economics, food, dress, and other cultural characteristics. How closely does the research the students have conducted match up with the representation of these locations in the video games the students have played? Do the real-world and video game locations look similar to each other? Do the residents dress similarly? Does the topography in the video game match up with the physical geography of the real-world location?

Discussion As an extension to this activity, ask the students to each choose a real-world city or region that, to the best of their knowledge, has not been featured in a video game. Assign each student the task of writing a short proposal for a new game that is set in this location. (As an added challenge, ask each student to choose a city or region randomly out of a hat.) In completing this activity extension, encourage the students to research the physical and cultural conditions of the cities or regions they have chosen. For example, the gameplay that is likely to occur in a temperate climate will be far different from that which occurs in a colder region. Similarly, the architectural style, cultural attractions, and local dress of a region will largely determine the makeup of the game world and the clothing worn by civilians. So too, the political, economic, and security conditions of the chosen location are apt to have important implications for the storyline and mission goals of the game. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Geography

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Music Critic If there is one thing young people are into more than video games and computers, it is music. MP3 downloads, the Apple iPod, and the latest CD releases are all the rage and, along with fashion trends, form much of the basis of youth culture. Yet even here there is a crossover between the most popular music groups and the songs that are featured in video games. Many musical artists license their songs for inclusion in video games, especially driving games in which races are often accompanied by up-tempo musical tracks. The licensed musical tracks for certain video games have even helped previously unknown independent artists gain a foothold in the music industry and a worldwide following over the Web. In this activity, the students critique the licensed musical mix that is featured in a video game.

Activity Ask the students to each choose a favorite video game that features several licensed musical tracks. Assign them the task of writing a review of the music mix. Their review should note the size of the playlist, the best and worst songs, the musical genre(s) that are showcased most prominently, and the appropriateness of the tracks to the style(s) of gameplay featured in the video game. As they complete their reviews, ask the students to also note any in-game options that enhance the listening experience, such as random play and custom soundtrack support, the latter of which allows gamers to program their own musical mix using songs in their CD or MP3 collection.

Discussion As an extension to this activity, ask the students to research the process by which music gets licensed for video games. Who are the stakeholders in such a deal? Who gets paid? Who transfers money to whom? How much are the typical royalties for licensed music? What musical genres are the most sought-after licenses for video games?

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118 Ä Playing to Learn Which musical artists and groups are the current favorites when it comes to licensed musical tracks? The type of music that is licensed often depends on the time period in which a video game is set. For example, titles that are set in the 1970s, the 1980s, or the 1990s are likely to have very different musical mixes, each of which enhances the experience of being immersed in a specific time period. The same holds true for the location in which a video game is set. Consider focusing this activity on video games that take place in a particular decade or region of the world. This will provide both music and history teachers with a seamless entry point for introducing students to musical styles and lyrics that they have perhaps not heard before. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Music

Activity Quickie

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Flight Controls

Provide the students with two or more photos of a cockpit in a real airplane and the flight controls in a flight simulator video game. Ask the students to compare the images to determine how accurate the simulated flight controls are to the real thing. (Computers)

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New Multiplayer Mode Most first-person shooters include two basic modes of play: single player and multiplayer. The single player missions typically weave together a tightly scripted story in which a gamer is led through a sequence of levels that progress in difficulty and advance the single player storyline to its inevitable climax. In contrast, a shooter’s multiplayer modes typically drop gamers into a wide-open environment in which they work alone or in teams to defeat other players in online competitive matches. Some multiplayer games also offer cooperative modes in which players work together to defeat computer controlled enemies. Ask any online gamer and they will tell you that multiplayer gaming is where it’s at. While the scripted artificial intelligence of single player games is improving all the time, many gamers have the most fun online, interacting with other gamers and the randomness of the experiences such human-to-human action affords. The basic multiplayer mode in shooters is called “deathmatch.” This “every man for himself” scenario pits each player against every other player. The goal is to frag (i.e., kill) other players while keeping your own character alive for as long as possible. If you frag another player, you score a point. If you are fragged, you lose a few seconds of valuable gameplay time before you respawn (i.e., appear again in the game). In some deathmatch games, you don’t respawn at all but instead sit out until the next round begins. Although deathmatch is by far the most popular multiplayer mode, there are numerous other modes that gamers can choose to play. It all depends on the video game. Some games support “team deathmatch” and/or “capture the flag” matches, while others feature unique multiplayer modes that are finely tuned to match the style of gameplay featured in the game (e.g., stealth or squad control). In this activity, the students brainstorm new multiplayer modes that comprise sets of gameplay rules and scenarios for a popular online wargame.

Activity Invite one or more of the multiplayer gamers in the class to introduce the rest of the class to the phenomenon of online wargaming. Focus on four or five of the most popular multiplayer modes featured in first-person shooters. Clarify with students the scenarios and rules of play that underlie each mode. 119

120 Ä Playing to Learn Now challenge the class to work in pairs and come up with their own original multiplayer modes for a popular first-person shooter (e.g., Battlefield or Call of Duty). Encourage the students to balance challenging scenarios with fun gameplay and to clarify the rules of play as best they can. Have each pair of students present the specifics of their new multiplayer mode to the class. Following the presentations, have the students vote for their favorite multiplayer mode.

Discussion As an extension to this activity, survey the multiplayer gamers in your class as to their favorite multiplayer modes. Extend the survey to also include their favorite multiplayer games and/or maps. Refer to “The Survey” activity discussed elsewhere in this book for more suggestions related to this activity extension. First-person shooters are not the only video games that boast unique multiplayer modes. Consider expanding this activity to focus on a variety of multiplayer modes, as featured in racing, strategy, and massively multiplayer online role-playing games (e.g., World of Warcraft). Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Newscast Production With dozens, if not hundreds, of video game sites on the Web previewing and reviewing games and publishing regular news updates, there is certainly no shortage of daily video game news. In addition to the leading gaming news sites (see the list below), there are many dozens of third-party sites that often focus on a single gaming platform, genre, or video game series. Some PC gaming sites eschew highly publicized industry news in favor of regular updates from the mod community—groups of users who are modifying PC games using graphic design, 3D modeling, and programming tools (sometimes provided by a game’s publishers). Still other sites operate user forums where gamers can discuss (and rant about) recent video game news or recently released and upcoming games. Most websites still rely on static text and images to get the news across. However, video footage is quickly gaining popularity, especially at dedicated full motion video websites such as GameTrailers (www.gametrailers.com). Television news reporting about video games is generally relegated to specialty channels and programs, although the major newscasts on ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, and the cable news channels do cover major video game news events. Of particular interest to traditional news outlets are controversial issues related to video games, such as the “hot coffee” controversy that embroiled the Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas video game in the summer of 2005. In this activity, the students study the structure of a traditional television newscast. They then apply what they have learned to the creation of a live newscast of their own that reports on the video game news of the day.

Activity As assigned homework, ask the students to watch a full television broadcast of the nightly news. Provide each student with a questionnaire to complete or the more open-ended task of taking freeform notes on what they see. Ask the students to pay close attention to the structure of the newscast, the types of stories which are covered, the structure of a typical news story, and the role of the anchor, reporters, and other

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122 Ä Playing to Learn production staff (on and off camera) in producing the newscast. Discuss the students’ findings when they return to class the next day. Assign students the task of creating their own video-game-focused newscast. (For those students who are not interested in video games, suggest an alternative focus. A few suggestions are listed below.) Divide the class into small groups and have each group decide on a role for each member (e.g., anchor, reporter, interviewee, videographer, or director). Now ask the students to search the Internet for some breaking video game news. (Virtually every weekday, there is breaking news in the world of video games.) Have the students pick two or three news stories to cover. Each group should prepare a script for their chosen news stories. Once the script is ready, each member of the group should act out his or her assigned role in dramatizing coverage of the news story. Once they are sufficiently prepared, have each group present its newscast live to the class in the form of a play. Alternatively, the newscasts can be videotaped for later editing and playback on a computer.

Discussion Besides video games, student-created newscasts can focus on any number of topics, including happenings in the school, in the lives of the students themselves, or their take on world news or events in the local community. Student-created newscasts can also focus on news from the fashion world, popular culture, and the entertainment industry more generally. The students can contribute book, movie, and video game reviews to the newscasts. The possibilities are endless because a newscast essentially serves as an open-ended framework for creating a student-directed play or video production on almost any topic. In determining the content for game-focused newscasts, ask the students to browse the latest news at 1Up (www.1up.com), Gamasutra (www.gamasutra.com), GameSpot (www.gamespot.com), IGN (www.ign.com), and other leading video game websites. In advance of this activity, consider inviting a television news reporter to visit the class. Ask the reporter to introduce students to the process of preparing a news item for television broadcast (e.g., conducting interviews, capturing and editing video footage, and rehearsing introductory and closing comments). Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Drama


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Discussion Article Why We Need a Corporation for Public Gaming

by David Rejeski Somewhere between the summer of 1946, when RCA put their first black-and-white television sets on the market, and 1951, when I Love Lucy appeared in American living rooms, television took off. The penetration of the technology was breathtaking, rising from 4.4 million families with TVs in 1950 to over 50 million just ten years later (over 85 percent of all American homes). In 1950, with only two channels available, TV viewing time by children had already reached 2.5 hours per day in some cities, prompting researchers to raise questions about the effects of this new mass medium on the developing personality of the child as well as impacts on relationships within the family. From the very beginning there were concerns about the psychological and social impacts of television, and suspicions that TV was simply a technological funnel used to deliver advertising into the living rooms of millions of Americans. There was some truth to this assertion, since in the early days of TV, corporations literally owned shows, such as Milton Berle’s Texaco Star Theater. A formulaic approach to programming gave us thirty western series by 1958 (from Gunsmoke to Have Gun—Will Travel) as well as the half-hour windows into the idealized middle class American family of Ozzie and Harriet or the Cleavers in Leave It to Beaver. In 1961, Newton Minow, head of the Federal Communications Commission, made his now famous remark comparing TV programming to a “vast wasteland.” Though attempts were made to create alternative programming free from commercial influence, these proved difficult to sustain. A few dozen stations struggled to exist in the mid-1950’s, dependent largely on millions of dollars of Ford Foundation funding for National Educational Television (NET), which provided non-commercial programming to around 200 stations nationwide. The saccharine sweet family shows of the 50s and 60s gave way to harder biting social commentaries like All in the Family. In 1967, the same year that CBS television ended a 17-year blacklisting of folksinger Pete Seeger, President Johnson signed legislation to establish the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), asserting that “we have only begun to grasp the great promise of the medium” and noting that noncommercial television was reaching only “a fraction of its potential audience—and a fraction of its potential worth.” As part of the legislation, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was to launch major research on instructional television in the classroom. The $9 million investment in CPB in 1967 (about $47 million in today’s dollars) has grown to over $300 million in annual funding today.

124 Ä Playing to Learn Unlike television, the meteoric rise of computer and video games over the past decade has gone largely unnoticed except by the digiteratti and cultural anthropologists cruising web zines and blogs. This may be because games are not a technology per se, but applications that slip into our lives on the backs of existing technologies, from computers, to televisions and cell phones. They are less hardware and more software. Like many mass culture phenomena, games are understood more on the basis of prevailing myths than reality. Few people realize that the average gamer is 30 years old, that over 40 percent are female, and that most adult gamers have been playing games for 12 years. One reason myths shape public perceptions is because few universities have seen computer games as worthy of serious academic study, robbing the discourse around games of robust data on their use characteristics, effects, and potential value. There is, of course, the annual Congressional attack on the game world and its denizens, calling for more control of violent games and, like our TV-addicted forbearers, warning of dire consequences to mind and family. Politicians have conveniently made computer games a target of derision rather than a pedagogical ally or tool for public engagement. The best kept secret in the world of computer and video games is the rise of a movement—now in the thousands—of gamers dedicated to applying games to serious challenges such as education, training, medical treatment, or better government. The serious games movement is in many ways today’s equivalent of yesterday’s advocates for non-commercial, educational TV, who knew that the potential of the medium was unrealized and went far beyond pure entertainment. With small amounts of foundation money, and a lot of sweat equity and ingenuity, advocates of serious games are getting products built and used. A father with a diabetic son created GlucoBoy, a handheld game that helps children better manage their blood glucose levels. A state senator from Massachusetts worked with graduate students to create MassBalance, and challenged people to balance the state’s budget online. The United Nations World Food Program recently launched Food Force, a game with over 3 million players worldwide who work to save and rebuild the fictional island of Sheylan, ravished by drought and war. A number of people—or their virtual selves—come together in an online, multiplayer game called Second Life to help design a park for Queens, New York. The interactive nature of games, their ability to present complex and dynamic information, and, increasingly, to allow thousands of people to meet in sophisticated virtual environments means games can accomplish what TV never could in terms of addressing educational and social challenges. However, serious games, like serious TV, are likely to remain a sidebar in the history of mass media. Non-commercial television floundered, despite millions of dollars of investment by the Ford Foundation, until the government stepped in and created a viable and long-lasting alternative. With similar vision and foresight, and a relatively small amount of funding, this could happen with video and computer games. A Corporation for Public Gaming (CPG) could be established that would operate on a model similar to its broadcasting equivalent, providing grants to develop a diversity of games for the public good. Like CPB, the goal of the CPG would be to provide high quality games, which “inform, enlighten and enrich the public.” A $15 million annual


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investment would be made for a three-year period with a review conducted at the end of year three followed by recommendations for continuance, modification, or termination of the program. Grants would be made available to qualified non-profit groups who could partner with commercial game developers, universities, museums, schools, or government entities. All grants would require a 15 percent set aside to support a rigorous evaluation of the game’s impact. A portion of the overall funding would go to universities to conduct research on how to improve the content, impact, and evaluation of such games. An alternative model would be to support serious games within the existing Corporation for Public Broadcasting, by increasing the appropriation and changing the allocation formula from the 75–25 percent split between television and radio to one that reflected the additional funding for games. Granted, it would take vision and courage to create such an entity, especially today when the concept of public broadcasting has become politicized and compromised. But without such a commitment to serious games, we may find that in twenty years we have managed to create another “vast wasteland” out of a promising new mass medium. About the Author: David Rejeski is the Director of the Foresight and Governance Project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC. Source: Rejeski, David. 2006. Why we need a corporation for public gaming. Serious Games Source. April 11. URL: http://seriousgamessource.com/features/feature_ 041106_public_gaming.php


Do you agree with the author’s view that we need a Corporation for Public Gaming? Why or why not?

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Suggest two or three video game projects that the Corporation for Public Gaming should fund.

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Next Generation Console As this book was being written, the big three video game console companies— Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony—were all rolling out their entries in the next generation of console gaming. Variously boasting high-definition graphics and innovative motion controllers, the Xbox 360, Wii, and Playstation 3 gaming systems were literally years in the making—from initial concept design to product delivery in retail stores around the world. All three companies faced critical decisions related to the design of their systems. What features and cutting-edge technologies would their system support? What would the console and accompanying controller look like in terms of shape, color, and form factor? What multimedia functions would the console support? What online gaming features would players have access to? How much would the console cost to make, and what would it sell for at retail? What first- and third-party games would be ready for launch? Now that the new consoles are in stores, no doubt all three companies are looking to the future and making their initial plans for the next generation of gaming. In this activity, the students pick a name and design a model for a next-generation gaming system. They also brainstorm a list of cutting-edge features that the system will support.

Activity Working in small groups, challenge the students to come up with an original design for a next-generation video game console. The students will need to decide on the new console’s feature set, online functionality, multimedia capabilities, form factor, color scheme, gamepad design, connectivity options, and many other factors. As the designs for their console begin to crystallize, invite each group to prepare a marketing pamphlet, complete with mouthwatering visuals, cutting-edge technical specifications, and forward-looking promotional text. To help get them started, provide the students with a selection of the promotional materials available for the Playstation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360 consoles. Ask each group to give their new console a name prior to unveiling their next generation design to the class. 126


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Discussion Although this is primarily a visual arts activity, it can easily be turned into a business and math activity by assigning a pricing structure to the various components and features that make up a gaming system. For example, the students can be provided with a price list that details the costs of several CPU, graphics chip, hard drive, and DVD drive components, among other technologies. The students can then perform a cost/ benefit analysis of equipping their next generation console to the hilt with cutting-edge technologies versus keeping the manufacturing costs under control. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts

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Open World Directions

Some open world games, such as Test Drive Unlimited, aim to model accurately a real-world location, such as the Hawaiian island of Oahu. Other open world games create an entirely fictional world for players to roam and explore.

Open world driving games, such as the long-running Midnight Club and Need for Speed series, drop players in a wide-open environment that they are then able to navigate any way they wish. Some games of this type provide multiple means for getting around the often sprawling city (e.g., on foot, bike, car, or skateboard). Ideally, players can go anywhere, over curbs and sidewalks, through parks and parking lots, and perhaps even through the odd building or two. So, too, open world driving games ideally feature street names, working traffic lights, and cars and pedestrians that obey the rules of the road (even if the player doesn’t). A detailed in-game map that pinpoints the player’s exact location and various nearby landmarks is an absolute must. Most open world video games also feature a mini-map as part the game’s heads up display (HUD), sometimes with an integrated GPS system. This helps players to navigate the world even as they are racing through the city, giving chase, or evading the police. 128


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In this activity, the students write out the directions for getting from Point A to Point B in an open world driving game.

Activity In advance of this activity, choose an open world driving, biking, or skateboarding game that features an authentically modeled city environment, complete with street names, working traffic lights, a variety of locales, and cars and pedestrians that obey the rules of the road. Set up this activity as a learning center in the classroom. Prepare an activity card that asks a student to write out the directions for driving, biking, or skateboarding from Point A to Point B in the game. Now have a second student test these directions by following them to the letter in traveling from Point A to Point B. Once this second student has arrived at Point B, ask them to provide the first student with feedback on the directions they have given. For those games that feature labeled city streets, encourage the students to cite the actual street names when giving directions. Otherwise, the students can indicate the number of city blocks (or traffic lights) to pass through before turning left or right. The students can also refer to landmarks, such as underpasses and bridges, in their directions. For those open world video games that feature authentically modeled cities derived from the real world (e.g., L.A. Rush), encourage the students to cite the actual names of the buildings and attractions in the city.

Discussion For a math extension to this activity, ask the students to calculate the distance between Point A and Point B based on their average speed and the time it takes to reach their destination (i.e., Distance = Speed x Time). (A car’s speedometer is often shown on a game’s HUD.) Discuss with students the challenge of maintaining a constant rate of speed as they drive to their destination. How does slowing down or speeding up affect their distance calculation? How could the accuracy of their distance calculation be improved (e.g., practice the route beforehand or clear the roads of cars and pedestrians using an in-game cheat)? Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Geography

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Playing to Learn The dozens of activity ideas in this book are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to integrating video games into the classroom. Virtually every academic subject—from astronomy to zoology—has at least one strong tie to video games that teachers can take advantage of. For example, in astronomy class, students can conduct interstellar research using the tools and adventure games published by Imaginova (www. starrynight.com). In zoology class, students can conduct research on one or more of the animals they interact with in a zoo-themed video game, such as Zoo Tycoon (www.zootycoon.com). Students can also be challenged to come up with their own educational activities that intersect with video games. They can propose a research project that is connected to a favorite video game or that feeds into their own ambitions to create a video game from the ground up. In this activity, the students brainstorm and lead their own video game learning ac tiv i ties.

Activity Provide one or more of the students in your class with an opportunity to browse through the activity ideas in this book. Invite the students to brainstorm a half dozen or so more ways of integrating video games into the classroom. Ask the students to focus on one of the thirteen subject areas covered in this book or to instead choose a favorite topic area that is not covered. Have each student choose one of their brainstormed activity ideas to write up as an activity plan using the “Introduction,” “Activity,” and “Discussion” format utilized throughout this book. (Alternatively, the class can come up with its own activity template or use a template that is provided by the teacher.) Invite the students to lead their activities with the rest of the class. Following each activity, ask the class to provide constructive feedback on the activity, including what went well and how the activity could be improved.

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Discussion Teachers and students are invited to contribute their video game-related teaching ideas to this book’s website (www.playingtolearn.org). This site is maintained by the author of the book. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Poor Posture The science of ergonomics has emerged from relative obscurity in the early decades of the twentieth century to highlight one of the most important technology-related health issues of the early twenty-first century. As increasing numbers of adults spend more and more time in front of computers in offices and other workplace environments, there has emerged a pressing concern for the rising number of office workers who are afflicted with ergonomic injuries. Although it is the day-to-day impact of ergonomic injuries on the workplace that has received the most attention, there are also important lessons for schools. In this activity, the teacher gives a lesson on ergonomics in which a student volunteer demonstrates the proper posture for sitting at a computer.

Activity Ask a student volunteer to come up to the front of the class. Have an ergonomically designed computer workstation and chair ready for the student to sit at. Lead a demonstration lesson in which the student demonstrates a series of both proper and improper postures for sitting at a computer. Pay close attention to the height of the chair, the straightness of the student’s back, the placement of the keyboard, and the sight line of the computer monitor. Many books and websites about ergonomics feature photographs or illustrations that visually depict both good and bad seated postures. Consider photocopying a few of these images and distributing them to the class prior to or following the lesson. Also talk with students about common bodily stress points (e.g., the lower and upper back, shoulders, and wrists) and the importance of taking regular breaks from computer use. Next, ask the students about their video game playing habits. What types of gaming systems do the students regularly play (e.g., PC, console, and/or handheld), and what is their posture like when they are playing games (e.g., sitting, slouching, or lying on the floor)? Encourage the students to take regular breaks from gaming and to pay close attention to aches and pains. These are important physical messages that their bodies are sending them.

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Also use this discussion as an opportunity to introduce students to the topic of repetitive stress injury. Remind the students that most video games feature lots of repetitive fine motor movements.

Discussion Here are two Web links that can serve as excellent starting points for researching ergonomics in the classroom: ¸ http://www.galtglobalreview.com/careers/computer_ergonomics.html ¸ http://www.orosha.org/cergos/

As an extension to this activity, ask a group of older students to research the science of ergonomics. Encourage the students to review websites and books that provide information related to the history of ergonomic research, the diagnosis and treatment of ergonomic injuries, and ergonomic technologies that serve to alleviate stress and injury to the body (e.g., ergonomic chairs, back supports, and wrist-supporting mouse pads). This activity can lead nicely into the “Ergonomic Audit” activity discussed elsewhere in this book. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

Activity Quickie

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Machinima

Ask the students to use the Internet to research and find examples of machinima filmmaking. Machinima involves the capturing and editing of video game footage, which is then rendered as a finished movie short that others can view over the Web. Encourage the students to create their own machinima productions using footage captured from a favorite video game. (Computers)

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Race Relations

Video games, like other forms of popular culture, often embed not-so-subtle references to race, class, and gender in the gameplay. Racial stereotypes related to gang violence, drugs, and turf wars are commonly featured in urban games, such as Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

Racial stereotypes underlie many of the most successful commercial video games that are set in urban environments such as New York, Los Angeles, and other culturally diverse cities. Some of these games arguably exploit race as they turn cultural stereotypes and racial divisions into gameplay scenarios that pigeonhole one or more cultural groups and then pit these groups against each other. This may make for great gameplay, but it can also make for critically important— albeit controversial—discussion in the classroom. In this activity, the students discuss how different cultural groups are represented in video games.

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Activity Distribute to the class a recently published newspaper editorial or academic article on the topic of race in video games. Use the article as a launching point for a wide-ranging discussion of the representation of race and cultural groups in video games and movies. In the ensuing discussion, ensure that every opinion is heard and respected. Also ask the students to cite specific examples wherever possible to support their views.

Discussion There are many controversial issues related to video games and race/class/gender that teachers can discuss with students. Here are a few suggestions: ¸ the use of the “N” word in video games and movies ¸ Latino and African American stereotypes in video games (e.g., criminal be-

havior, violence, drug use, and gang membership)

¸ the representation of African, Asian, Latino, and Muslim countries as the “en-

emy” in wargames

¸ the low number of Hispanic, African American, and female game developers ¸ the representation of women and the female form in video games ¸ the appeal of video games to males versus females ¸ the representation (or lack thereof) of gays and lesbians in video games ¸ the proliferation of racist, sexist, and homophobic comments in online forums

Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Repetitive Stress Injury Gamers who regularly play video games for hours at a time are at risk of suffering a repetitive stress injury. Repetitive stress injuries are among the most common workrelated injuries that afflict adults, but children and teens are also at risk, especially if they play lots of video games, spend lots of time at the computer, or otherwise engage in repetitive motion (e.g., in the workplace or playing sports). A repetitive stress injury can occur when a body part undergoes too much stress. This can result in inflammation and swelling of the surrounding area, pain, discomfort, muscle strain, and/or tissue damage. Repeating the same movements over and over again on the job, at the computer, in competitive sports, or even playing a musical instrument can cause such injuries. In this activity, the teacher presents a formal lesson on repetitive stress injury to the class.

Activity Teach a formal lesson on the topic of repetitive stress injuries. Discuss with students the different contexts in which repetitive stress injuries can occur, including playing video games, working for long periods of time at the computer, playing sports, playing musical instruments, and performing repetitive movements in the workplace. Introduce or have the students brainstorm some of the preventive measures they can take to reduce the risk of repetitive stress injury. These include sitting properly when playing video games, investing in an ergonomic chair and computer workstation, taking regular breaks, stretching, exercising regularly (e.g., swimming), varying their movements, and limiting their video game playing and computer use.

Discussion The Kids Health website (www.kidshealth.org) has published an excellent resource on the topic of repetitive stress injuries in adolescence: http://www.kidshealth.org/teen/safety/first_aid/rsi.html

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Following this lesson, ask the students to list any activities they regularly engage in that are commonly associated with repetitive stress injury. Now ask the students to consider the lifestyle changes they could make to these activities to lessen their chances of experiencing a repetitive stress injury (e.g., taking regular breaks from the computer and/or limiting their video game playing). Ask the students to commit to making these lifestyle changes over a two-week period. At the end of the two weeks, check in with the students. Have their video game playing or other habits changed? If so, are these changes holding? If not, what strategies might better motivate the students to make the changes they’ve identified as healthy? Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

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Discussion Article

Protect Kids from Computer Injuries, Safety Council Urges

by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Researchers fear the popularity of computers and video games is responsible for an increase in injuries among children. The Canada Safety Council says children are getting strain injuries from sitting in front of computers and video games for hours. Children should be encouraged to take frequent breaks when playing video games. Council president Emile Therien said long-term health problems can develop if work stations are not set up properly. He gave as an example the use of dining-room tables instead of computer desks. Physiotherapists say anecdotal evidence suggests sitting in one position repeating the same motions over and over again can lead to problems in children. “Now is the time to really nip this problem in the bud before it becomes a very, very huge and serious concern,” said Therien. Parents should invest in desks and chairs that are the right height for children, advised Wayne Albert, a kinesiology professor at the University of New Brunswick. He said parents should also encourage children to take frequent breaks. And the children should pay attention to their posture. “They don’t always think about their posture,” said Albert. “They’ll sit in front of the computer screen or in front of the TV for hours in an awkward posture. This can cause long-lasting injuries.” Albert said parents should watch for signs that computer-screen time is hurting their children—neck pain, wrist pain, and eye strain.

138 Ä Playing to Learn Sitting at a computer with the head forward puts stress on the neck and shoulders, and repeatedly firing a video game button or using an adult-sized computer mouse can put more stress on the wrist, agreed Mark Duggan, a physiotherapist in Toronto. This could cause pain, irritation and inflammation in the thumb, arms, hands, and neck, he said. Source: CBC News. 2006. Protect kids from computer injuries. CBC News. January 6. Reprinted courtesy of CBC. URL: http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/ 2006/01/06/computers-kids060106.html


Poll the gamers in your class. Do they sometimes experience the bodily aches and pains discussed in the article when playing video games for long stretches of time?

2.

Brainstorm what an ergonomic gaming station might look (and feel) like.

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Researching the Credits Gamers sometimes take for granted the tremendous amount of work that goes into the development of a video game. Although it is possible for a single individual to create a modestly successful PC game, most commercial games instead rely on development teams comprising dozens (and occasionally hundreds) of people. In this activity, the students research a specific video game–related job and its role in the development of a video game title.

Activity Most video games include either in-game credits or a list of credits in the printed manual that accompanies the game. In a tribute to the influence of movies on video games, rolling credits are also available as a menu option in many games. Ask the students to browse the full listing of credits for a favorite video game. From the credit list, ask each student to pick either a job they know little about or one that intrigues them in some way. Now ask the students to use the Internet to research the jobs they have chosen. (The posted job listings at the websites for video game development studios are a good place to start.) Here are some of the key questions that students should ask as they research their chosen job: 1) Does this job require teamwork and collaboration, or does it mostly involve working on one’s own? 2) What level of education does this job require? 3) What is the scope of this job? What does this person do, and what does he or she not do? 4) How has this job changed over the course of the last ten years or so? 5) Does this job entail a leadership role in the design of a video game, or is it more of a support role? 6) Are there plenty of employment listings for this job on the Internet? What are the prospects for securing a position doing this job? Ask each student to present his or her findings in the form of a written report or an oral presentation to the class.

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Discussion At the end of this activity, ask the students to pick the video game–related career they believe they would most enjoy based on the student presentations they have heard. As a follow-up to this activity, ask each student to research work-related contexts, other than video game development studios, where their chosen career plays a key role. Also encourage the students to list those attributes of their chosen career that they think they would most enjoy. What aspects of the job would they least enjoy? Are there other careers that share similar attributes which the students may also wish to consider? Many of the leading video game websites regularly post interviews with game developers in which they talk about their contributions to a specific project. The Gamasutra website (www.gamasutra.com) is particularly noteworthy in this regard. Among other articles, this website features video game “postmortems” in which game developers reflect on the games they have helped to design. On a related note, the bonus features on DVD movies often feature behind-the-scenes interviews and documentaries on the making of films. The Star Wars DVDs are excellent examples of this and provide a plethora of movie-related job information for students to research. Although still catching up, an increasing number of video games (e.g., F.E.A.R.) also feature behind-the-scenes bonus content (including director’s commentaries). Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Business

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Researching the Credits (Take Two) Gamers sometimes take for granted the complex management of human resources that goes into the design of a video game. Dozens (sometimes hundreds) of people contribute to the development of major video game titles. These individuals may all be housed in a single studio in Los Angeles, Montreal, Shanghai, or elsewhere, or instead spread throughout the world. To manage all of the personnel who contribute their skills and know how to a game, most studios maintain a strict hierarchy of responsibility and line of authority. They also organize their game developers into teams. Each team has one or more specific responsibilities related to the design of a video game. In this activity, the students browse the credits for one or more video games as a way of helping them to organize their own in-class game development studio into assigned roles and tasks.

Activity As part of the planning for their own video game creations, ask the students to browse the in-game or printed credits for one or more video games. As they spot job titles with which they are unfamiliar, have the students look up basic information about the jobs on the Internet. As they review the credits, encourage the students to sort the various production roles they uncover into related categories such as writing, modeling, programming, composing, and directing. Ask the students to research some or all of the development roles they have uncovered prior to forming their own in-school development studio. What are the essential roles that are needed regardless of a studio’s size or commercial or amateur status? Who, in the class, is best suited for each development role based on their interests and skills? Also encourage the students to use the Internet to research the organizational structure of a video game studio. The Gamasutra website (www.gamasutra.com) is a great place to start because most of its contributors are active game developers who work for commercial video game studios.

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Discussion As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to create a flowchart that tracks the progress of a game’s development from inception to post-production, marketing, and distribution. At which point in the production process does each of the development jobs the students have flagged play a key role in a game’s design? Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Computers

Activity Quickie

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Massively Multiplayer Ethics

Ask the students to search the Internet for information about “gold farming.” In massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), gold farming is a controversial practice in which unscrupulous players exploit a game’s weaknesses to acquire (and then sell in the real world) the valuable in-game items they have accumulated. Many video games outlaw gold farming. Once they have completed their research, discuss with students the ethical issues surrounding the practice of gold farming, including the exploitation of labor in some developing countries. (Social Studies)

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Review Roundup One of the most important research skills that students learn in school is how to pull out the main points of an article and compare and contrast these points with those that they find in other articles on the same topic. This is an essential skill if students are to hone their research abilities as they take notes from books and newspaper articles and conduct Internet searches that return dozens (if not thousands) of results. Video game reviews are the perfect testing grounds for building students’ note-taking abilities. Print and online reviews tend to be only a few hundred words long, and there are multiple well-written reviews to draw from for almost every video game title that is released. In this activity, the students compare and contrast two or more reviews of a video game. They write a review roundup that sums up the views of the critics plus their own insights.

Activity Ask each student to collect two or more print or online reviews for a recently released video game. Encourage the students to choose video games that they have particularly strong feelings about (i.e., a game that they really enjoyed or did not enjoy playing). Ask the students to take notes on each of the reviews they have collected. Their notes should summarize the main points of each article, particularly the positive and negative aspects of the video games under review. The students can use a two-column chart to organize their points (i.e., pros and cons) or take free-form notes instead. Ask each student to use the notes they have amassed to write a review roundup that summarizes the main points of each article. The students can be required to only report on the contents of each article (using their own words) or instead be given the opportunity to inject their own views into the essay. Following this activity, ask the students to peer edit each other’s writing and also share both the original reviews and review roundups in pairs. Encourage the students to provide constructive feedback to one another on any major points that were missed in the original reviews.

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Discussion The GameRankings website (www.gamerankings.com) is an excellent online resource for reviews. This site serves as a clearinghouse for video game reviews at other websites and is an excellent starting point for this activity. For an added challenge, ask each student to pick the highest and lowest scoring reviews for a video game at the GameRankings website. As part of their review roundup, challenge the students to clarify (and, if possible, rectify) the sharp differences of opinion that exist between the two reviews. Following this activity, introduce students to the terms “annotated bibliography” and “review of the literature.” Similar to a review roundup, these terms refer to essays that summarize the discussion in the literature for a particular topic. In addition to reviews of the literature, some researchers perform “meta-analyses” of particular topics in which they compare, contrast, critique, and/or re-analyze the findings in the literature for a particular issue (e.g., the effects of video game violence on aggressive tendencies in gamers). Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Review of the Real World It should come as no surprise that many video games aim to emulate the real world as best they can. From simulations, such as The Sims, to wargames, such as the Rainbow Six series, it is a primary goal of many video games to recreate the most realistic settings, characters, and gameplay experiences that are possible with today’s technologies. Yet what if the real world as we know it was itself (in a Matrix-style way) a video game? How would an outside critic review The Real World. What score out of ten would The Real World earn? In this activity, the students turn the notion of a video game review on its head and instead review the real world as if it were a video game.

Activity Consider leading this activity with students who have written their own video game reviews or who have perused and analyzed the game reviews at popular video game websites. Tell the students that you have some exciting news. You have been given an advance look at a top-secret upcoming game that is sure to become the next big hit. The characters are so lifelike, they are almost too good to be true. Although limited to a single planet, players can travel almost anywhere in the world. And on this world, it seems that almost anything can (and will) happen. The game is called The Real World and all of us are living it right now. Following this hook, ask the students to turn their critical reviewers’ eye to the real world they are living in right now. Challenge each of them to write a balanced and honest review of the real world—from a personal perspective or a more objective stance—that takes some or all of the following factors into account: ¸ the real world’s multiplayer features ¸ the real world’s competitive and cooperative modes ¸ the quality of the environments

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146 Ä Playing to Learn ¸ the quality of the graphics and animation ¸ the quality of the dialog and sound effects ¸ options for character customization ¸ the level of artificial intelligence ¸ the learning curve ¸ the music soundtrack ¸ other factors

Once they have completed their reviews of the real world, ask each student to assign the game an overall score out of ten. Then have the students share their reviews of the real world with the rest of the class.

Discussion Prior to leading this activity, ask the students to read the accompanying discussion article, “Real Life: The Full Review,” which was written by a professional video game journalist. (If you would prefer that the students not be influenced by this piece in advance of the activity, instead have them read and discuss the article after completing this activity.) To help the students get started, consider asking them to begin their reviews of the real world with the following phrase: “The Real World is a massively multiplayer video game that...” Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Discussion Article Real Life: The Full Review

by Greg Kasavin Volumes have already been written about real life, the most accessible and most widely accepted massively multiplayer online role-playing game to date. Featuring believable characters, plenty of lasting appeal, and a lot of challenge and variety, real life is absolutely recommendable to those who’ve grown weary of all the cookie-cutter games that have tried to emulate its popularity—or to just about anyone, really.


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Real life isn’t above reproach. In one of the stranger design decisions in the game, for some reason you have no choice in determining your character’s initial starting location, appearance, or gender, which are chosen for you seemingly at random. However, over the course of your character’s life, you have tremendous opportunities to customize and define a truly unique appearance for yourself—not only can you fine-tune your hairstyle and hair color, but you can also purchase and wear a seemingly infinite variety of clothing and influence your body type using various in-game mechanisms. For example, if your character exercises frequently, you will appear fit and muscular. You may also choose from a huge variety of tattoos and body piercings, and later you can even pay for cosmetic surgery, though this is expensive and there’s a small chance that the operation will backfire. At any rate, real life offers a truly remarkable amount of variety in determining your character’s outward appearance, and this depth isn’t only skin deep. The only problem is you’re relegated to playing as a human character, though the game does randomly choose one of several different races for you (which have little bearing on gameplay and mostly just affect appearances and your standing with certain factions). The gameplay itself is extremely open-ended, though it’s structured in such a way that you’ll have a fairly clear path to follow when you’re just starting out. Real life features a great system whereby newbie players will automatically be guided along through the early levels by one or more “parent” characters who elect to take newbie characters under their wing. This is a great system, as these older, more experienced characters reap their own benefits from doing a good job of guiding the newbie character along. The system does have some problems though—sometimes you’ll encounter “griefer” parents who shirk their responsibilities or, even worse, seem content to harass newbie players. Such a situation could, in theory, irreparably damage your experience in real life. Fortunately, chances of this are relatively slim, as a harsh punitive system is in place to prevent the vast majority of players from experiencing or engaging in this sort of behavior. Typically, a character will learn of the numerous viable career paths available by undergoing schooling. This can be a long and tedious process, equivalent to the sort of “level treadmill” monotony that characterizes almost all MMORPGs. Nevertheless, many players do manage to enjoy themselves in this phase, especially if they band together—real life definitely rewards players who join groups, though soloing is certainly an option as well. At any rate, through the schooling process, as you engage in various activities, you eventually settle on a career path, and this is when you can start making a good amount of money and really taking matters into your own hands. There are a few known exploits for making money, but generally the game’s financial system is well balanced, complex, and rewarding for those who put forth proportionally more effort. You can use money to acquire new and better clothing, your own custom housing (a tremendous variety of options are available here as well), and new means of transportation ranging from bicycles to automobiles and beyond, and you can even employ other players and some non-player characters to do your bidding. Most notably, certain actions in real life are necessary and yet require a considerable amount of expertise to perform, or are simply boring. Additionally, even if

148 Ä Playing to Learn you do have expertise in a field, that doesn’t mean you can perform a given task for yourself—in this way, real life encourages and even forces player interaction, so those who prefer to go solo might find themselves in a bind at times. For example, even if your character specializes in dentistry, that doesn’t mean you can perform a root-canal operation on yourself. Fortunately, dentistry is one of many lucrative professions in real life, and its practitioners can easily afford to pay for the various required maintenance tasks, freeing up their own free time for more interesting activities. One issue with real life is that it gives you very little specific feedback on character advancement. To give a couple of examples, a highly proficient player might receive a sudden pay raise or might become a champion boxer, but there’s no clear way to tell exactly how smart or how strong you really are. Cleverly, there are in-game ways of at least getting a sense of these and other key attributes. You may attempt to lift weights to roughly determine how your strength compares with that of other characters. Various tests are available to gauge your overall intellect and expertise and knowledge in a variety of fields, though annoyingly, you need to pay a considerable fee to take some of these—and if you fail, often you aren’t allowed to retake the exam for a while, or sometimes at all. The game’s player-run economy and well-balanced career system are extremely well done, but similar to what’s found in other games. On the other hand, a particularly innovative aspect of real life is the way in which it forces you to gain certification to use certain objects. This feels much less contrived than the level caps or class restrictions found in other games (there are no “levels” or “experience points” per se in real life), and it also prevents players who “twink” money from their parents from automatically getting access to all the best facilities and equipment—though it’s certainly true that players of good parentage have an inherent and arguably unfair advantage. Nevertheless, it’s standard practice to have to qualify for certain professions, to engage in certain activities, to use certain equipment, and so forth. This system is quite modular. For example, even if you’ve become certified to drive a motorcycle, that doesn’t automatically qualify you to drive an automobile. This example is evidence of some of the amazing depth offered by real life—there are so many different options and viable decisions for a character to make that it’s just about impossible for any one character to see everything and visit all the colorful and sometimes dangerous locations. Unlike in other MMORPGs, combat actually isn’t a major factor for most players in real life, though players are bound to engage in a few skirmishes early in their lives. Interestingly, though, real life does offer an amazingly intricate combat system, featuring complex hand-to-hand and ranged combat options that a character may learn and even specialize in. That being the case, you’d think more players would be drawn to combat in real life, and in some territories, they are. However, the player versus environment (PVE) aspect of real life is relatively unpopular and the player versus player (PVP) portion, while interesting, is far too risky for most of the population. That’s on account of the game’s very strict death penalty and punitive system—you may freely attempt to harm or kill any other player at any time, but you will then likely be heavily punished by the game’s player-run authorities. The punitive system has loopholes and other problems,


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allowing certain players to elude punishment and continue to engage in various player-killing activities. But for the most part, real life does a good enough job of making the punishment fit the crime, as it were, so in most regions there’s a relative sense of order. Player death is a serious issue in real life and cause for continued debate among players, who often direct unanswerable questions on the subject to the game’s developers, who are apparently (and understandably) so busy that they generally keep silent. In short, players who die—at the hands of other players, by the occasional environmental hazard, or when their account expires—are essentially removed from the game world and apparently cannot return at all. This further discourages players from engaging in PVP combat, but it does help real life’s rapidly growing player population from getting too out of hand (though eventually there will be a need for additional servers). Real life looks incredible, to say the least. To be sure, certain areas appear drab and colorless, even unpleasantly so. But some of the outdoor environments and even some of the player-made urban settings are truly a sight to behold, and various environmental and weather effects only add to the charm. The character models, meanwhile, are as impressive and detailed as they are varied. Some are incredibly striking and beautiful, while others appear hideously ugly—it’s great that you can more or less decide for yourself on which side of the spectrum you wish to be. Real life also features some of the most believable ambient effects and footstep sounds to date, and it offers an incredible variety of music for good measure. In one of the game’s best touches, players can actually compose, conduct, and perform their own music, and this is viable either for solo players or for groups. Especially skilled musicians go on to become some of the wealthiest and most popular characters around. The music career path is more complex and challenging than you’d expect and it’s another one of real life’s really impressive and well-implemented features. One of the coolest experiences in the game is traveling to different regions and listening to how different the music sounds for that territory. For that matter, architecture and even player languages differ depending on the region. Real life can occasionally feel like a chore. Some players legitimately dislike it, despite having attempted and even excelled at numerous career paths. Others externalize their frustrations by harming other players or, in some cases, even harming themselves. These players do have access to various support forums, and often end up whiling away the time by engaging in various available minigames or other competitive activities. Socializing is always an option, and as with other online role-playing games, real life is certainly at its most rewarding when you manage to find and consort with other like-minded companions. At any rate, it’s hard to fault the game for lack of content or viable activities, and even when certain players try to subvert the system or harm others, it still makes for some exciting and spontaneous events for other players who happen to be in the area or just hear of the event. Beyond that, real life can indeed be very time-consuming, and some of the less exciting moments, such as when your character is tired or injured, can be annoyingly so. It’s also true that real life is constantly being refined. Some players argue that many of the numerous changes constantly being made are for the worse. For example, players running once-profitable tobacco companies, as well as players who are addicted to

150 Ä Playing to Learn using popular tobacco products, often complain that the tobacco business is being “nerfed” for no good reason. But either way, it’s good to know that players are able to actively improve certain features that require finer tuning. This keeps the developers free to focus on bigger issues. Ultimately, if you take a step back and look at the big picture, you’ll see that real life is an impressive and exciting experience, despite its occasional and sometimes noticeable problems. It says a lot for real life that, even with these issues, it’s still very highly recommendable. Simply put, those missing out on real life are doing just that. Score: 9.6/10 About the Author: Greg Kasavin is the former Editor-in-Chief at GameSpot (www.gamespot.com). Source: Kasavin, Greg. 2003. Real life: The full review. GameSpot. July 11. URL: http://www.gamespot.com/gamespot/features/all/gamespotting/071103minusworld/ 1.html


Do you agree with the author’s review of real life? What score would you give real life and why?

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Pick an attribute of real life not covered in the article (e.g., space exploration). Now write a paragraph that describes this attribute from the perspective of a video game reviewer.

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Scary Stories Survival horror video games, such as the popular Resident Evil series, are a subset of the adventure game genre. Most have an ESRB rating of Mature (or higher) and are not appropriate for children. Yet, as we all know, well-loved children’s stories, such as Hansel and Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood, are scary in themselves. The element of fear is a common theme that also runs through many popular children’s book series (e.g., Harry Potter and Goosebumps). In this activity, the students discuss what makes a story, movie, or video game scary. They then write their own scary story.

Activity To prepare the students for this activity, lead a class discussion on what makes a story scary. Ask the students to brainstorm a list of scary stories, movies, and/or video games they enjoy. What specifically makes them scary? What are the characteristics of a scary story that evokes fear in a reader? Possible answers include the following: the fear of what is about to happen (i.e., anticipation), suspense, surprise, emotional and descriptive exposition, weird characters, and, in movies and video games, musical cues, camera angles, and lighting and shadow effects. Now ask the students to write their own scary stories. Encourage them to incorporate some or all of the characteristics they have brainstormed. (You may need to lay down some basic ground rules if you are worried that some of the scary stories the students write may be in poor taste.) When it comes time to share the students’ stories orally, consider closing the blinds and turning off the lights. Now have the students read their scary stories using flashlights alone. Encourage the students to use inflection in their voices in order to heighten the sense of fear and foreboding in the story they are telling.

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Discussion Consider leading this activity just prior to Halloween—if you dare :) Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Video games illicit a wide range of emotions from utter jubilation to sheer terror. The horror game Condemned: Criminal Origins strands players in a dark and run-down building in which dozens of zombified enemies lie in wait.

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Scooby-Doo and the Laws of Physics Because they exist in a virtual space, video games have the luxury of breaking the physical laws of the universe that are a given in the real world. Weight, speed, and many other physical properties that have set limits in the real world can be bent or ignored all together in the world of video games. Similarly, cartoon programs often eschew the physical laws of the universe. Cartoon characters move at the speed of light, lift and throw objects many times their weight, and blow up and then instantly reappear on screen. Perhaps no cartoon program breaks the physical laws of the real world more often than the ever popular Scooby-Doo Mysteries, a staple on American television since 1969. In this activity, the students watch a half-hour Scooby-Doo Mysteries episode and count and/or categorize the number of times the characters—both friends and foes—do the impossible.

Activity As part of a science unit that introduces the physical properties of the real world (e.g., gravity, force, and motion), invite the students to view an episode of the animated Scooby-Doo Mysteries series. (Viewing the episode in class requires public performance permission. You may instead wish to assign students the task of completing this activity at home during a scheduled broadcast of the show.) Ask the students to note each time a character breaks the laws of physics by running, spinning, climbing, jumping, or falling faster than they possibly could in the real world. Provide each student with a tally chart for keeping track of the results of their findings or instead ask them to keep free-form notes. Following the broadcast, ask the students to share their findings. Use this discussion as the launching point for a scientific study of those physical laws of the universe (e.g., gravity) that place limits on what can be done in the real world. Use scientific terminology and examples to reinforce the concepts under discussion.

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Discussion Ask the students to brainstorm a list of other television shows, movies, and video games that also regularly bend or break the laws of physics. Ask the students to group into categories (e.g., weight, speed, and force) the various ways cartoon programs, movies, and video games skirt the physical properties of the universe. Following this activity, discuss with students some of the more innovative gameplay mechanics that have been introduced into video games. Some gameplay mechanics, by their very nature, break the physical laws of the universe. For example, the Max Payne series is famous for the ability of its lead character to slow down time. Similarly, some racing games also feature the ability to slow down time. This allows drivers to navigate more easily sharp corners and other driving hazards. Slowing down time is only one example of a gameplay mechanic that breaks the physical laws of the universe. Ask the students to come up with some other examples (e.g., walking or seeing through walls, rocket launcher jumping, and instantaneously transporting between locations). Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Science

Adventure games, such as Psychonauts, routinely break the laws of physics. Characters leap great distances, push through obstacles many times their weight, and otherwise confound the laws of the real world.

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Serious Games Brainstorming In addition to the mainstream commercial games that are cited in this book, there is a whole category of video games that students won’t typically find in local retail stores. So-called “serious games” belong to a specialized genre of video games that aim to educate and train, even as they entertain. Normally developed in-house or in partnership with independent game developers, this genre of video games is growing ever more popular as universities, hospitals, the military, commercial businesses, and many other institutions turn to video games as training grounds for the knowledge and skills their employees, clients, and students require. Examples of serious games include the following: video games that serve as virtual tours of museum or art gallery collections, leadership training simulations that teach decision-making skills, military wargames (e.g., America’s Army), and emergency management simulations (e.g., Incident Commander). Serious games aim to take full advantage of the fun and compelling nature of video games, even as they teach and reinforce a specific field of knowledge and skill set. Many serious games function as simulations of real-world places, such as war zones, hospitals, and emergency management command centers. As they make their way through these virtual worlds, players are required to make key decisions that affect the outcome of the simulation. For example, an emergency management simulation may require players to deploy and manage a half dozen emergency services during a weather-related crisis. A military simulation may require players to make sound tactical decisions in moving troops through enemy territory. These scenarios are common examples of simulation games, but serious games have also been used in hospitals to treat patients’ psychosomatic symptoms, by commercial businesses to market their products, and by educators to teach scientific principles. Educational games (sometimes referred to as “edutainment”) are a type of serious game. However, unlike other serious games, educational games are long established in K–12 classrooms (long before the term “serious games” was invented), whereas video games that service the military, medical, and other professions have only recently begun to gain prominence. In this activity, the students brainstorm ideas for a new serious game that teaches the knowledge and skill set required by a particular profession.

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Activity Introduce the genre of serious games to students. Provide the students with a few examples of serious games that are now in production or currently in use in the military, medical, and emergency service professions. Now have the students brainstorm as a full class a list of the careers they are most interested in pursuing. Divide the class into small groups. Ask each group to choose one of the careers the class has brainstormed. Challenge each group to brainstorm a list of the various types of knowledge and skills that are required by their chosen profession. How might a video game be used to teach the knowledge and skills the students have brainstormed? Have the groups summarize a serious game scenario for their chosen profession and then share it with the class.

Discussion Encourage those students who are interested in developing their own video games from the ground up to consider serious games as a possible genre for their project. Not only are serious games more directly tied to education, they are also easier to market than retail games, which jockey for market share in a highly competitive commercial marketplace. Once their serious game is complete, the students can market their title to the specific audience for which the game is intended. Interested students can learn much more about serious games by visiting the Serious Games Source website (www.seriousgamessource.com). This site explores the phenomena of serious games as an emerging genre of video games. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Discussion Article

Video Game Therapy: A New Frontier

by Reuters Doctors pronounced Ethan Myers brain dead after a car accident dealt the nine-yearold a severe brain injury in 2002. After he miraculously awoke from a nearly month-long coma, doctors declared he would never again eat on his own, walk or talk. Yet, thanks partly to a video game system, Myers has caught up with his peers in school and even read a speech to a large group of students. “I’m doing the exact same things as them. I’m getting buddies and stuff,” said Myers, who had relearned to walk and was reading at a second-grade level before his video game therapy began in May 2004.


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“I couldn’t remember where I put stuff and now I can. I remember school stuff and people’s names,” he said in a telephone interview from his family’s home in Colorado. More fundamentally, Myers can now fully open his right hand, which paralysis had curled closed. His brother and sister, who were in the car with him during the accident and who each suffered mild brain injuries, have also shown improvement in their memory and other functions. Ethan and his parents attribute his most recent progress to neurofeedback training on the CyberLearning Technology system, which is often used to play car racing video games. “In the last year, we’ve seen the Ethan we knew before the accident,” said Howard Myers, the teenager’s father. Neurofeedback is a form of conditioning that rewards people for producing specific brain waves, such as those that appear when a person is relaxed or paying attention. While this form of treatment has been around for decades, incorporating video games marks a new frontier that taps young people’s fascination with animation and electronics to sweeten often frightening, lengthy, and tedious medical treatments. Video games are being used, for instance, to help sick children manage pain and anxiety during hospital stays. A young leukemia patient inspired Ben’s Game, which let him fight the cancer cells invading his body. A private island called Brigadoon in Linden Lab’s Second Life virtual world is open only to people with Asperger’s syndrome and autism. West Virginia’s public schools are battling obesity by making Dance Dance Revolution— a step-to-the-beat video game—part of their curriculum, while Nintendo has made a splash with its new Brain Age mind-exercising game.

Planes, Brains and Automobiles CyberLearning’s Smart BrainGames system, which Myers still uses, targets symptoms arising from brain injuries, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and learning disabilities. Priced at $584, the system is built on NASA technology that used video games and neurofeedback to train pilots to stay alert during long flights and calm during emergencies. It is compatible with Sony’s PlayStation 1 and 2 consoles as well as Microsoft’s Xbox, which video game-crazed kids are quite familiar with. Users wear a helmet with built-in sensors to measure brain waves. That data is relayed to a neurofeedback system that affects the game controller. Car racing games work best with the system, which rewards users by telling the controller to allow them to go fast and steer with control, doctors said. When patients’ brain waves aren’t in “the zone” the controller makes it harder to accelerate and steer.

158 Ä Playing to Learn Families generally pay $2000 to $2500 for a six-month supervised program with one of CyberLearning’s 55 licensed health professionals trained on the Smart BrainGames system. Despite the demonstrated benefits of neurofeedback, one pediatrician said better designed studies are needed to help parents of children with ADHD make informed decisions. “We have some very effective treatments for kids with ADHD,” said Dr. Andrew Adesman, chief of developmental and behavioral pediatrics at Schneider Children’s Hospital in New Hyde Park, N.Y. “I’d be concerned about parents pursuing expensive and not very established treatments in lieu of more proven therapies.” Traditional treatments, such as prescribing the stimulant Ritalin, behavioral therapy and education, are often covered by health insurance, while neurofeedback usually is not. Last year, Margaret MacDonald, a San Jose, California doctor, focused her practice on neurofeedback after her son’s attention-deficit symptoms improved within three months of using CyberLearning’s system. She starts patients with 20 to 25 minute sessions, at least two times per week, and recommends that they work with a trained professional to ensure they are reinforcing the right brain wave activity to produce the desired result. “This isn’t something you can just play with ... You could train the wrong thing and cause someone to become more anxious and irritable,” she said. Steven Stockdale, the licensed psychologist in Colorado Springs, Colo., who treats Ethan Myers, said he has seen some nice changes come about from the video game therapy. “Kids can become less agitated, more calm and less angry,” he said. “It’s much more engaging.” Source: Reuters. 2006. Video game therapy: A new frontier. Reuters News Service. March 18. URL: http://news.com.com/Video+game+therapy—a+new+frontier/ 2100-1043_3-6051269.html?tag=nefd.top


This article highlights the potential medical benefits of video games, but some critics argue that video games are in fact harmful to children, not helpful. Who is right?

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Think about the video games you regularly play. Could some of these video games be adapted to serve medical goals similar to the examples given in the article?

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Spelling Dictation Spelling dictation is a staple of many elementary school classrooms. Why not poll the students on their interests and then compile a list of spelling words that extend from the results? In this activity, the teacher compiles a spelling list of video game–related terms.

Activity Prepare one or more spelling lists that consist solely of video game related terms. Here are some example words: accelerate achievement action activate addiction adventure adversary alien ambience ammunition animation arcade arena armament artificial intelligence artistic avatar blog bot boundary broadband button camera campaign challenge character

chase cheat checkpoint cinematic command competition console controller controversial cooperative corridor creature crosshair crouch cutscene damage demo destination destructible detonate developer dialog download drone edutainment electronic 159

enemy engine entertainment environment ergonomic escape expansion exploit fantasy feature first-person flank force feedback force field fortification forum fragged franchise futuristic gamepad gameplay genre glitch graphics gravity handling

160 Ä Playing to Learn hardware heads up display health hero heroine holographic hype immersion indoor installation interactive joystick landscape leaderboard level lifelike lighting linear load location maneuver map mayhem media medic mini-game mission mode model modification morph movement multimedia multiplayer music mystery mythology narrative navigation nemesis network objective online opponent

otherworldly outdoor pathway performance perspective platform power-up practice preview programming progress projectile prone protagonist proximity publisher pursuit puzzle pyrotechnic racing range rank rating review robotic role-playing sandbox save scenario scene score screenshot script secret sequel series setting shadow simulation skirmish software spaceship spawn specifications

squad statistic status stealth storyline straddle strafe strategy studio stunt superhero survival switch tactical target team teammate teamwork technological technology teleport terrain territory texture third-person trailer transport trigger tunnel turn-based tutorial uniform unit unlock urban user interface vehicle villain violence virtual visual walkthrough waypoint zoom


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If you are unsure of the meaning of some of these terms (as they relate to video games), consider asking the student gamers in your class to help you formulate definitions using their own words.

Discussion In addition to using these and other video game-related words in spelling dictation, assign students the task of writing a descriptive paragraph or short essay about video games in which they use five or more video game-related terms. Also encourage the students to use formal video game–related terminology whenever they write video game reviews or essays. Consider extending this activity even further by challenging a group of older students to create the first ever video game dictionary of common gaming terminology. Ask the students to pinpoint the origins of some of the more obscure video game–related terms they brainstorm (e.g., bunny hopping). The Wikipedia online encyclopedia (www. wikipedia.org) is a excellent resource for researching video game terminology. (Try looking up “bunny hopping” for starters.) Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Statistical Analysis Video games afford plenty of opportunities for teachers and students to collect data that can then be analyzed, charted, and otherwise manipulated in math class. In this activity, the students analyze and discuss a number of video game–related statistics.

Activity Here are three engaging math activities that work with the numbers generated by video games: 1.

Leaderboard Math: Many multiplayer shooters and driving games precisely track each gamer’s statistics as they play a video game. Most wargames, for example, keep careful track of a gamer’s total number of frags (i.e., kills), deaths, playing time, and favorite weapons, for example. Gamers can browse their own statistics and also compare their statistics with the statistics of other gamers. Statistics for the very best players appear at the top of the leaderboard. In this activity, have the students analyze the leaderboards for a popular action or driving game and then perform a variety of calculations on the statistics that are listed (e.g., sums, averages, differentials, and comparisons).

2.

Gas Expenses: Have the students calculate the distance from Point A to Point B in an open world driving or racing game (i.e., Distance = Speed x Time). Now have the students use the current cost of gas and an estimate of a car’s fuel efficiency rating to determine how expensive the trip would be if actually driven. (Students may have to estimate the fuel efficiency rating for the concept cars in a racing game, but they can find the correct information online for real-world cars.) Some racing games list the length of a race track prior to the start of a race. As an extension to this activity, have the students calculate the time it will take for three cars traveling 80, 100, and 120 MPH to complete three laps of a circuit race for example.

3.

Play Time: Have two or more students compete to complete the same level of a video game in record time. (Use a stopwatch if the game itself does not keep track of the elapsed time.) Now compare the results. By how many minutes and/or seconds did the winner beat the challenger? Have each student play the level two or three more times. Graph the results to show the rise and/or decline in how long it 162


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took each gamer to complete the level after multiple tries. What do the results suggest? Does practice make perfect? Or does playing the same level too many times cause gamers to takes risks that cost them time?

Discussion Having completed several of the math activities in this book, ask the students to brainstorm three other ways a video game’s “numbers” can be utilized in math class. Encourage the students to consider various numbers, including a weapon’s ammunition capacity and rate of fire, a player’s high score, total playing time, and other gameplay statistics. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Math

Data Table

Sample Racing Leaderboard The following leaderboard is a mock up of statistics for the five best players in a fictional racing game. Most online video games track numerous player statistics. These statistics can be analyzed in math class. Gamertag

Wins

2nd Places

3rd Places

Total Points

Distance Traveled (Miles)

RevenueWare

301

521

421

2366

3729

HeatStrum1

313

458

255

2110

3078

Fullstory333

258

421

423

2039

3306

Reactory31

222

328

301

1623

2553

NuffAlready11

198

289

246

1418

2199

Discussion Questions Analyze the results in the above table. Why does the player with the most wins place second overall and not first? (Answer: This player has less total points.) Assume that there are only three drivers competing in each race. Calculate the win percentage for each player. Now calculate the average distance traveled per race for each player. Try to figure out how the total points in this game are calculated. (Answer: First place earns 3 points, second place earns 2 points, and third place earns 1 point.)

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Strategy Guide Review Third-party strategy guides are often released alongside video games. Some, but certainly not all, gamers purchase strategy guides to help them complete missions, navigate the game world, and uncover hidden secrets. Strategy guides range in length and detail. Virtually all of them feature mission briefings and screenshots. Some strategy guides are very detailed and include high-resolution images, vehicle and/or weapon statistics, detailed maps of the game world, and the locations of secret passageways and pickups. In this activity, the students write and then publish a review of a video game strategy guide.

Activity Ask the students to review an official strategy guide for a favorite or newly released video game. Each review should take a number of factors into consideration. These can include the following: 1) The accuracy of the strategy guide: Is it well written? Are there significant errors or omissions? 2) The length of the strategy guide: Is it too short to be of help or too long-winded? 3) The attractiveness of the strategy guide’s layout and design. 4) The quality of the screenshots and images. 5) The breadth of the strategy guide: Does it cover the whole game and include lots of behind the scenes information and/or bonus content that will interest experienced players? 6) The retail price of the strategy guide. Is it worth the cost?

Discussion Most video game strategy guides are published by one of two companies—Brady Games (www.bradygames.com) and Prima Games (www.primagames.com). Because most video game websites don’t publish reviews of strategy guides, there is a niche opportunity here for schools to approach one or both of these publishers with the offer to write and publish strategy guide reviews as part of a language arts program at the upper elementary or secondary school level.

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As an alternative to reviewing a commercial strategy guide, each student could instead review a fan-created strategy guide that is posted to GameFAQs (www.gamefaqs. com) or another website. Having reviewed another author’s strategy guide, next ask each student to write his or her own strategy guide for a video game. Refer to the “Strategy Guide Writing” activity that follows for more information. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Strategy Guide Writing Does playing video games lead gamers to write less? The answer to this question may not be known for all gamers, but for those who choose to write strategy guides for their favorite video games, the answer is a resounding no. Player-created strategy guides abound on the Internet. In a carry over from the early days of the Web, most are plain text documents that feature some or all of the following sections: table of contents, general game information, character biographies, weapon and/or vehicle overviews, mission walkthroughs, Easter eggs/secrets, glitches, cheats, and frequently ask questions (FAQs). In this activity, the students author their own strategy guides for a full video game or a single mission from a favorite game.

Activity Ask the students to visit the GameFAQs website (www.gamefaqs.com) and download two or three fan-created strategy guides for one or more video games. Now ask the students to review these strategy guides and take note of the different content sections featured in each. The students should also note how the strategy guide is formatted and organized. Discuss with students some of the writing techniques strategy guide authors routinely use (e.g., clear and precise directions and navigational assists such as “turn left” or “walk to the other side of the room”) . Encourage the students to use similar techniques as they author their own strategy guides for either a full game or a single level or mission from a favorite game. Once they have completed their first drafts, ask each student to share their work with a peer who has also played the game they are writing about. Encourage the students to solicit feedback on what they have written and to peer edit each other’s work. Are the instructions in the strategy guide clear, precise, and accurate? Is any critical information missing? What bonus content could be added to the strategy guide in order to make it even more appealing to readers?

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Discussion GameFAQs is the most popular website for hosting strategy guides. Encourage the students to review the submission guidelines carefully before contributing a strategy guide to this or any other website. GameFAQs and other sites require strategy guides to be formatted in certain ways, and they only accept a certain number of strategy guides and walkthroughs for each video game. As a way of celebrating their role as young authors, consider devoting a section of the school library to student-written strategy guides for video games. To help them complete a video game, allow the school’s students to sign out a student-authored strategy guide as they would any other book. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Study of the Future

Some action games are set in the past, while others take place in the present. Many, however, are set in the future and often on distant planets. The view of Earth in this image, as envisioned in Halo 3, is set several centuries into the future, following a devastating alien invasion.

While some video games aim for historical or present-day realism in the game worlds they envision, other games instead imagine fantasy environments set in some distant future or faraway place. In designing such games, conceptualizing the game world—its environments, peoples, technologies, and so on—is a critical first step in the development process. The act of envisioning helps a game’s designers to establish what the fantasy world will look like, as well as the possibilities and limits of the gameplay that will occur. Not surprisingly, many future-oriented video games (e.g., the Halo series) place players in a post-apocalyptic world at war where they play a war hero (or heroine) who alone has the only chance of saving the day. (Such games invariably place a great deal of emphasis on what the weapons of the future will look, sound, and feel like.)

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Other fantasy-themed games (e.g., the Myst series) instead stress exploration over combat. These games emphasize the unique cultural and technological characteristics of some future or distant world, as well as the inherent challenges that accompany membership in that world. In this activity, the students write an essay that predicts what our world will look like in the future.

Activity Discuss the term “future studies” with students. Scholars who are engaged in future studies endeavor to extrapolate what the world may look like in the future based largely on facts and trends that can be gleaned by studying the world at present. For the purpose of this activity, invite the students to become future studies scholars. Ask each student to write an essay that explores what the world will look like twenty-five or so years into the future. In completing this activity, ask the students to pay close attention to what some or all of the following will look like in the future: architecture, cars, clothing, computers, education, entertainment, food, homes, the military, scientific research, space exploration, sports, technology, travel, and so on. Optionally, allow the students to narrow their focus to just one or two of these topics or to pick their own original topic to focus on.

Discussion Consider asking the students to limit their focus to one of the following future orientations: possible, probable, or preferred. Possible futures envision the variety of future worlds that we may see. Probable futures envision the world a student thinks we will see. Preferred futures envision the world a student hopes we will see. Use this activity as a launching point for exploring the students’ aspirations and fears for the future more generally. At a time of increasing global uncertainty, this activity can be used as a vehicle for discussing environmental and security issues, emerging economic challenges, and rapid technological change, among other topics. As an alternative to writing an essay, ask a class of younger students to each draw and then describe a picture of the future. Invite a class of older students each to draw a three-panel picture that comprises the possible, probable, and preferred future orientations defined above. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Social Studies


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Discussion Article Laura’s Story

by David Hutchison In the not-too-distant future, a ten-year-old girl – let’s call her Laura – wakes up one morning excitedly anticipating the coming day. It is 3 a.m. but Laura is oblivious to the darkness outside. Holographic windows in her bedroom make it seem like a bright sunny morning and, after all, she did retire early yesterday at 16:00 GMT. (GMT is now the agreed upon standard for time the world over.) Laura’s first meeting of the day is with a 13-year-old pen pal halfway around the world. It is too late to wash and dress, so rather than connecting via real-time video conferencing, she instead chooses a 3D avatar from her digital character collection to appear at the meeting in place of herself. The avatar will perfectly translate all of Laura’s facial expressions, verbal inflections, and body language without any effort on Laura’s part. As Laura has double booked another meeting for the same time, she assigns an intelligent avatar to represent her (with apologies) at this second meeting. This avatar has been given specific tasks to accomplish and questions to ask. It will report back to Laura, at her convenience, once the meeting has concluded. Now Laura is effectively in three places at once. 6:00: As she slept, Laura’s computer was busy collating data for a research project she has negotiated with her teacher-mentor. (Laura’s online mentor has 50 pupils in some 14 countries. Each is pursuing an interest-driven individual/collaborative learning plan of one’s own design.) The data which her computer has collected, organized, reworded and summarized is all set for presentation to Laura whenever she is ready. Using a holographic white board, Laura pushes and pulls the textual, visual, and auditory data—Minority Report–style—from one place to another until she is satisfied with its order, discarding what is not needed, and privileging the most important. Laura knows that her teacher-mentor will evaluate her, not on her ability to paraphrase and graphically “re-present” the content she has collected (her computer will handle this task no problem), but on the originality of the synaptic bindings she forges, as she connects together seemingly disparate content categories to create new networked bindings not hosted on the Internet to date. 10:00: The “real world” is just now waking up and Laura has scheduled the daily physical R&R required by law for all children for the next two hours. (This law was enacted almost a decade ago to guard against the muscular atrophy, obesity, and questionable psychological effects of total virtual immersion.) She participates in a timeless game of hide-and-seek with some local children at the playground some two blocks away from home. 12:00: In Laura’s day, physical play and meal times are pretty much the only real-world activities that remain. Work, leisure and learning are now all conducted online. Rarely is there the need for Laura or her parents to travel by air for business or pleasure, nor are there many (solar-powered) cars on the road as almost all work is


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conducted from home. 10-year-old Laura meets with friends at a local restaurant where she spends some of the pin money she has made designing intelligent avatars for girls her own age through her small business. 13:30: Laura arrives home with plans to enter her family’s “CAVE,” a dedicated room in her house with full coverage holographic projection screens for walls, ceiling, and floor. From the menu of fifty places that her parents have leased, Laura chooses an asteroid adventure space to explore and map. As she moves through the space, the virtual conveyor belt for a floor underfoot moves backwards, forwards, and sideways, ensuring that Laura is always centered in the scene. The realism is just too tempting. Laura reaches out to grab some space dust that she has kicked up from the rocky surface below, but there is nothing to grab hold of. One day, Laura knows, holographic technology will have matured to the point where a child can grab hold of that space dust and slowly let it seep through her fingers, feeling the fine granular texture of each speck. How Laura wishes she were living a hundred years in the future! 15:00: Laura has now been awake for twelve hours. Growing tired, she returns to her room and verbally instructs her computer to perform an “overnight” Internet search. She carefully lays down the search rules her computer should follow as it links to and collates the found content for a new sub-topic her research project will address. As she slips under the covers, relaxing surround sound music fills the room and the holographic windows fade into a nighttime prairie scene. Laura claps her hands twice to turn off the lights :) About the Author: David Hutchison is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education, Brock University and the author of this book. Source: Hutchison, David. 2004. A natural history of place in education. New York: Teachers College Press, pp. 124–126.


In your view, how accurate is Laura’s story in foretelling what our world might look like fifty or so years in the future?

2.

What are the pros and cons of living in Laura’s world?

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Superhero Design

An increasing number of video games, including City of Heroes, allow players to customize their characters’ look and dress. In massively multiplayer games, players personalize their avatars’ appearance and then show off their character to other gamers.

What would video games be like without superheroes to lead the way through ever more challenging missions? Popular video game characters such as Master Chief, Sam Fisher, and Solid Snake have taken on lives of their own, a few even inspiring film adaptations. So, too, many popular comic book characters, including Batman, Spiderman, Superman, and the X-Men, have found their way into video games (with varying success). 172


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The video games that these superheroes inspire take full advantage of each character’s superpowers in forging new gameplay mechanics that variously introduce stealth, web slinging, and flying behaviors into the gameplay mix. In this activity, the students design an original superhero character for a video game.

Activity Ask the class to brainstorm a list of superhero characters with which they are familiar from reading comic books, watching movies and television shows, and playing video games. As they brainstorm their list, also ask the students to note each superhero’s special powers. Following the brainstorming, have the students browse the Web and download images of several of the characters they have listed. Using the character designs they have downloaded for inspiration, challenge the students to work in small groups to design an original superhero character. Each group should decide what their superhero will look like, including his or her build, face, costume, mask, and other features. Each group should also brainstorm one or more special powers for their superhero and give the new character a name. The students may also be asked to identify a specific weakness for their superhero (e.g., Superman is weakened by kryptonite) and write a short fictional biography that details their character’s back-story. Finally, encourage each group to come up with an ideal video game scenario for its character. To showcase their superhero, ask each group to design a poster board that shows off its superhero’s design. Also have the students use the poster board to describe their superhero’s special powers and other details. Following this activity, have each group share its poster boards with the rest of the class.

Discussion An increasing number of video games, most notably City of Heroes (www. cityofheroes.com) and City of Villains (www.cityofvillains.com), allow players to create a hero or villain character from scratch. Prior to leading this activity, invite one or two students to visit these websites and report back to the class on the various character customization options that are available in the two games. As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to design their own villain characters for a video game. Villains have many of the same features as superheroes, but, as their namesake suggests, they are prone to dastardly deeds. They often also have a hidden villainous lair for a home base. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts

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Surround Sound Map Next to excellent gameplay mechanics and cutting-edge graphical effects, high-quality surround sound is perhaps the most sought-after technical feature desired by gamers, particularly fans of racing and tactical wargames in which directional sound can provide an important clue as to which direction a car or enemy is approaching from. Surround sound immerses listeners in a multidirectional sound field where music emanates from all around, including the front, rear, sides, and perhaps, too, overhead. With dozens of speakers lining their walls, movie theaters feature built-in surround sound, as do many home theater setups. Speakers are placed in front of the listener, as well as to the rear and sides. The most common surround sound formats are Dolby Digital and DTS, each of which features between five and ten discrete sound channels that immerse listeners in a multidirectional sound field. Although certainly not as popular as downloadable MP3s, surround sound music has also gained increasing attention in the form of DVD-Audio and SACD music disks. Live musical performances are particular favorites for the surround sound treatment. A surround sound recording of a rock band or orchestra’s live performance has the potential to envelop listeners in the middle of the surround sound field, almost as if they are in the audience, listening to the performance live. In this activity, the students go outside and draw a directional sound-field map that plots the location of natural and human-made sounds coming from the front, rear, sides, and overhead.

Activity Introduce students to the concept of surround sound and then take them outside on to the playground for this activity. Provide each student with a pencil and a large, unlined cue card to draw on. Ask each student to find a spot to work on their own. Their task is to draw a sound-field map that plots the location of everything they hear, including both natural and humanmade sounds.

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The students should start by drawing a small dot in the center of their cue card that denotes their location. Next ask the students to use a variety of symbols and directional arrows to plot the location and orientation of the natural and human-made sounds they hear emanating all around them. Sounds that are farther away should be plotted farthest from the center point of the cue card. Sounds that are nearby should be plotted closer to the center point. Ask the students to remain silent throughout this activity. This will help them focus their listening skills.

Discussion Following this activity, ask the students to share with the class the sounds that they heard and how they represented those sounds on their cue cards. How did the students represent overhead sounds on a two-dimensional cue card? Might there be other ways of representing environmental sounds on paper (e.g., traditional notation, poetry, or drawings)? Consider repeating this activity later in the year using one of the alternative notational systems the students suggest. As a follow-up to this activity, introduce students to some of the principles of surround sound. These include divergence, the Doppler effect, and radial sounds that rotate around the listener. Have the students brainstorm a list of the best-sounding video games they have ever played. Discuss the role that well-produced sound plays in a variety of video game genres, including racing and adventure games. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Music

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Tactical Analysis Good tactics are central to the gameplay experience of most video games that are played well. Military wargames require players to have good situational awareness, to always know what’s going on all around them. Racing games require players to negotiate sharp turns and corners quickly, at top speed, without losing control. Strategy games require players to be able to think well ahead and make sound strategic decisions. In this activity, the students write about one or more tactics they have successfully used in a video game.

Activity Ask the student gamers in the class to pick a video game that they are really skilled at playing. Now ask each student to write a short essay that explains several of the tactics they regularly use when playing the game. Encourage the students to focus on tactics related to the following: ¸ leveraging the gameplay to their advantage ¸ “loading out” their character at the start of the game ¸ tuning their car prior to the start of a race ¸ anticipating the enemies’ moves ¸ effectively using the game’s heads up display (HUD) ¸ other tactics

Have the students teach each other some of the tactics they have written about. How effective are these tactics in improving an inexperienced player’s gaming skills?

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Discussion Discuss with students the process by which gamers “get good” at a game. How many read a video game’s manual cover to cover? How many purchase the official strategy guide for a game? How many consult with other players in online forums and discussion boards or at school? How many practice a game for hours at a time? How many carefully plan how they will go about learning a game? If one is to master a game, how important is it to know a game inside out? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Technological Progress

Compare this screenshot of PGA Championship Golf 1999 with the photorealism achieved in recent golf games. The clear trend in computer graphics is to feature more highly detailed models, greater draw distances, multilayered and animated textures, destructible environments, and complex lighting and particle effects.

The theme of progress runs deep throughout the study of history, but nowhere is this concept more evident than in the history of technological innovation. The speed of computers, for example, their size, memory, and storage capacities, as well as their graphic and sound capabilities, have all made technological leaps and bounds over the last half century. Today’s cutting-edge computer configuration will be nothing more than an “also ran” a year or two from now. In this activity, the students review the graphical features of three video games, respectively published this year, three years ago, and six years ago. 178


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Activity In advance of this activity, choose three PC or console video games that were respectively released this year, three years ago, and six years ago. Consider choosing three video games that belong to the same genre or even the same video game series (e.g., Tomb Raider). Install the games on a PC computer or, if possible, bring in the legacy console hardware on which the older games run (e.g., PlayStation 1). Invite a group of students to play the video games and take free-form notes on each of the game’s graphical features. Ask the students to compare the resolution of the graphics, the load times for the various levels, the complexity of the models, the texture detail, the quality of the animations, the lighting, special effects, and other graphical features. Assign students the task of preparing a slideshow presentation that includes screenshots from all three games plus the results of their findings. Ideally, the slideshow will present the three video games in chronological order and clearly delineate the graphical improvements to video game technologies that have occurred over the last six years.

Discussion Ideally, in completing this activity, the students will have an opportunity to play all three video games on a PC computer or legacy video game console. If this is not possible, instead ask the students to perform a photo analysis using screenshots from all three games. Screenshots for older games are readily available on the Internet. GameSpot (www.gamespot.com), for example, archives screenshots for video games going as far back as 1996. With older students, use this activity as a launching point for discussing the idea of historical progress more generally. As with technological progress, many of our most cherished cultural values have strong historical roots that point to a future that is inevitably better than the past. The promise of the “American Dream,” a faith that science will eventually solve all problems, and the promise that each successive generation will have a better quality of life than the previous generation are but three examples. Discuss with students the merits of having faith in historical progress. Do the students share this faith? In their view, do other young people have this faith? The notion of progress that is exemplified in this activity also has deep philosophical roots that run more subtly through other histories, technological and otherwise. Does the notion of progress that the students have chronicled in this activity (in relation to technology) also apply to other historical themes, such as children’s rights, international development, or the promise of social democracy? Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: History

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Television Technologies Planning to buy a television for playing video games and/or watching DVD movies? Walk into any home electronics store, and you are sure to come face-to-face with a wide variety of television models and technologies from which to choose. Long gone are the days of the standard 4:3 20-inch CRT TV. Console gamers and movie buffs now have multiple television technologies from which to choose. These include large-screen rear projection CRTs, flat and rear projection LCD TVs, plasma displays, and DLP projection TVs. And this list does not include the wide variety of front projection systems that are also on the market. In this activity, the students research the science behind the four major television technologies: CRT, LCD, DLP, and plasma. They report on the pros and cons of each.

Activity This activity is appropriately introduced during a science unit on light. Ask the students to apply the basic scientific properties of light they are learning about in class (e.g., spectrum, refraction, and optics) to focused research on the underlying technologies that power modern televisions (and computer displays). In addition to marketing information on their products, many manufacturers of televisions also make available (online and in retail stores) technical details and basic schematics on how their televisions work. Ask the students to browse the websites of the major TV manufacturers (e.g., Hitachi, Sony, and Toshiba) for information on how CRT, LCD, DLP, and plasma displays work. Also encourage the students to search for online articles that focus on the advantages and disadvantages of each technology, as well as the pros and cons of the 4:3 versus 16:9 aspect ratios, flat versus rear projection versus front projection technologies, and other competing features of modern televisions. Assign each student the task of writing a report that details the differences between the four competing television technologies and the benefits and drawbacks of each. Which television technology is best for playing video games? Which is the most ideal for watching DVD movies? Which offers the best bang for the buck? Where might television technologies be headed in the coming years (e.g., holographic technologies or 3D visors)? 180


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Discussion This activity can also be extended into history class. Ask the students to research the history of television, including the history of television technologies, the first live broadcasts, the rise of television news, and the social history of radio and television programming throughout the twentieth century. Also consider asking the students to compare the magazine and online reviews of specific television models or search the Web for the best HDTV deals. By constructing a comparative chart in math class, the students can perform a cost-benefit analysis using screen size and other television specifications as factors for comparison. The U.S. broadcasting industry has been gradually transitioning to HDTV over the last several years. Ask a group of older students to research the FCC regulatory issues underlying this transition (www.dtv.gov), the steps broadcasters are taking to meet the new requirements, and the status of the HDTV transition in the United States compared with other countries, such as the United Kingdom and Japan. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Science

Ä Test Drive

Head-to-head racing, in Forza Motorsport 2 and other games, can lead into all sorts of math activities that calculate the total distance traveled, rate of acceleration, top speed, best lap time, and many other driving statistics.

Racing games are generally grouped into the following subcategories: arcade, simulation, and tuner. Some driving games fit nicely into one of these categories. Others incorporate features that are drawn from two or three of these subgenres. Arcade games emphasize fun and speed over realism. They feature cars that are easy to drive and whip around corners at top speed, but the car handling in arcade games is the least realistic of the three categories. Simulation games emphasize realism over easy car handling. In these games, players race real-world cars on real-world race tracks. Tuners allow players to tune, mod, and “pimp” virtually every aspect of their car, including its exterior appearance and various tuning and performance parts, such as the car’s engine, transmission, brakes, and other components.

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In this activity, the students design a science experiment in which their peers take the cars in a racing game for a test drive. They report on which cars have the best and worst control and handling according to the participants in the study.

Activity Ask a group of students to choose three of their favorite racing games for this science activity. They are going to design an experiment in which several of their classmates take the same cars in each game for a test drive. The participants in the experiment will be asked to report individually on which cars have the best and worst control and handling. Key questions for this experiment include: 1) Did the participants generally agree on which cars had the best and worst control and handling, or did their opinions vary significantly? 2) Were there differences in the preferences expressed by novice versus experienced gamers? 3) Were there gender differences in the results? Prior to beginning this experiment, ask the students to fill out a scientific method form that includes the following sections: ¸ the purpose of the experiment ¸ a hypothesis describing the expected outcome(s) of the experiment ¸ the materials needed to complete the experiment ¸ the procedure that will be followed to perform the experiment

Once the experiment is complete, have the students fill out two additional pieces of information on the form: ¸ the results of the experiment ¸ a discussion of the results

For a more complex version of this experiment, have each participant compare the experience of racing each car using a keyboard, a control pad, and a driving wheel.

Discussion Consider requiring the students to complete the scientific method form described above prior to conducting other video game–related experiments, including “The Survey” activity described elsewhere in this book. This activity can be adapted to also work with flight simulators, the most popular of which is the Flight Simulator series. Ask the participants in a flight simulator experiment to report on the responsiveness of the flight controls and the ease with which a

184 Ä Playing to Learn flight simulator’s planes can be flown by novice and/or experienced gamers. Is it easier to use a keyboard, a control pad, or a flight stick to control the planes in a flying game? Also have the students report on the breadth of the control options supported in competing flight simulators. Some flight simulators support only basic flight controls. Hence, they appeal mostly to novice and recreational gamers. Other flight simulators aim for absolute realism and authenticity in their support for dozens of instrument control panel settings that monitor and adjust many take off, landing, and in-flight parameters. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Science

Activity Quickie

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Virtual Economy

An increasing number of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) feature complex economies in which goods, services, and real estate are regularly bought and sold. Ask the students to conduct an economic audit of a virtual community (e.g., Second Life) to determine how the game’s economy is structured, how capital is valued and transferred, and the most profitable business ventures. (Business)

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The Gaming PC Many hardcore PC gamers are not content with the generic PC computers widely available in consumer electronic stores. Instead, they demand even more power and even better looking PCs that epitomize the “cool factor” of being a cutting-edge gamer. A small number of specialty shops are happy to oblige such gamers. These shops specialize in building custom gaming PCs that have all the trimmings and internal components to ensure an optimum gaming experience. Yet just having the latest graphics card and the fastest processor is not sufficient. Hardware vendors such as Falcon Northwest (www.falcon-nw.com) and VoodooPC (www.voodoopc.com) also build computer workstations that boast unique case designs, custom paint jobs, thematic tattoos, transparent side windows, and internal neon lights. Here, for example, is an excerpt from the marketing material for a custom paint job at the Falcon Northwest website: The fastest PCs in the world now have the looks to match! Imagine your favorite color. Now imagine it with brilliant metallic sparkles, floating under layers of rich clearcoat.... on your favorite dream car. That’s what Mach V Exotix painted cases are. Real automotive finishes, applied by an award winning Certified Master Tech with over 20 years of auto painting experience. Mach V Exotix have 10 layers of base coats, colors, tints and clearcoats—baked-on in an automotive thermal downdraft oven. And that’s just the paint job! Custom PCs also boast the latest in internal circuitry, fanless cooling technology (to reduce noise), and graphical embellishments on both the outside and insides of the PC enclosure itself. In this activity, the students design the casing for a custom gaming PC that optionally features a custom paint job, decals, neon lights, tattoos, and other embellishments.

Activity Invite the students to search the Internet for photos and specifications of custom gaming PCs from Falcon Northwest, VoodooPC, and other online specialty PC vendors. As they browse the Web, encourage the students to download the photos they find to a folder on their computer and take notes on the wide variety of case designs that are available for custom gaming PCs. 185

186 Ä Playing to Learn Drawing from their online research, ask small groups of students to design a custom case for a gaming PC. Encourage each group to come up with a unique case design, color scheme, and gaming theme (e.g., Star Wars). Their custom PC can also include neon lights, stencil designs, transparent windows, and other cutting-edge features such as fanless cooling and wireless connectivity. Have the students present their custom gaming PCs to the class in the form of a poster session. Inject a little friendly competition into this activity by awarding gold, sliver, and bronze medals to the top designs.

Discussion This activity can be adapted to work with car designs. Many racing games allow players to modify the look of their cars via custom paint jobs, trims, decals, and a variety of other embellishments. As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to design the exterior look of a cool new concept car. Refer to the “Car of the Future” activity, discussed elsewhere in this book, for details. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts

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The Interview What makes gamers tick? Do they see the world differently from the rest of us? Are their hopes and dreams for the future that much different from those of non-gamers? Can they feel violent tendencies growing ever stronger within them as they play video games? These and no doubt many other questions lie at the heart of countless research studies that endeavor to unlock the innermost secrets of hardcore gamers. In an effort to learn more about the lifestyle and playing habits of gamers, researchers ask both quantitative and qualitative questions of gamers ranging from the number of hours they spend playing video games each week to personality tests that aim to identify the key psychological attributes that attract young people to video games in the first place. In this activity, the students interview their peers about their video game playing habits. They then draw tentative conclusions from the data they have gathered.

Activity Cast the students in your class into the role of researchers. Ask them to brainstorm a list of questions they would most like to pose to gamers in an effort to learn more about their daily routines and video game playing habits. Help the students to narrow down and hone in on a manageable set of well-formed questions that they could comfortably ask their peers in another class. With the permission of the teacher and parents of the students in another class, have your students conduct one-to-one interviews with their peers. Consider having the student-researchers work in pairs. One student conducts the interview, while the other takes notes. Once the interviews have been completed, have the students collate the data they have collected. Encourage them to organize the participants’ statements into categories. Have them pull out statements of agreement between the participants and also points of contention. Also analyze the results by age, gender, and other criteria. As they discuss the results, ensure that the students maintain the anonymity of the students who were interviewed.

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188 Ä Playing to Learn Now have the students draw tentative conclusions from the data they have collected. What research questions have been left unanswered? How might the students go about organizing a new research project that aims to answer these questions?

Discussion Consider leading this activity as a follow-up to “The Survey” activity, discussed elsewhere in this book. “The Survey” activity also lists a sample set of questions that the students may wish to pose in their interviews. Following both activities, ask the students to list the pros and cons of each research approach. What are the advantages and disadvantages of conducting a face-to-face interview versus a survey questionnaire that is administered impersonally to multiple participants? Which research methodology poses the most challenges? Can surveys and interviews be used in conjunction with one another? If so, how? Finally, how would this activity have turned out differently if, instead of conducting one-on-one interviews, the students had facilitated small group discussions with four or five of their peers at a time? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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The Obituary Lead characters in a video game die many times over throughout the life of video game. Yet to restore life to a character, all a player need do is hit the reset button and replay the current mission. Although movies occasionally kill off the lead character for good early on (e.g., Psycho) or have the lead character sacrifice oneself at the end of the movie, few, if any, video games surprise players with such a turn of fortunes. This would surely leave the prospect of a sequel in grave doubt. What would happen if the lead character in a video game were to die? How would the hero or heroine who saved the day be remembered? How would the world continue on without his or her leadership and strength? In this activity, the students write an obituary which recounts the life of a lead video game character who has died.

Activity Ask the students to brainstorm a list of lead characters from their favorite video games (e.g., Lara Croft, Master Chief, and Solid Snake). Now ask the students to consider the impossible. How would these characters be remembered if they were to die? What stories would be told about them? How would their many feats and victories be immortalized? Who, if anyone, would miss them? Who would take their place? Introduce the term “obituary” to students. Consider bringing some newspapers into the classroom and having the students read a few of the obituaries for people who have recently passed away. Ask the students to list the categories of information most obituaries include (e.g., date of birth, cause of death, life achievements, and surviving family members). Now assign each student the task of writing an obituary for a lead character in a video game who has died. Ask each student to focus on the character’s accomplishments in life, his or her legacy, and how the character is likely to be remembered, both by friends and foes.

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Discussion For a variation on this activity, ask each student to write a memorable epitaph for the gravestone of a lead video game character who has died. Each character’s epitaph could begin “Here lies ....” This activity can also be extended to include secondary characters, or the evil nemesis of a lead character. As a follow-up to this activity, you may wish to ask the students to write their own obituaries (seventy or so years into the future) as a way of helping them to frame a set of life goals for themselves. It is important that this activity be handled very sensitively. Prior to leading this activity, be aware of any recent deaths in the families of the students you teach and how this activity might stir up sad memories for those students who have experienced loss in their lives, either recently or a long time ago. Seriously consider consulting with parents prior to having students write their own obituaries. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Ä The Pitch

It is probably fair to say that most gamers have had fantasies about designing a brand-new video game or a follow-up title for a series they enjoy. No doubt most gamers have also considered the improvements they would make to an existing video game were they able to go back in time and direct the development team that originally designed the game. Before a video game can be green-lighted (i.e., approved for development), it must first be pitched to those who control the purse strings, as well as the personnel, and other resources needed to ensure the project’s success. Game publishers make decisions about which projects will go forward on the basis of what has faired well in the past, the reputation of the development team, and the strength of the game proposal itself. In this activity, the students prepare a proposal for a brand-new video game, which they then pitch to the class.

Activity Challenge the students to work in pairs or small groups to develop a proposal for a brand-new PC, console, or handheld video game. Once their proposal is finalized, ask each group to pitch it to the class. Once they’ve formed their groups, the students should begin by brainstorming a list of potential game ideas. Encourage the students to keep in mind the wide variety of video game genres from which they can draw (e.g., adventure, driving, puzzle, role-playing, and strategy). From the list they have brainstormed, have the students narrow down their choice to the game idea that they feel has the best chance of being picked by the class based on its originality, fun factor, and other criteria. Next, the students should flesh out the details for the video game they are proposing. What gameplay mechanics (e.g., driving, puzzle solving, or stealth) will be used? Who are the lead characters? What will the game’s environments look like? What weapons, vehicles, and other technologies will be featured? How many levels or missions will there be? Will the game support both single and multiplayer gameplay?

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192 Ä Playing to Learn With many of the game’s details ironed out, the students now need to prepare the presentation materials they will rely on as they pitch their game idea to the class. This may include a multimedia presentation, a poster board, a one- or two-page handout, or other presentation media. Begin the presentations once each group has finalized their pitch and is ready to share its game idea with the class. Following each presentation, have the student audience complete feedback forms for each pitch. Once all of the presentations are complete, ask the students to vote for the pitch that they believe has the most merit (not including their own). Announce the results of the competition to the class.

Discussion Instead of proposing a brand-new video game, ask the students to propose a sequel to a top-selling video game, thus turning the original game into a video game franchise. Alternatively, the students can critique an existing game and instead put forward suggestions on what changes, improvements, and new features they would have insisted on had they been in charge of the game’s development. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Business

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Discussion Article Bringing Back the Dream

by Noel Llopis A lot of people have a particular moment or experience that defined their future. It can be anything: reading a particular book, traveling through a different country, meeting somebody special, or going through a very painful (or happy) experience. For me, the future crystallized on a fall afternoon in 1985, when I sat in front of an 8-bit computer at a friend’s house. It was the beginning of a long personal journey. Without it, I wouldn’t be developing games today, and I certainly wouldn’t be writing this article. The computer was laughably primitive by today’s standards: a Z80 4MHz CPU with 64KB of RAM. What made it stand out from other computers at the time was a whopping 16 simultaneous colors (as long as you gave up half your horizontal resolution), three-channel square wave sound generation, and 3′′ floppy disks. Cell phones these days are hundreds of times more powerful than that computer. Heck, the chip inside a microwave oven is probably more powerful!


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What was it that caused love at first sight with that computer? Impressive as they were at the time, it wasn’t the technical specs that attracted me. It wasn’t the silly games either, even though those were fun for a few days. It was being able to give commands to the machine and have it execute them immediately. The computer booted directly into a BASIC interpreter. I started experimenting with a few PRINT statements, then moved to FOR loops, getting input and solving algebra problems as if by magic. I spent endless hours typing game listings that came in magazines (usually with a few printing errors, which made them so much more fun to get working correctly). I experimented with graphics, sounds, and animations. Before I knew it, the BASIC interpreter was too slow and bloated and I had to graduate to assembly. Programming became a bit slower (especially since for some reason I could only save the assembly onto tapes, not disks), but the programs became thousands of times faster. I was finally able to draw sprites without the annoying flicker, use all available memory, and even overwrite part of the ROM jump table to squeeze in a few extra KB. I was hooked. That experience totally changed the rest of my life. It caused me to study computer engineering and computer science and eventually to write games professionally (much to my parents’ dismay). About the Author: Noel Llopis is an author and game programmer. Source: Llopis, Noel. 2006. Bringing back the dream. Games from Within. August 16 (Excerpt). URL: http://www.gamesfromwithin.com/articles/0608/000111.html


What is the oldest technology that you can remember seeing or using? Describe it to the class.

2.

Do you have a hobby or passion to which you think you might like to devote your career? If so, what is it, and why is it so enjoyable?

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The Rewrite One of the most common complaints that is leveled at video games by reviewers is the poor dialog. The “Deadpan Dialog” activity, discussed elsewhere in this book, explores the elocution of the spoken word, but often the culprit is the screenplay itself, which features poorly written conversations between characters in the game. In this activity, the students rewrite the dialog for a cutscene in a video game that is in desperate need of improvement.

Activity Assign one or two students the task of creating a written transcript for a single cutscene in a video game. Choose a game that features lackluster dialog. (Sadly, it will not be difficult to find many video games fitting this criteria.) Photocopy and distribute the written transcript to a class of students. Working in pairs, ask the students to rewrite the scene in an effort to improve the dialog. Their aim should not be to alter what happens in the scene or to change the meanings of the words used. Rather, they should focus on improving the conversations that underlie what is already happening by reworking and enhancing the phrases that are spoken. Ask the students to share their rewrites orally in front of the class.

Discussion This activity can be adapted to work with movie dialog, theatrical scripts, and quoted conversations in books. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Drama

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The Rewrite (Take Two) Most gamers have very well-formed opinions about the video games they play. Indeed, one look at the user reviews at GameSpot (www.gamespot.com) and other leading video game websites, suggests that many gamers are more than willing to share their strong views with others. Yet many user reviews also reveal inherent weaknesses, such as extreme brevity, poor spelling and grammar, and less-than-well-formed thoughts. Many user reviews are in desperate need of a copyeditor who can spot and correct the numerous spelling, sentence structure, and grammatical errors that are strewn throughout. Improving the writing style of a review lends the review more credence when visitors read it. Hence copyediting is an activity students should regularly engage in with their own writing and the writing of their peers. In this activity, the students rewrite a video game user review in an effort to improve its clarity and sentence structure.

Activity Introduce students to the job responsibilities of a copyeditor who works in a book, newspaper, or magazine editorial department. (Also note that copyeditors work in many other industries.) Copyeditors proofread and improve the legibility, spelling, grammar, and sentence structure of books and newspaper and magazine articles. They mark up a draft of a book or article with corrections for the author to review. Inform the students that they are going to copyedit a few of the user reviews posted at a video game website. Ask the students to browse the user reviews for a favorite video game at GameSpot or another website. Assign each student the task of picking a poorly written user review to proofread and edit. Without altering its intent or meaning, each student should rewrite the review they have picked to express the reviewer’s points more clearly, using better sentence structure and improved spelling and grammar. Following this activity, have the students share with a peer the before and after versions of the user reviews they have copyedited.

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Discussion User reviews tend to be on the short side, so they are excellent choices for focused lessons on grammar and sentence structure. Consider printing out a dozen or more video game user reviews for the students to critique, edit, and improve. Have the students report back on the most common grammatical and sentence structure errors they have found. As a follow-up to this activity, ask each student to rewrite an official print or online review of a video game, movie, or book. Are professional journalists and movie critics more or less likely than everyday gamers to publish well-written reviews? Which video game and movie websites feature the most well-written reviews? Which publish the least well written? Copyeditors use a common set of markup symbols when proofreading books and articles. As a follow-up to this activity, consider introducing students to a few of the more common symbols copyeditors use. An explanation of the various copyediting symbols can be found here: http://www.colorado.edu/Publications/styleguide/symbols.html Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Ä The Stunt

Insane stunts, such as this view of a paratrooper motorcycling off a cliff in Just Cause, are part and parcel of the over-the-top gameplay that is featured in most action games.

In first-person shooters, rocket jumps are an increasingly popular gameplay move, particularly in online matches in which the competition is at its most fierce. An explosive projectile (e.g., from a handheld rocket launcher) is fired at the ground, causing the player’s character to recoil and leap high into the air, gaining the advantage of elevation or a quick escape. In the real world, this action would of course kill a person instantly, but in the world of video games, it is an effective technique for accessing ledges and other elevated locations that are normally off limits. Rocket jumps can also be adapted to work with vehicles in an effort to propel them forward over long distances as part of a dramatic stunt sequence. 197

198 Ä Playing to Learn The Internet is ripe with captured video game footage of super jumps and other insane stunts. Indeed, some gamers make it their primary mission to capture footage of their character performing in-game stunts in Battlefield, Halo, and other action-packed video games. In this activity, the students capture some in-game footage of their characters performing insane stunts on foot or in vehicles.

Activity Challenge the student gamers in your class to capture on foot or in vehicle stunt footage from their favorite video games. Invite the students to edit the footage they have captured into a movie reel that showcases an action-packed sequence highlighting the most insane stunts they have filmed. Next ask the students to write out short captions that explain how each stunt was performed. At the students’ discretion, these captions can be edited into the compiled video game footage as titles that precede or follow each stunt.

Discussion As a follow-up to this activity, have the students work together to create a stunt reel that showcases the exploits of several gamers. Screen the stunt reel for the full class and invite the rest of the students to vote for their favorite stunt. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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The Survey

Surveys are one of the most common means by which researchers collect information about the lifestyle habits of video game enthusiasts. Among other things, researchers are interested in the types of video games young people are drawn to, for how long they play each week, and how they construct their identities as gamers. In this activity, the students design a video game survey, which they then administer to other students in the school.

Activity This is a three-part activity in which the students design a video game–related survey, conduct the survey with their peers, and then tally and analyze the results. Working as a full class, have the students brainstorm a list of questions that they would like to ask their peers about their video game playing habits. Once the brainstorming is complete, have the students narrow down their list of questions to the best ten or twenty. Encourage the students to hone in on each question, ensuring that each is well worded, precise, and unbiased. (Refer to the discussion section that follows for a list of sample questions.) Once the questions have been finalized, have the students conduct their survey with another class in the school. They can choose to invite a class of similarly aged peers to complete the questionnaire or instead administer the survey to a group of older or younger students (or both). The survey can be conducted as a one-to-one interview or completed on paper on a voluntary basis. (To ensure the anonymity of the participants, be sure that no information that identifies the participants is collected during the survey.) Once the survey sheets have been collected, have the students tally the results of their survey. Invite them to analyze their findings and begin drawing tentative conclusions from the data. Also encourage the students to create dot, line, bar, and pie graphs using the data they have collected.

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Discussion Here are some questions that students may wish to pose in their survey: 1.

How many hours a week do you play video games?

2.

How old were you when you first started playing video games?

3.

Do you mostly play video games alone, with your friends, or both?

4.

How many hours a week do you play video games online?

5.

What is your favorite video game?

6.

What is your favorite video game genre (e.g., driving games)?

7.

What is your favorite video game console?

8.

Do your parents allow you to play video games that have a Mature rating?

9.

Do you consider yourself to be addicted to video games?

10.

When you are not playing video games, what fun things do you like to do?

Following this activity, ask the students to consider what changes to their survey (if any) they would make with the benefit of hindsight. What new or follow-up questions would they have liked to ask the participants in the study? In what ways might the results of the questionnaire be different had they posed the same questions to a younger or older group of students or more girls or boys or adults instead of young people? What follow-up research might the students consider undertaking given the findings in their study? In leading this activity, take full advantage of the opportunity to discuss the reliability of survey instruments and the problems posed by surveys that have limited participation or pose vague, leading, or biased questions. Also ask the students to take note of the way surveys are reported in the news media. The number of participants surveyed and the reliability of the survey (e.g., “plus or minus five percentage points, nineteen times out of twenty”) are often cited along with the results. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Math

Activity Quickie

!

Fan Fiction

Ask the students to each write a fictional story that extends the storyline in a favorite video game. The students’ stories can feature both new and returning characters and be written as either a prequel or sequel to the game. Optionally, challenge the students to set their fictional story in an alternative universe that follows a different timeline. (Language Arts)

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Ultimate Gaming Bundle When Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console was released in late 2005, many online retailers quickly announced bundle deals for the new console. These bundles variously included the new Xbox 360 console, extra controllers, a headset, a battery charger, and a variety of games. Xbox players all over the world got out their calculators and began crunching the numbers to determine the best value for their money. In this activity, the students design an advertisement for the ultimate gaming bundle, consisting of a PC or console system and third-party hardware and games.

Activity Introduce students to the notion of a product bundle in which the cost of purchasing all of the bundled items together as a single package deal is less than the cost of purchasing all of the items separately. Show the students examples of several bundle deals for video games, home theater setups, cars, and other commonly bundled products. Working in small groups, assign students the task of creating a bundle deal for a PC or video game console. Their package deal can include hardware, internal upgrades, third-party accessories, bundled games, and so on. Also assign students the task of determining a price point for the bundle deal. This price should be attractive to consumers but not money losing for retailers and manufacturers. To market their package deal, have the students create an appealing print advertisement that will grab the attention of consumers. Create a display area in the classroom where all of the print advertisements can be browsed. Ask the students to vote for the bundle deal that they believe is the best value for customers (not including their own). Tally the results to determine a winner.

Discussion Discuss with students some of the other marketing ploys advertisers use to draw in customers. These include mail-in rebates, in-store specials, two-for-one deals, cross-promotions (e.g., movie theaters and movie rental stores), extended warranties, viral marketing, and free delivery and installation. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Business 201

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Urban Planning Among the most ambitious of video games are those that model an entire city for players to walk, drive, bike, skateboard, or otherwise travel through. Some of these video games allow players to move freely throughout the city. Others require players to complete missions or races in different parts of the city as the gameplay proceeds. In either scenario, the city needs to be modeled right down to each individual district, building, road, lamp post, and pedestrian. The game’s designers essentially apply the skills of an urban planner in doing so, although they never lose sight of the need to also ensure that their virtual city is fun, inviting, and accessible for gamers. In this activity, the students choose the location for a new city, which they then design from the ground up.

Activity Prior to leading this activity, introduce students to the term “urban planning.” Discuss the role of an urban planner in designing or improving the physical layout and infrastructure of a city or town. (Urban planners also play a lead role in enhancing the social and economic life of a city.) Also introduce students to some of the mapping and surveying skills urban planners use daily in their jobs. Next, have the students survey the maps of two or three real-world cities or towns, as well as a few of the virtual maps that can be found in most open world video games. (The official strategy guides for such games often feature detailed printed maps.) What types of districts are represented on these maps (e.g., residential, commercial, and industrial)? What amenities are shown on these maps (e.g., houses, stores, police stations, airports, and parking lots)? Invite the students to become urban planners. Working in small groups, ask them to apply all of the geographic skills they have learned to the challenge of designing the plans for a new city. Their first task will be to locate the city in a topographic area of their choosing (e.g., beside a lake or on top of a mountain). Next, they will need to decide which types of districts to feature and the relative location of each. The road system comes next, as do the various buildings that will be located in each district.

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Provide the students with large pieces of paper on which to draw up the plans for their city. Ensure that the students properly label the map they create and add a key and compass rose. Alternatively, invite the students to create a 3D scale model of their city using construction paper, clay, pasticine, or other arts and crafts supplies.

Discussion Consider leading this activity at the end of a major unit on mapping in geography class. This way the students can apply all of the geographic skills they have learned, including their newfound mapping skills, topographic knowledge, and urban planning skills, to the task of designing a new city. As they plan their city, encourage a group of older students to take the following factors into consideration: ¸ natural hazards such a flooding and soil erosion ¸ the need to clearly demarcate residential, business, and industrial areas into

separate building zones

¸ the amenities most commonly found in residential areas. These could include

a corner store, an elementary and secondary school, a public library, a police and fire station, and so on.

¸ a well-thought-out road system that eases traffic congestion. Large cities

should include an interstate and rail system plus multilane roads. All cities should ideally have a public transportion system of some kind.

¸ the relative proximity of the airport to the nearest residential area. The stu-

dents should consider the issue of noise pollution versus the convenience of having an airport located nearby.

¸ the designation of public areas such as town squares, public parks, and other

natural spaces

¸ the growth potential of the city. For example, will the city be able to accom-

modate new residential areas in the future?

In advance of this activity, consider asking the students to catalog all of the different types of amenities found on the real-world and video game maps they are browsing (e.g., hotels, hospitals, and railway stations). Determining a location for each of these amenities in their city plans could be made a requirement for successful completion of the activity. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Geography

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User Interface Review

This prototype of a menu in Gran Turismo HD experiments with a stylish new design that is made especially for widescreen displays. A video game’s user interface offers players a first impression of a game’s overall quality.

A gamer’s first impression of a video game often comes from the game’s user interface, especially the main menus that serve to guide the player through the tasks of creating, saving, and loading games, managing user profiles, and changing other gameplay options and preferences. A video game’s menu system offers gamers a critical first clue as to the quality and workmanship that went into the design of the game. A well-designed user interface translates into early player confidence in the game as a whole. On the other hand, a poorly designed user interface does not bode well for the rest of the game. User interface design is both an art and a science. The principles of user interface design are applicable not only to video games but also computer software, websites, handheld devices, and home appliances—virtually any product with which humans interact. User-friendly interfaces are both attractive and functional. They are easy on the eyes but also simple to navigate and use. In this activity, the students apply the principles of user interface design to their review of a game’s user interface, menu system, or heads up display (HUD). 204


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Activity Ask a group of students to choose a recently released video game to review. Instead of reviewing the whole game, assign students the task of critiquing the game’s user interface, especially its front end menu system that appears when the game is first launched. In evaluating the game’s user interface, the students should focus on both the attractiveness of the interface and also its functionality. Is the user interface easy on the eyes and attractive to look at? For console games, is the menu text large enough to be viewed from a distance? Is the menu system well organized, responsive to mouse or controller clicks, and easy to navigate? Are there any missing menu items that the students would have expected to see? Have the students write up a brief report on their findings and then share the results of their review with the class. Following this activity, ask multiple groups of students to brainstorm some of the commonalities in their findings. Were most of the user interfaces the students reviewed well designed or did most leave a lot to be desired? What advice would the students give to the developers of video games on ways to improve the user interface experience more generally?

Discussion Instead of reviewing a video game’s menu system, ask the students to critique a game’s HUD, the in-game user interface that is overlaid on top of the gameplay action (e.g., the mini map and character stats). Alternatively, encourage the console gamers in your class to apply the principles of user interface design to a review of the Xbox 360 dashboard or the Playstation 3 interface. For a variation on this activity, ask the students to review the layout and interface of a popular gaming website or an educational software title. There are lots of print and online resources on user interface design that the students can review in advance of this activity. Have them perform an Internet search for the phrase “user interface design.” Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Visual Arts


Data Table

Video Game Play by Age The following data set is provided courtesy of the NPD Group (www.npd.com). It breaks down young children’s video game playing habits by age. Age

Don’t Play Video Games (%)

Play Video Games (%)

5 to 6

48

52

7 to 8

32

68

9 to 10

25

75

11 to 12

27

73

Source: NPD Group. 2006.

Discussion Questions What trends (if any) can you glean from the above data set? Are the results what you expected? Use the above data to extrapolate a trend line that continues the data set into the teenage years.

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Video Game Addiction Video game addiction ranks near the top of many adults’ concerns when it comes to young peoples’ video game playing habits. Most of us probably know at least one teen or early adult gamer who spends far too many hours a week playing (or thinking about) video games. In actual fact, the term “addiction” is often misused in describing those who spend hours surfing the Web, chatting online with friends, watching television, or playing video games. Addiction has a clinical meaning that raises the bar high in determining who is addicted and who is not. Despite this caveat, there is no denying that many of the most dedicated gamers—both young and old—play video games for long stretches of time each day—far too long, some would argue. Sometimes a gamer’s playing habits interfere with his or her relationships with families and friends as he or she gets increasingly cut off from social contact with people in the real world. In this activity, the students research the topic of video game addiction. They decide on a list of criteria for determining whether someone is addicted to video games.

Activity Assign students the task of conducting some online research related to video game addiction. Ask them to search for definitions of video game addiction, as well as criteria lists for diagnosing this addiction. The students should also seek out strategies for helping those who are addicted to video games. The students may also wish to broaden their research to look at other forms of addiction, such as gambling and Internet addictions, which have many things in common with video game addiction. Once they have completed their research, ask the students to work together to sort through all of the information (some of it no doubt contradictory) that they have collected. Their task is to come up with a definitive list of criteria for diagnosing video game addiction. Here are some starting points: ¸ the gamer displays compulsive behavior toward video games ¸ the gamer thinks about video games even when he or she is not playing them

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208 Ä Playing to Learn ¸ the gamer plays video games for long stretches of time and virtually every day ¸ the gamer has fewer and fewer social contacts with people in the real world ¸ the gamer expresses a craving for video games and experiences feelings of

withdrawal when he or she stops playing them

As the students compile their list, ask them to consider some of the following questions: 1) For a person to be addicted to video games, must he or she meet every one of the criteria the students have listed, or just a preponderance of the criteria? 2) How are the criteria the students have listed similar to or different from the criteria that students would normally associate with other addictions, such as gambling or Internet addictions? 3) How can video game addicts be helped? Ask the students to try and come up with a remedy for each of the addiction criteria they have listed.

Discussion Any genre of video games can attract addicts, but it is massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), such as Everquest and World of Warcraft, that have proved to be the most “addictive.” In these games, players are competing against one another for resources and skills as they dedicate ever increasing amounts of time (often months) to “leveling up” in an effort to gain as much power for their character as possible. Supporters of these games would counter that MMORPGs are inherently social worlds in which players are continually interacting with one another. Therefore, a gamer’s participation in an online role-playing game falls outside of any notion of addiction that includes a social isolation criterion. Grades: 8 and higher | Subject: Health and Physical Education

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Discussion Article

Doctor Claims 40 Percent of World of Warcraft Players Are Addicted

by Jeremy Reimer A few years ago, when I was working at Electronic Arts, a co-worker of mine had a problem. He spent much of his time playing Sony’s massively multiplayer online role-playing game EverQuest, and when he wasn’t playing it, he was talking about it, posting to online forums about it, or dreaming about the next time he could log on. He played obsessively, often signing on as soon as he got home from work. Predictably,


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his behavior had a negative impact on his family and social life, and eventually cost him his job. Many of us have known people like this. The problems of online gaming addiction date back to the days of text-based MUDs, but in more recent years terms like “Evercrack” and “World of Warcrack” have entered the popular lexicon. Now, Dr. Maressa Hecht Orzack, a clinical psychologist at McLean Hospital in Massachusetts, has come forward to claim that up to 40 percent of World of Warcraft players are addicted to the game. Dr. Orzack, who is the founder and coordinator of the Computer Addiction Service, explains in an e-mail that the 40 percent figure came from “a forum that Nick Yee runs” but did not reveal any additional methodology for arriving at this number. She added that “even if the percentage is 5 to 10 percent which is standard for most addictive behaviors, it is a huge number of people who are out of control.” Orzack states that she has been studying the problem for the last 11 years. She claims to be swamped with people asking for her help, usually concerned parents, neglected spouses, and sometimes the players themselves. She points out that MMORPGs typically use what is known in psychological circles as variable ratio reinforcement. Variable ratio reinforcement is the idea that the best way to optimize the desired behavior in the subject is to hand out rewards for correct behavior, and then adjust the number of times the subject is required to exhibit that behavior before a reward is handed out. For instance, if a rat must press a bar to receive food, then it will press faster and more often if it doesn’t know how many times it needs to press the bar. An equivalent in World of Warcraft would be purple (epic) loot drops: you never know when they are going to happen, but that just increases the anticipation of getting them. Orzack feels that the games are at fault more than the players. “This isn’t about willpower or restraint,” she said in an interview. “These games are very elaborately designed to ease you in gently, entice you, and keep you there. And it’s a cycle. People begin to spend too much time playing and their careers and personal relationships begin to deteriorate.” So what’s her solution? She believes that MMORPGs should come with warning labels on the box, much like cigarette boxes do today. In addition, she feels that computer-related addiction (not just gaming, but also excessive chat and Internet use) should be considered legitimate mental disorders, and thus be eligible for health insurance. Currently, there is no entry for gaming or Internet addiction in the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Orzack isn’t the only one worried about people playing too many online games. The Chinese government recently instituted time limits for MMORPG players, citing concern that its citizens were spending too much time playing games such as World of Warcraft. A recovery clinic for video game addiction was recently opened in Amsterdam. There are definitely people who fall into the MMORPG trap, but I’m not sure it’s an epidemic. With World of Warcraft’s player base at 6.5 million and climbing, if 40 per-

210 Ä Playing to Learn cent of those people are actually addicted, that’s 2.6 million people doomed for the psych ward. Either there are more mentally ill people in the world than I thought, or Orzack’s figures are somewhat exaggerated. This story is also a personal issue for me, because I avoided MMORPGs for many years over concerns about their addictive qualities, yet finally succumbed to World of Warcraft because many of my friends were already playing it. (I suspect many other people also fall into this category.) While I admit to the game’s addictive nature, I sometimes wonder if the word “addiction” is being spread too thinly, and perhaps being applied to areas where it is not necessarily relevant. In life, we all do things that operate on the variable ratio reinforcement principle. Work, for example. Bonuses, raises, and promotions are handed out at a variable rate. Yet we don’t worry too much about becoming addicted to work. Getting excited about variable ratio rewards seems to me to be very much a part of the human condition. Still, there are people who we would consider workaholics, just as there are people addicted to working out, or other activities generally considered positive. And, yes, people who spend too much time on these activities, to the exclusion of all others, risk negative real-world consequences. But in my opinion, the answer to these issues is not to simply label them as addictions and blame the activity itself, or to get the pharmaceutical companies all excited about new products that they can push on the general population. The solution is to promote greater awareness about the necessity of balance in our lives. That, perhaps, is the greatest variable ratio reward of all. About the Author: Jeremy Reimer is a frequent contributor to Ars Technica (www.arstechnica.com). Source: Reimer, Jeremy. 2006. Doctor claims 40 percent of World of Warcraft players are addicted. Ars Technica. August 9. URL: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/ 20060809-7459.html


Are certain video games inherently addictive? If so, what makes them addictive?

2.

How can we distinguish between people who are addicted to video games and those who simply spend a lot of their free time playing video games?

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Video Game Database Some of the students in your class may own a large collection of video games at home. Others may frequent movie and video game rental stores that maintain their own extensive collection of video games. Keeping track of these games is a big job. Video game rental stores, for example, need know which games are in stock and which are out on loan. They also need to be able to ascertain quickly the ESRB ratings for games prior to renting them to youth who are underage. Video game stores need to know the rental and purchase price for each game, how much inventory they have on hand, the discounted prices for used games, plus the contact information for a game’s distributor. This last piece of information is needed to restock the game once it has sold out. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to keeping track of a store’s video game holdings. In this activity, the students design a database for storing information about video games. They pretend they are opening a video game rental store and need to keep track of their inventory.

Activity Databases can either be created on paper, in the form of a table, or designed on the computer using one of the database software tools listed in the discussion section that follows. In either scenario, the students first need to brainstorm the fields (i.e., categories of information) their database will store. At a minimum, a database will have fields for storing the title of each video game, the names of the publisher and distributor, and the game’s price. Ask the students to brainstorm a list of the fields they wish to include in their database as a full class. Then have them create either an electronic database or a tabular chart that features a column heading for each field. Once the structure of the database is set, the next step is to begin populating the database with records (i.e., filling in the chart with information about each video game). The students can bring in the games they own from home and then browse each game’s packaging for the relevant information or they can collect the same information from the listings at an online video game store, such as GameFly (www.gamefly.com) or GameStop (www.gamestop.com). 211

212 Ä Playing to Learn Here are several of the fields that the students should consider including in their database. Although some of these fields are more important than others, all hold vital information that would be useful to a video game rental store: ¸ Title (e.g., Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) ¸ Platform (e.g., PlayStation 2) ¸ Publisher (e.g., Electronic Arts) ¸ Developer (e.g., Electronic Arts) ¸ Distributor (e.g., Electronic Arts) ¸ Release Date (e.g., 2005) ¸ Genre (e.g., Adventure) ¸ ESRB Rating (e.g., Everyone 10+) ¸ List Price (e.g., $19.99) ¸ Rental Price (e.g., $5.95) ¸ Sell Price (e.g., $17.95) ¸ Used Price (e.g., $10.95) ¸ Quantity in Stock (e.g., 4)

Discussion Instead of creating a fictional database for a video game rental store, encourage those students in your class who own large video game collections to instead create a database that stores and organizes their entire video game library. This activity can also be adapted to organize collections of books, CDs, DVDs, and other assets. FileMaker Pro (www.filemaker.com) is a good cross-platform tool for creating databases. Macintosh users may also wish to consider iList Data (www.lakewoodstudios. com), which was developed by the author of this book. Microsoft Access (www. microsoft.com) is a professional database tool for Windows users. In addition to these generic databases, dedicated software applications are also available for organizing video games, books, CDs, and DVDs, as well as photos, music, and other multimedia files. Consider asking the students to write a comparative review that looks at the demo versions of two or more of these applications. The Download


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(www.download.com) and VersionTracker (www.versiontracker.com) websites are excellent online resources for Windows and Macintosh software. A growing number of dedicated cataloging tools feature barcode scanning support. Consider investing in a barcode scanner for your classroom. Also, take the opportunity to introduce students to how barcodes work. The following website has some introductory information about barcodes that should prove useful: http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/upc.htm Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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Video Game Debate Video games—particularly violent video games—are controversial in the eyes of many teachers, parents, and other adults. For this reason alone, some teachers undoubtedly choose not to discuss video game–related issues in their classrooms. Yet the controversial nature of video games makes them the perfect fodder for intense debates over their place in society. Because so many of their peers actually play video games, the students can enter into meaningful debates and discussion over the merits of video games and their impact on individuals and society. In this activity, the students debate a controversial issue related to video games.

Activity Prior to leading a debate, divide the class into two teams. Announce the video game–related issue that will be debated. (If possible, formulate the issue as “it is resolved that ....”) Assign one group of students to be in favor of the resolution. The other group will be opposed to the resolution. Allow each group to meet and research the resolution for an appropriate length of time. The task of each side is to gather evidence and formulate arguments in support of their side and to prepare rebuttal statements to the points that they anticipate the other side will make. The groups should assign each member the task of presenting one or more supporting and/or rebuttal arguments. Convene the debate. Set up the classroom so that the students’ desks are divided into two groups facing one another. Position yourself at the head of the room, between the two sides. Once it is formally convened and the resolution read out, the debate can proceed as follows: 1) The IN FAVOR side presents its first argument in support of the resolution; 2) The OPPOSED side presents its rebuttal to this argument; 3) The OPPOSED side presents its first argument in opposition to the resolution; and 4) The IN FAVOR side presents its rebuttal to this argument. The debate can continue in this fashion (facilitated by the teacher) until all of the arguments have been presented or the allotted time has run out. Allow each side to make a concluding statement to sum up its position. 214


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Discussion Here are some video game–related resolutions that should make for good debates: 1.

It is resolved that playing video games increases violent tendencies in gamers.

2.

It is resolved that no topic should be off limits to video game developers.

3.

It is resolved that the ESRB ratings system should be abolished.

4.

It is resolved that children should be able to purchase any video game they wish to.

5.

It is resolved that PC games are better than console video games.

6.

It is resolved that first-person games are better than third-person games.

7.

It is resolved that children who play video games play outside less often with their friends.

In introducing and leading a debate, use words such as “resolution,” “rebuttal,” “in favor,” and “opposed” to formalize the debate. You may also wish to assign stakeholder roles to the individual members of each team (e.g., parent, gamer, government representative, and health expert). Consider assigning three students to be the official judges for the debate. Following the debate, they will vote to determine the winner. Prior to or following the debate, optionally assign older students the task of writing a formal essay on the debate topic. This will help them to hone in on the essential arguments that support each side of the issue. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Social Studies

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Discussion Article Massacre in Winterspring

by Gabe Graziani A disturbing in-game video from World of Warcraft (WoW) recently circulating online shows an organized, premeditated attack on an in-game funeral held for a real girl who had passed away. The incident sent shockwaves through the WoW community and sparked heated debate about massively multiplayer online ethics and behavior. It all began on the public WoW forums, with a posted announcement regarding the real life passing of a member of the Horde faction on the Illidan server. It stated that the girl, known online as Fayejin, had died from a stroke and that all were invited to a virtual memorial service in Winterspring—an area deep inside contested territory— where people could meet and mourn.

216 Ä Playing to Learn On the day of the funeral, as both Horde and Alliance players queued up to pay their respects to Fayejin’s avatar (logged on by friends for the event), a large guild of Alliance players descended upon the peaceful gathering. Catching everyone off guard, the raiders slaughtered every last Horde player in attendance. The group responsible, a guild called Serenity Now, then released a video of the attack, eliciting a hell-storm of public outcry over the depravity and lack of respect the massacre showed. We sought out a pink-haired Gnome Warrior known as Bronnieman, the acknowledged leader of the Serenity Now raid party, to uncover the motivations behind what, on the surface, appears to be a case of griefers assaulting grievers. But Bronnieman claims there was an underlying message buried within the offensive. “Essentially, it was to encourage Player vs. Player (PvP), which has been lacking on Illidan since the introduction of Battlegrounds,” he explains. The raiding party, he asserts, was trying to provoke a response from Blizzard (the publishers of World of Warcraft). “We feel that Blizzard has yet to address the issue of PvPers and instead just shrugs them off as a small voice.” The desired result of the “Funeral Bombing,” as Serenity Now has dubbed the event, appears to have been achieved, as countless forum threads can attest. While most find the guild’s actions reprehensible, the topic of PvP is certainly hotter than ever. “For or against doesn’t matter much, [so long as] people [have been] made more aware that PvP still exists,” says Bronnieman. “We achieved our goal.” Bronnieman is quick to point out that every member of the raid was sorry to hear of the real life girl’s death. Nevertheless, Serenity Now stands by its actions, reiterating that Illidan is a PvP server and that Winterspring is a contested zone where PvP is allowed and encouraged. No one disputes that the memorial could have been held in a zone where the massacre would have been impossible. However, the organizers have stated that Winterspring was chosen because it was the girl’s favorite zone. While flame wars continue to rage over the issue, it’s clear that Serenity Now has accomplished the goal of inspiring a full-swing PvP discussion. However, the achievement may be bittersweet—members of Serenity Now now find themselves on countless Horde faction kill-on-sight lists. Deservedly so? About the Author: Gabe Graziani is a regular contributor to GamesRadar (www. gamesradar.com). Source: Graziani, Gabe. 2006. Massacre in Winterspring. PC Gamer. 13(7). July. p. 80.


Discuss the ethical issues raised by the event chronicled in this article. Did the Serenity Now guild cross a moral line or were their actions justified given the Player vs. Player rules in effect?

2.

Search the Internet for other examples of ethical dilemmas in the world of massively multiplayer online role-playing video games (MMORGs). Share one or two examples with the class.

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Video Game Reenactment Video games that boast strong storylines have been likened to interactive narratives in which the player gets to control what happens next. The very best story-driven video games feature major plot twists, deep character development, well-acted cutscenes, and dramatic climaxes to top off the games. In this activity, the students reenact a key scene from a video game that boasts a strong storyline.

Activity For this activity, have the students work together as actors in small groups. Have each group choose a favorite video game that boasts a strong plotline. Ask each group to choose a key scene or plot twist from the game to dramatize for the rest of the class. Optionally, allow the students to design costumes and create set pieces for their dramas. When they are ready, have each group present their dramas to the class. Consider filming the dramatic reenactments for inclusion in a school film festival at the end of the academic year.

Discussion As an alternative to a dramatic reenactment, instead ask each group to create a tableau that comprises three or four key scenes from a video game. To create a tableau, a group of actors strike a series of still poses, each of which illustrates a key scene or plot development in a video game. These poses are presented to the audience in chronological order, either silently or with the benefit of an offstage narrator. After each tableau has been presented to the class, ask the audience to offer guesses as to which video game the tableau is drawn from. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Drama

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Video Game Review

The notion that gaming and reading don’t mix is countered by the sheer number of magazines and websites that proliferate the world of video games.

Perhaps the most obvious video game–related learning activity teachers can assign to students is the task of writing a video game review. Next to breaking news, reviews are by far the most popular articles at video game websites. So, too, it is most often the reviews to which subscribers first turn when they open a new issue of a video game magazine. In this activity, the students write a review for a video game they are currently playing. 218


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Activity Assign each student the task of writing a review for a newly released video game. Once the first draft of their review is complete, have each student ask a peer who is also familiar with the video game to offer feedback and suggestions on improving the review. (Some video game magazines publish second opinions for each of their reviews as a sidebar to the main review. Consider asking the students to incorporate the second opinion they have solicited alongside the main review.) As they complete their video game reviews, encourage (ideally, require) the students to peer edit each other’s writing and offer suggestions for improving each review’s spelling, grammar, and sentence structure. Each peer editor should also check that a review has the following: 1) a solid introduction that captures the attention of the reader while introducing the game; 2) a middle section that critiques a game’s graphics, audio, gameplay, and single and multiplayer features; and 3) a conclusion that sums up the review. Once finalized, ask the students to type up their reviews and add one or two screenshots to the text. They can also award the review a star rating out of five, a score out of ten, or a percentage grade out of 100. Encourage those students who are interested to submit their reviews to online video game forums and then track the feedback their reviews receive. Some websites, such as GameSpot (www.gamespot.com) also invite readers to submit formal reader reviews, which are then linked to the official review of the game.

Discussion Instead of reviewing a full video game, instead ask each student to review a single mission or level or a fan-created modification to a PC game. Also encourage the students to write comparative reviews that look at two or more similar titles that belong to the same genre. The students can also write reviews that compare the same video game titles running on different platforms (e.g., PlayStation vs. Xbox or PC vs. console). Prior to leading this activity, consider asking the students to design a review template that the class will use whenever they write video game reviews. A review template could include the following sections: title, genre, ESRB rating, developer/publisher, official website, platforms, platform the review was completed on, introduction, gameplay, single player, multiplayer, graphics, audio, bonus features, score, and so on. Here’s another suggestion for the student gamers in your class. Invite them to create a dedicated video game review website that is perhaps hosted at the school’s website. Refer to the “Website Design” activity, discussed elsewhere in this book, for details. Following this activity, lead a discussion with students in which they debate the merits of various video game scoring systems (e.g., thumbs up or down vs. a star rating out of five vs. a letter grade vs. a percentage grade out of 100). In recent years, some leading

220 Ä Playing to Learn video game magazines and websites have experimented with the idea of not awarding a review score at all. Grades 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Discussion Article Living in Oblivion

by Jane Pinckard Like so many others, I have a secret life. By day I toil in a cubicle, surrounded by the banal trappings of modern life, little electronic emitters that tie me to meaningless responsibilities—answering phones, emails, generating digital reams of content for ephemeral consumption. And all I can think about, every day, is that at 8 PM I will throw off this disguise as an ordinary mortal and embark in a world (aka The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion) beset with peril as Thistle Rose, woodland elf and ranger. Thistle is an attractive creature, with brown eyes and dark hair, skin tanned nut-brown from spending her days in the woods and fields among forest creatures. She’s made a lifelong study of regional plants, driven by her native curiosity for ecology, which has allowed her to try her hand at alchemy. She prefers to make potions that help rather than hurt, although she’s not above dipping her arrows in a little poison against the evil that stalks innocent people. Recent events have forced her to leave her natural home and deal with the townsfolk and all their confusing customs. Thistle’s not very good at talking to people, and not very good at reading them—she’s a bit awkward and sometimes tactless. But times are changing, and she realizes she needs to learn to live with the urban encroachment. She’s also been (accidentally?) sent on a strange quest by the late emperor that requires her to become better at negotiation and information gathering. Although she’s not naturally gifted in the magical arts, she joined the Mage’s Guild in order to advance her study of the Illusion school, which she has learned will help charm surly citizens into telling her what she needs to know. Illusion spells also help conceal her as she hunts by starlight. Thistle has a moral sense of right and wrong—it’s just not exactly aligned with the Imperium’s laws. She does not hesitate to steal if she thinks it will have a low impact, or if the usefulness of the item outweighs the evil of the act. So, for example, she did steal the mage’s Guild key before she joined the guild and got her own copy, but that was only so she could look around the library. She did steal some mutton from a wealthy home where it was simply left on the dining room table, uneaten, and would have gone to waste—but she then placed that mutton in a beggar’s sack while he was sleeping. In her own way, she tries to do good.


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As much as I like Thistle, her adventure in Oblivion is a lonely enterprise, as it was in Morrowind. There are no parties, not one constant companion to lighten the hours of travel, not even a wolf companion or horse that will follow behind you and nuzzle your hand. It’s a mostly silent game of stalking a solitary path. Which is perhaps why I feel driven to share my experiences every day with someone else who is playing the game: “Last night, I did this...went there...saw this...” In that, at least, I’m not alone, as the message boards are noisy with gamers wishing to share their experiences, too. This is a game that is like an MMO without the other people; peaceful, sure, but oddly empty and meaningless. At least my real life, as banal as it may be sometimes, has actual people living in it, with all the attendant excitement and frustrations that come along with that. It’s just that sometimes, it is tempting to run away from it all and wander alone under foreign stars. About the Author: Jane Pinckard is the Editor-in-Chief at Game Girl Advance (www.gamegirladvance.com). Source: Pinckard, Jane. 2006. Living in Oblivion. Game Girl Advance. April 5. URL: http://www.gamegirladvance.com/archives/2006/04/05/living_in_oblivion.html


This article is, in many ways, a character study. Having read the article, describe the Thistle Rose character using your own words.

2.

Write and then share your own description of a video game character you closely identify with.

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Virtual Journal Every day, millions of gamers—young and old—log into the virtual world of their choice where they form lasting friendships, compete against other players, start businesses, buy and sell virtual real estate, and engage in other life experiences that are, in many ways, similar to those life experiences which occur in the real world. The most popular virtual worlds (e.g., Second Life) incorporate mature content, so they mostly appeal to adult gamers. But there are also safe and accessible virtual worlds that cater especially to children. The most successful of these worlds is Whyville (www.whyville.net), a free sponsor-supported online virtual community, with more than 1.7 million members. Whyville was designed from day one to serve as an online virtual meeting place for children. Here is how the Whyville website introduces itself to teachers: Whyville was launched in 1999 by Numedeon, Inc. to apply over 20 years of research in education and cooperative learning to [the development of] new Web-based tools for education.... We launched Whyville as a virtual city which engages young people in constructive educational activities while promoting socially responsible behavior. It is an outgrowth of the company’s extensive research and practical experience related to learner-centered, hands-on, inquiry-based education. Inside Whyville, citizens learn about art history, science, journalism, civics, economics, and really so, so much more. Whyville works directly with the Getty, NASA, the School Nutrition Association, and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (to name just a few) to bring incredible educational content to kids in an incredibly engaging manner.... Increasingly, Whyville is finding its way into the classroom, from elementary schools to post-graduate courses for pre-service teachers. In this activity, the students write a series of journal entries that chronicle their virtual life in an online role-playing or open world video game.

Activity With the permission of their parents, invite the students in your class to join the Whyville community or another child-safe virtual world. Alternatively, ask those students who are already members of an online virtual community to complete this activity. 222


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Invite each student to keep a virtual journal or diary that chronicles their stay in the virtual world. Encourage the students to keep track of their experiences, the locations they visit, and the people they meet. Also ask the students to share their thoughts about life in a virtual world, what they look forward to, and what they dislike. Invite the students to use their journals to compare life in the virtual world with life in the real world.

Discussion Life in an online virtual world is not unlike life in the real world. In many virtual communities, students will be confronted with economic, moral, and political choices that they will need to make as they socialize with others and grow their avatar in the virtual world. As students delve ever deeper into the life of a virtual community, ask them to discuss in class some of the challenges and moral decisions they have faced. How are the challenges they confront and the choices they make in the virtual world similar to or different from those that they face in the real world? Was there ever a time that they felt uncomfortable in an online virtual community? What kinds of things do they most (or least) enjoy doing in a virtual world? What cutting-edge features would students like to see supported by the next generation of virtual worlds? Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

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Discussion Article Are Virtual Worlds the Future of the Classroom?

by Stephanie Olsen This summer, as many as a million virtual kids could catch an infectious virus known as Whypox, causing them to break out in red welts and spout “Achoo” whenever chatting with friends. Meanwhile, at the beach, crowds of “tweens,” 8- to 12-year-olds, will see their popular hangout beset with so-called red tides, as the seashore changes from blue to red with phytoplankton blossoms. Are these two signs of a crumbling world? No, they’re learning tools for Whyvillains, the residents of an online virtual world whose population of kids has grown to about 1.6 million since its inception in 1999. Children in Whyville earn “clams” through activities and games, and use that virtual money to buy face decorations for their otherwise plain avatars. Then, they typically socialize with peers via chat, bulletin boards and the city’s mail system.

224 Ä Playing to Learn “When Whypox first hits, they start saying ‘Achoo,’ and it interferes with their chat, which is obviously very important. So they are interested in finding out what it is and what they can do about it,” in Whyville’s Center for Disease Control, said Cathleen Galas, a teacher who helped a class of sixth graders through a bout of the pox last year by instructing them about epidemiology, the study of infectious diseases. In educational circles, Whyville’s private universe is known as a multiuser virtual environment, or MUVE, a genre of software games created to inspire children to learn about math and science, among other subjects. Unlike most game software and social networks, which elicit negative associations for some parents and teachers, MUVEs are structured environments with rules for behavior, yet no pat formula for action. Designed to provide problems to solve that don’t involve slaying monsters, MUVEs compel kids to figure out the issues to succeed in the environments or have time to socialize. Learning-based virtual worlds are growing more popular in schools and among children, thanks to ongoing efforts by universities and private companies. For example, Harvard University’s River City is a MUVE that involves a society in the late 1800s that’s in political and environmental disrepair. The kids must figure out why residents are falling ill. Harvard’s School of Education is in talks with several urban school districts to introduce the software to tens of thousands of schoolchildren this fall. Quest Atlantis, a downloadable MUVE developed at Indiana University that focuses on an ancient culture, will be introduced to 50 new classrooms, or between 10,000 to 20,000 students, in New Jersey next fall, according to Indiana Associate Professor Sasha Barab, who specializes in learning sciences and instructional systems technology. Privately held companies like Pasadena, California, Numedeon, makers of Whyville, are also finding it easier to lure new sponsors. In the next month, Toyota Financial Services will host a Whyville loan center to help kids learn about FICO scores and interest rates in order to borrow money to buy a virtual Toyota Scion to drive around the world, according to the site’s co-founder and president, Jennifer Sun. (Driving a Scion became a popular activity when the cars were introduced in Whyville in April.) Wider adoption of MUVEs raises the question: Are virtual worlds the future of learning for the wired generation? Ask some educators and they’ll tell you yes. That’s because research has shown that kids engage deeply in virtual environments, gaining a conceptual and ethical understanding of school subjects, according to education experts. And many kids are already comfortable socializing online, so educationally oriented virtual worlds can offer that same sort of stimulus and use that potential to aid learning. There’s one big caveat, however: Virtual worlds must have knowledgeable and motivated teachers driving the train. Chris Dede, Harvard professor and creator of River City, has researched the effects of MUVEs in schools for the last six years. “Based on our results thus far, we’re excited


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about how MUVEs can provide immersive, engaging simulations that complement lectures, textbooks, labs and field trips as part of an effective science curriculum,” Dede says in a video promoting the project. “As a (teaching) supplement, this is the wave of the future,” said Numedeon’s Sun. Still, proponents have an uphill battle when it comes to dispelling negative preconceptions of video games and socially oriented computing environments. They say many people automatically fear that games can’t teach kids anything valuable, or worse, that they’re a waste of time. With the rise of MySpace, many parents are also worried that kids aren’t safe against predators in digital communities. “One of the things for us is how do we deal in this fearful culture?” said Barab. “Do classrooms want to innovate and make it educational and entertaining?” He added that there’s also some tension around how educators enlist kids in a fantasy world so that it has real-world value. In regard to teaching an inner-city kid about Rome and its ancient art, politics and society, for example, a virtual world can spark the child’s imagination more than a textbook filled with beautiful pictures can, Gallas said. Virtual environments, ironically, offer the feeling of reality.

River Rafting Harvard professor Chris Dede developed River City nearly six years ago, seeking to answer two simple research questions: Can kids learn from this type of virtual interface? And if so, how much can they learn? He answered these questions by evaluating use of the MUVE in schools around the greater Boston area. Kids in River City have avatars and can walk, run, or swim through the city, which contains a polluted river and mosquito-ridden bogs. Students work in teams to investigate the virtual town, click on objects to interview subjects, and collectively form hypotheses about what’s affecting the city and making people sick. Inside the city, they can also access library materials and other data sources—and each lesson is up to the national standards for biology and history. Kids must also handle tasks like analyzing water samples at a virtual treatment plant. “Instead of teaching slash-and-slay mentality, River City teaches kids to be scientists through the technology,” said Edward Dieterle, advanced doctoral candidate in learning and teaching at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. In one example, kids who experienced River City found that people in densely populated tenements were much more likely to be stricken with the illness than wealthier people living farther apart. They sought to change variables in the city, such as adding more tenements, which the MUVE allows through administrators, but then one change set off a domino effect that didn’t necessarily fix the city. The kids learned that because of the complexity of the world, it takes many changes to solve its problems. “In ways, many adults don’t understand this,” said Gallas. Deede and his team have also found that lessons in River City can significantly aid learning for kids who aren’t usually engaged in the classroom, or who have a history of

226 Ä Playing to Learn absenteeism. Low-scoring kids typically do as well in River City as high scorers. “Underperforming students come alive by learning in River City,” said Dieterle. Gallas, who’s done some research with River City, put it like this: “If you’re motivated to spend a lot of time doing something, that’s where the learning happens. If you look at snowboarders or skateboarders—these may be kids that don’t do well in traditional school environments—if they want to learn a trick, they go through a hundred to 200 iterations to do it.” Now the Harvard team is researching whether the local success of River City will carry over to a broad number of schools. Funded with $4 million in grants from the National Science Foundation, the program has been implemented in seven states. Last year, it was introduced to about 100 teachers and 10,000 students across the United States, and was found to work well with large school districts such as Miami Dade and Milwaukee. In the next two years, the Harvard team hopes to bring River City to other districts, including those in Washington, D.C., and Chicago.

Whyville—The Anti MySpace? Numedeon was founded in 1999 by a biology professor at CalTech, along with two Ph.D. students. The three, including Numedeon president Sun, wanted to revamp the way science was taught in schools, shifting it to inquiry-based education, in which educators construct engaging experiments to teach science through interaction, rather than through books. Whyville launched in 1999. The community creates activities that simulate questions in science, such as how do ice skaters spin so fast? Whyville’s Spin Lab lets kids figure out the answer. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab has sponsored WASA, a center where kids can become certified space engineers. Inside a virtual lab, zero gravity conditions teach kids to throw projectiles in order to move, in the process teaching them about Newton’s Third Law: Every action has a reaction. This summer Whyville will add a spectrograph game that will let kids analyze a specimen like carbon or sodium. The University of Texas has also sponsored a program in Whyville, called WhyEat, to teach kids about nutrition in an age of rampant child obesity. Kids who play must choose nutritious foods, or they could get ill. As for red tides, children at the beach can visit Wood’s Hole Oceanographic Institute on Whyville—sponsored by the real Oceanographic Institute—to learn about the algae outbreaks and what they can do to fix their warm-weather hangout. A major side effect of Whyville is a thriving business economy that’s created wealthy citizens. Whyville kids love face decorations and other avatar accessories enough that they can pay a clam fee to create and produce a decoration or accessory of their own to sell to other kids. In order to do that, children must factor in profit margins and learn about advertising and marketing to promote their stores. The wealthiest kids, with millions of clams, have developed a hot-selling item. Kids also trade goods like furniture or art


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work, which they collected on treasure hunts at the Getty, a virtual museum hosted by the real J. Paul Getty Museum. “All of that really taught us and enforced the idea that when you allow the process to be driven by the user, they always come back and surprise you,” said Sun. “They learn about life. And sometimes they learn about themselves.”

Kid Safety in the Age of MySpace Phobias The economy has also taught kids a harder lesson in life: how to protect themselves against scams. For example, rogue citizens have been known to pose as “city workers”—staff members of Numedeon who wear special hats in Whyville—to send e-mail to other kids and try to get their passwords. When they get them, they steal the user’s virtual possessions. Whyville citizenship isn’t easy to come by, creating a challenge for predators. To gain the privilege to chat with other members, send “internal city e-mail” or post messages on bulletin boards, kids must have their parents send a fax that verifies the child’s application to join Whyville and approves those activities. Without such permission, kids may play games or join educational activities, but they can’t talk to others. What’s more, the community requires new members to get their “chat license,” which involves taking a multiple-choice quiz that tests their knowledge on how to act with strangers, what information to give out to other members (no personal information), and other such things. And kids must log in on three different days before they can chat. Artificial-intelligence technology also filters out bad words or suggestive words, like “pants,” and asks chatters to rephrase their sentence. If the person persists, he or she can lose chat privileges. As for River City, its creators say it’s 100 percent safe, given that it’s distributed only to K-12 schools, password-protected, and overseen by teachers. Students’ digital characters can only communicate with members of their team via chat or e-mail. Teachers also often sift through chat logs to ensure that no child is harassing others.

Disease Detectives Gallas used Whyville for a classroom of sixth graders at University Elementary School, inside the University of California at Los Angeles’ School of Education and Information Science. The students used butcher paper in class to chart how the infection spread from child to child with information on Post-It notes about symptoms, who talked to whom, where and when they got the infection and how long the symptoms lasted. The kids wrote papers on the subject and became philanthropic, donating money and land for universities and hospitals. “They started coming up with theories, like because the beach was so densely crowded, that’s where they might have caught it,” or that the virus has a seven day lifecycle, she said.

228 Ä Playing to Learn “None of this information was given to them. They were the disease detectives. And I would lead the discussion.” About the Author: Stephanie Olsen is a Staff Writer who covers science and technology topics for CNET News. Source: Olsen, Stephanie. 2006. Are virtual worlds the future of the classroom? CNET News. June 12. URL: http://news.com.com/Are+virtual+worlds+the+future+of+the+ classroom/2009-1041_3-6081870.html?tag=st.num


Having read the article, does the prospect of joining an online virtual world appeal to you? Why or why not?

2.

Pick a topic that you are currently studying in school. Now outline an activity that you could complete in Whyville or another virtual community to help you learn more about this topic.

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Website Design Video game websites are among the most popular online destinations on the Internet. The leading websites (e.g., 1Up, GameSpot, and IGN) are commercial ventures that employ dozens of writers, news gatherers, artists, and other contributors, in addition to management teams. These websites generate most of their revenue through online advertising and membership fees that unlock premium content that is unavailable to nonpaying visitors (e.g., strategy guides). Yet for every leading website, there are dozens (if not hundreds) of smaller websites, many of which focus on a single gaming platform (e.g., PlayStation or Xbox) or genre of video games (e.g., wargames). There are also noncommercial fan sites dedicated to particular video game franchises, a single game, or fan-created modifications to a specific game. In most cases, these websites rely on the goodwill and voluntary efforts of the site’s contributors who are invariably big fans of the video games they write about. More recently, other types of video game websites have started to gain popularity. Video game blogs (e.g., www.terranova.blogs.com) and scholarly websites (e.g., www.gamestudies.org) are but two examples of the increasing diversity of video game-related content to be found online. There are also online destinations for video game developers (e.g., www.gamasutra.com). In this activity, the students brainstorm ideas for a video game website that features content not typically found at existing websites.

Activity Ask the students to browse several of the leading video game websites. Have them list the various types of content that are commonly found at these websites (e.g., news, previews, and reviews). Now ask the class to brainstorm a list of additional content that video game websites could also feature to distinguish themselves from competing websites. As they brainstorm their list of ideas, ask the students to focus on the kinds of content that are most likely to appeal to gamers (e.g., opinion articles, game downloads, and gameplay videos).

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Discussion As a follow-up to this activity, ask the students to put their ideas into action and create a website (that is perhaps hosted at the school’s website) for showcasing the results of the video game activities they have completed in class. This website could feature video game reviews, the results of school surveys, the students’ superhero designs, and much more. As they complete this activity, the students will probably discover that video game websites tend to focus heavily on news and press releases, as well as previews and reviews of upcoming and newly released video games. Yet there is plenty of additional content that video game websites could also feature. For example: ¸ reviews of video game-related books ¸ reviews of official strategy guides ¸ proposals for new video games or sequels to existing games ¸ reviews of player-created maps or modifications ¸ comparative reviews of two or more video games ¸ video game inspired fan fiction ¸ place analyses of video game environments ¸ fan contributed gameplay videos ¸ news feeds from other video game websites ¸ reviews of game development tools

Some of the above ideas are discussed elsewhere in this book in the form of activity ideas. These include the “Book Review,” “Car Commercial,” “Don’t Believe the Hype,” “Historical Place Analysis,” “I Beg to Differ,” “Review Roundup,” “Strategy Guide Review,” “Strategy Guide Writing,” “Tactical Analysis,” “The Stunt,” “Video Game Review,” and “Virtual Journal” activities. Grades: 6 and higher | Subject: Computers

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ü

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Checklist Video Game Website Checklist

¨ activity write-ups

¨ news feeds

¨ advertising

¨ online store

¨ blogs

¨ opinion articles

¨ book reviews

¨ podcasts

¨ interviews

¨ preview articles

¨ fan fiction

¨ reader articles

¨ FAQs

¨ release calendar

¨ game database

¨ reviews

¨ game mods

¨ screenshots

¨ game rankings

¨ strategy guides

¨ game trailers

¨ strategy guide

¨ game trailer reviews ¨ gameplay videos ¨ interviews ¨ links ¨ news

reviews

¨ user forum ¨ user polls ¨ other

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Well-Balanced Diet Gamers are a mixed bunch. Some will try out every demo that becomes available but rarely (if ever) actually purchase or rent a game. Others will stick to a single video game for months (or even years) at a time. Still others will play multiple titles but choose to stick to a single genre of video games (e.g., racing games). In this activity, the students propose a set of four video games that provide a desired gameplay balance and variety of play.

Activity Lead the class in a brainstorming session in which they list all of the different genres of video games: action games, driving games, massively multiplayer games, sports games, strategy games, and so on. (Refer to the opening pages of this book for a brief explanation of these and other genres.) Now discuss with students the inherent quality of experience that accompanies these genres: the rush of speeding 180 MPH through a racing game, the intense concentration required by a strategy game, the tremendous commitment of time required to level up in an massively multiplayer online role-playing game, and so on. Remind the students that many gamers stick to just one game or video game genre most of the time. But just what would a “well-balanced” video game diet look like if gamers played a variety of video games that belonged to a variety of genres? Ask each student to brainstorm a list of four video games that, in their view, provide a desired gameplay balance and variety of play. Have the students give reasons for their choices and defend their gameplay diet to other students.

Discussion Just as it may be unhealthy for gamers to play only one video game for months at a time, so, too, it is unhealthy for gamers to play only video games for hours at a time and never go outside to play or pursue other recreational hobbies. Gamers who do so are at risk of experiencing a repetitive stress injury and other health problems related to a lack of exercise (e.g., obesity). They are also at risk of losing their non-gamer friends

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and missing out completely on the real world that exists quite apart from the world of video games. With this in mind, consider adapting this activity to explore the wide variety of recreational pursuits that students can enjoy quite apart from video games. Ask the students to propose a set of four recreational activities (only one of which can be playing video games or watching television) that provide a desired recreational balance between fun, sport, art, music, learning, rest, and other recreational and learning pursuits. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Computers

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World without Music Unlike movies and television shows, many video games allow players to control the music volume independent of other sounds such as dialog and sound effects. This presents music teachers with a unique opportunity to highlight (through its absence) the important role music plays in a movie, television show, or video game title. In this activity, the students reflect on the perceptual experience of playing a video game without music.

Activity Ask the students to play a favorite video game with the music volume turned off or all the way down to its lowest setting. Now ask the students to reflect on the experience of playing a video game without music. Here are some key questions for the students to consider: 1) How does the absence of music alter the emotional quality of the video game? 2) Does the absence of music make it any harder to anticipate key game events (e.g., the appearance of an enemy)? 3) Does the absence of music lead to more or less distractions when playing the video game? 4) Once this activity ends, how likely is it that you will continue to play the video game without music?

Discussion Discuss with students the aesthetic and thematic roles that music plays in video games. Ask the students to list the video game soundtracks they most enjoy or view as essential to the gaming experience. Discuss why some game developers may choose not to have music accompany the gameplay. This activity can also provide music teachers with a welcome opportunity to introduce students to the topic of musical cues. Important events in video games (similar to horror movies) are often preceded or accompanied by musical cues. If an enemy is lurking around the next corner or an ambush is about to take place, the player is often alerted to the change in conditions by a sudden musical accent or change in tempo. Discuss with students the importance of musical cues, why composers use them, what forms they take, and what the experience of playing a video game might be like without them. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Music 234

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World’s Best Gamertag When gamers play online against other players, they are rarely identified by their real names. For the sake of protecting each gamer’s privacy, most online gaming systems require gamers to choose a unique username or Gamertag that will then be used to identify them online. In many multiplayer games, players’ Gamertags float above their avatars’ heads. This way, other players can identify them in the game world as they work together or compete against each other. Gamertags are also used to identify gamers in discussion boards and online leaderboards that track each gamer’s performance in a video game. In this activity, the students are challenged to come up with the most creative Gamertag they can think of.

Activity Visit the discussion forums at the Xbox website (www.xbox.com) and make note of a few of the more creative Gamertags you find. Share these Gamertags with the students and talk more generally about the importance of a Gamertag in establishing a gamer’s identify online. Also ask the student gamers in the class to share their own Gamertag names should they wish. Often, the choice of a Gamertag name is quite personal. It may express something about the person it belongs to, and it serves as a person’s “formal name” in the gaming community. Challenge the students to work together in small groups to brainstorm ten of the most creative Gamertags they can think of. Then have each group share their list with the rest of class. Optionally, have the students vote for the best Gamertag the class has come up with. Now have one student go online to find out if that Gamertag is already in use.

Discussion It is important that teachers lay down clear ground rules prior to starting this activity. Some students may wrongly equate the quality of a Gamertag with its ability to shock (or offend) other players. Most online gaming systems do not permit gamers to choose Gamertags that disparage a social group or that include curse words (or trademarked 235

236 Ä Playing to Learn names). Discuss with students the reasons these policies might be in place and then enforce them as students complete this activity. Incidentally, the most memorable Gamertag this author has encountered online is “urmomsanoob.” In the realm of competitive gaming, calling an adversary a “noob” (i.e., a newbie) is the ultimate insult. Calling a gamer’s mother a noob is just asking for trouble :) This activity can also be adapted to work with website domain names. Challenge the students to come up with a memorable domain name for a video game website or a fictional product they have designed. Then have a student go online to find out whether that domain name is already in use. Grades: 4 and higher | Subject: Language Arts

Afterword: Video Game Design in the Classroom This book has explored dozens of activity ideas that help teachers integrate video games into the classroom, but perhaps the most important—and ambitious—activity idea has only been hinted at: challenging students to design their own video games from the ground up. That’s what this Afterword is about—the joy and rewards of taking on a video game development project, either on one’s own or as part of a small team of like-minded students with similar goals. Although by no means exhaustive in scope, these closing comments do serve to highlight some of the most important points to keep in mind when introducing video game design into the classroom. So where to start? Perhaps with the following nine-step method that takes students through the very same development process that even ambitious commercial games go through.

1. Exploring Video Game Design In many ways, the activities in this book are all about this important first step. There is no sense in initiating a video game design project with students unless all involved have a pretty good understanding of the challenges that lay ahead. Begin by asking the students to turn a critical eye to the video games they routinely play. What works and what doesn’t in their view (and in the view of professional reviewers)? What makes a game fun to play but also successful in the marketplace? Even as the students begin looking critically at the games they play, introduce them to some of the behind-the-scenes roles and tasks that go into creating a video game, such as collecting and/or designing the game’s assets (e.g., models, textures, and sound effects) and programming the gameplay. Introduce students to the important roles played by artists, modelers, programmers, and other professionals who contribute their expertise to a video game project. Encourage older students, in particular, to begin learning and exploring the video game design tools they will need to master should they wish to create original content for their games (e.g., 3D design software).

2. Generating an Idea Coming up with an intriguing and original idea for a video game is the next step. Depending on the nature of the project, the game’s subject matter may be assigned by the teacher, determined by the topic under study, posed as a challenge by another group of students, or generated through a brainstorming session led by the teacher or a student. 237

238 Ä Playing to Learn Even at this early stage, the students should have some sense of the time and resources that are available to develop the game. Both will heavily influence the scope and complexity of the game ideas the students consider and the software tools they choose to use. Perhaps the most important advice is to pick a video game idea that has legs. The chosen subject matter should have room to grow and develop. It should sustain the interest of the students over time. And it should have educational merit. Any number of the activities in this book can be used to help students brainstorm ideas for new video games. The “Alternate History,” “Best Kids’ Game,” “Choose Your Own Adventure,” “Game Invention,” “Historical Campaign,” “Kid-friendly Grand Theft Auto,” “Scary Stories,” “Serious Games Brainstorming,” “Study of the Future,” “Superhero Design,” and “The Pitch” activities are particularly noteworthy. As they brainstorm ideas, encourage the students to also be mindful of the various video game genres they can choose from: 2D puzzle games, 3D platform games, action/adventure games, driving/racing games, flight simulators, math drill games, open world games, science simulation games, the list goes on …

3. Choosing a Game Engine There are literally dozens of game engines from which to choose. The most basic are essentially point-and-click game building tools. The most complex require advanced programming skills. The best game engines for schools probably fall somewhere in the middle. The ideal educational game engine is simple enough for K–12 students to learn, but flexible enough to accommodate their most creative ideas. Some engines require no programming or scripting whatsoever. Other engines require minimal scripting. They are ideal for teachers who wish their students to learn basic math, logic, and computer programming skills as they develop their games. For a comprehensive list of 3D game engines, search the DevMaster website (www.devmaster.net) for the following information. Each engine’s: ¸ educational price ¸ game distribution license (i.e., royalty free is ideal) ¸ programming requirements (e.g., none, basic scripting, or C++ programming) ¸ feature set (e.g., integrated 3D modeling and multiplayer support) ¸ bells and whistles (e.g., graphical effects and physics system) ¸ import and export support (e.g., for models and graphics) ¸ publishing options (e.g., Windows, Macintosh, and/or Web) ¸ level of developer and community support


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Also visit the websites for these student-oriented video game engines: 3D GameStudio (www.3dgamestudio.com), Adventure Game Studio (www.adventuregamestudio. co.uk), Alice (www.alice.org), Blitz Tools (www.blitzbasic.com), DarkBasic (www. thegamecreators.com), FPS Creator (www.fpscreator.com), Game Maker (www. gamemaker.nl), Games Factory (www.clickteam.com), Revolution (www.runrev. com), RPG Toolkit (www.toolkitzone.com), Unity (www.unity3d.com), and XNA Game Studio Express (www.microsoft.com). Also consider Hyperstudio (www. hyperstudio.com) and the LOGO language as ideal entry points for introducing younger students to multimedia design and computer programming respectively. It is advisable for teachers and students to take their time in choosing a game engine. Many hours will be devoted in class to learning and using the software. Therefore, it is critical that a chosen engine’s required level of expertise, user interface, and feature set are all appropriate for the grade and experience level of the students. Seriously consider, in particular, those game engines that are designed with children and teachers in mind or that feature integrated editors for modeling, texturing, animating, and publishing games, without the need to add third-party software to the workflow. In truth, the choice of a game engine will often drive the rest of the game design process in many classrooms. Some easy-to-use tools are optimized for particular genres of video games (e.g., 2D platformer games), whereas others have only a limited feature set. These game engines may be inappropriate choices for commercial game development, but they are often the ideal rapid application development tools for amateur, hobbyist, and student developers. Encourage the students to familiarize themselves with both the strengths and weaknesses of the various game engines available to them in class. Ensure that they are mindful of each tool’s intended usage as they brainstorm compelling gameplay ideas for their video games.

4. Pitching the Game Idea Once the students have come up with an engaging idea, articulated its most important elements, and chosen a development tool within which to create their game, ask them to pitch their idea to the class. (Consider leading “The Pitch” activity as part of this process.) The students can be asked to pitch their video game idea to an informal roundtable or instead make a formal multimedia presentation—complete with concept art—to the entire class. The purpose of the pitch is to ensure that the game idea is compelling, feasible (given the time constraints, choice of development tool, and level of expertise of the students), and well thought out. Also ensure that the project is challenging, but not too ambitious. Immediately following the pitch, the teacher and students should ask questions of the student developers. These questions should aim to glean further information about the development team’s plans and timelines, as well as the contributions each member of the development team will make to the game.

240 Ä Playing to Learn A pitch can end with a simple up or down vote on the game proposal plus some constructive feedback for the development team to keep in mind as their project moves on to the next stage.

5. Writing a Story or Scenario Coming up with the basic idea for a video game is important, but many games also require well developed characters and an engaging storyline. The scenario for a racing or math drill game may be very simple and lacking in even a basic story, but for many others genres—adventure games especially—a well-articulated storyline is practically essential. A good adventure game story can be set in either a familiar or otherworldly place, in the herein now or in some future or past world. The chosen setting should be compelling enough for gamers to want to spend considerable time there. An adventure game will also need one or more lead characters plus a nemesis of some kind for the lead character to be pitted against. The lead character will almost surely face a series of problematic crises (e.g., sole responsibility for saving the world) and may be equipped with special powers to help him or her in that quest. Each level of an adventure game will typically challenge the lead character to make one’s way through a hostile environment, solving puzzles along the way, and/or fighting enemies. Writing a good story for an adventure game requires the students to flesh out the various settings, characters, dialog, and plot developments that will be featured in the game. All of this needs to be set against a well-honed story arc that takes gamers on a compelling journey. As they write the story or scenario for their game, encourage the students to follow the five basic stages of the authoring cycle: planning, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. At each stage of the writing process, ask the students to solicit feedback from their peers. They should also regularly meet with the teacher and other students to keep their adventure story on track.

6. Collecting and Designing Assets By far the two most time-consuming tasks of game development are asset design and gameplay programming. Unless the students are relying on a preprogrammed game engine, the latter cannot be avoided. But the former can if the students are prepared to search for and use premade 3D models, characters, textures, images, decals, skyboxes, sounds, and so on that are widely available on the Web. No doubt the students will find many online assets that require purchasing, at Turbo Squid (www.turbosquid.com), for example, but there are also many websites with assets that are free to download and use (but perhaps not free to use in a commercial video game). Collecting (and giving credit to) assets that others have made is one option, but many students will no doubt wish to create their own visual and audio assets. To do so, the students will need to use specialized 3D modeling and sound design tools. As with the game engine, the choice of 3D software ranges from free, inexpensive, and simple-to-use, all the way up to thousands of dollars to purchase and very complex to


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learn. In the case of 3D Studio Max (the most popular professional 3D design software) and other leading tools, look for special educational pricing. Asset collection and design are not only potentially expensive, they are also time-consuming. In choosing a game engine, seriously consider those tools that ship with plenty of models, textures, and audio assets for the students to immediately use. Or instead purchase one or two reasonably priced asset collections that the students can quickly import into their games.

7. Programming the Gameplay Programming or scripting the basic gameplay lies at the heart of the development process. Considerable time should be set aside for this stage, especially if the students are simultaneously designing the game and learning how to use the game engine. There will be moments of frustration as the students program the gameplay. The students will discover “bugs” in their game, and they will need to find workarounds for features the game engine doesn’t adequately support. There will be times that the students aren’t sure about what to do next. Encourage the students to be patient, to take a break, and to solicit the help of their peers. Putting the game project aside for a few days and then returning to it with fresh eyes is also advisable. Once the main programming is complete, the development team should devote some time to building a user-friendly menu interface for the game. The students may also wish to create an opening welcome screen for the game and a simple help system or user’s guide. Finally, if the game is destined for the Windows or Macintosh platform, the students may need to create an installer.

8. Testing the Game Prior to releasing their game, it is critical that the students not only test their game thoroughly but also solicit the feedback of their peers, especially members of the target audience the game is intended for (e.g., racing game fans). Most importantly, the development team should ensure that players who pick up their game for the first time are able to get up to speed quickly on how to play the game. The students should also be on the look out for gameplay bugs and things that don’t quite work as expected. Ironing out these bugs should be a top priority during the testing phase. One way to solicit the feedback of other students is to conduct a beta test in which a small group of gamers are invited to play the game and then give their feedback to the developers. Based on the feedback they receive, the development team may decide to alter certain elements of the game, enhance the game’s artificial intelligence, improve the help system, redesign a few of the assets, and so on.


9. Sharing and Celebrating the Game Now that all of the hard work has been done, the development team will no doubt be anxious to share its completed video game with others. The student developers have a wide variety of distribution options to choose from. With permission, they can simply install the game on the school’s computer network for other students to download and play or instead burn the game to a CD or DVD for their peers to take home. The development team could also post their game online to a website they have created to market their game or to a popular download site for video games, such as FileFront (www.filefront.com). If the students plan to sell their game commercially (perhaps as a school fund-raising project), they will need to ensure that they have the right to distribute commercial games created with the engine and assets they have used. And, of course, it goes without saying that the whole class should hold a launch party to celebrate the game’s release!

Conclusion These nine steps are just the beginning when it comes to designing video games in the classroom. Each school year, most teachers will have at least a few students in their class who are eager to create their first (or second or third) video game. Engaging these students and the rest of the class in the study of video games is what this book is all about. For some students, completing the activities in this book could lead directly into a career in the video game industry. For others, the activities will serve as real eye-openers to the potential of video games—today and in the future—to entertain, inspire, and teach, as game designers around the world forge brave new virtual worlds for people to explore.

Activity List Sorted by Subject *Activity Quickie

Business Advertising Campaign Branding the Box Chart Toppers

Researching the Credits The Pitch Ultimate Gaming Bundle

Virtual Economy*

Gaming Station Machinima* New Multiplayer Mode Researching the Credits (Take Two) The Stunt

Video Game Database Website Design Well-Balanced Diet

Newscast Production Storyboard Sequence* The Rewrite

Video Game Reenactment

Lay of the Land Map of the World Open World Directions Place Analysis*

School Map* Urban Planning

Computers Best Kids’ Game Car Commercial Cheat Code Central Critiquing the Controllers Flight Controls* Foley Effects Artist (Take Two)

Drama Deadpan Dialog Do You Recognize This Voice?

Geography Battleship Design Your Own Race Track Design Your Own Race Track (Take Two)

Health and Physical Education Body Image Ergonomic Audit Exercise Games*

Fitness Regime Game Invention Poor Posture 243

Repetitive Stress Injury Video Game Addiction


History Alternate History Historical Campaign

Historical Place Analysis Historical Weaponry

Technological Progress

I Beg to Differ Letter to the Editor* Playing to Learn Review Roundup Scary Stories Spelling Dictation Strategy Guide Review

Strategy Guide Writing Tactical Analysis The Obituary The Rewrite (Take Two) Video Game Review Virtual Journal World’s Best Gamertag

Language Arts Book Review Car Tuning Guide* Choose Your Own Adventure Don’t Believe the Hype Fact vs. Opinion Fan Fiction*

Math Fine Motor Count For How Long Do I Play?

Gaming Budget Statistical Analysis The Survey

Music Composer Discography Foley Effects Artist

Musical Critic Surround Sound Map

World without Music

Science Scooby-Doo and the Laws of Physics

Television Technologies Test Drive

Social Studies Arcade vs. Video Games Bully ESRB Ratings Review I Believe Kid-friendly Grand Theft Auto

Massively Multiplayer Ethics* Race Relations Review of the Real World Serious Games Brainstorming

Study of the Future The Interview Video Game Debate


Ä 245

Visual Arts Artistic Rendering Car of the Future Graphical Analysis

Next Generation Console Photo Analysis* Superhero Design

The Gaming PC User Interface Review

Index Absynth, 80 action games, 10, 16, 17 addiction, video game, 20, 207–10 Adesman, Andrew, 158 adventure, choose your own, 39–40 Adventure Game Studio (website), 239 adventure games, 11, 151, 154, 175, 191, 240 advertising, 1–3, 29–30, 66, 201, 229. See also marketing age, video game play by, 206 aggression, 26, 27, 65–66, 68, 144. See also violence Albert, Wayne, 137 Alice, 239 alternate history, 4–6 Altman, Drew, 82 Amazon (website), 22 American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), 81, 83 America’s Army, 155 animation, 146, 179 annotated bibliographies, 144 arcade games, 73, 182 architecture, 99–102 Are Virtual Worlds the Future of the Classroom? (discussion article), 223–28 Armstrong, Alison, 62 artificial intelligence, 146, 227, 241 artistic rendering, 9–11 assets, 240–41, 242 attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), 157

Battlefield, 120, 198 Battleship, 12–13 Beck, Jock C., 20 bedrooms, media equipment in, 82 behavioral characteristics, 34 Ben’s Game, 157 bias, 64–65 Blitz Tools (website), 239 blogs, 229 board games, 12–13 body image, 16–19, 73 books about video games, 20–22 Boulding, Aaron, 56, 57 Brady Games, 164 Brain Age, 157 branching storylines, 39, 40 branding, 23–24 Bringing Back the Dream (discussion article), 192–93 Brothers in Arms, 98 Bryant, Cedric, 73, 75 Bully, 25 Bullying Online (website), 25 bundles, gaming, 201 Burnham, Van, 20 business, 1–2, 24, 34–36, 127, 139–40, 184, 191–92, 201 buying vs. renting video games, 90–91 Call of Duty series, 37, 105, 120 Canada Safety Council, 137–38 car commercials, 29–30 car tuning guides, 93 careers, 139–40, 242 cartoons, 153–54 Casement, Charles, 62 cases, custom, 185–86 Castronova, Edward, 21 censorship, 26

balance, 232–33 Barab, Sasha, 224, 225 Bartie, Richard, 109 Batman, 172 247

248 Ä Index characters creation of, 240 customization of, 173 death of, 189–90 cheat codes, 37–38, 129 checklists video game marketing strategies, 3 video game websites, 231 chess, 13 Child and the Machine, The, 62 child-friendly games, 14–15, 110–12 children, 66, 222 Choose Your Own Adventure series, 39–40 Cieply, Michael, 57 cities, planning, 202–203 City of Heroes, 173 City of Villains, 173 Civilization series, 10, 12 Clement, Shawn, 74 Command & Conquer: Generals, 114 composer discographies, 41–42 Computer Addiction Service, 209 computers, 14–15, 29–30, 37–38, 43–44, 79–80, 92–93, 118, 119–20, 141–42, 197–98, 211–13, 229–30, 232–33 concept art, 9–10 concept cars, 31–32, 162, 186 Condemned: Criminal Origins, 152 consoles, 126–27, 201 Contradictions (discussion article), 109 control interfaces, evaluating, 44 control options, 184 controllers, 43–44, 126, 201 Convention for the Protection of Virtual Architectural Heritage, The (discussion article), 99–102 copyeditors, 195, 196 Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), 123, 125 Corporation for Public Gaming (CPG), 124 cost-benefit analysis of buying vs. renting video games, 90–91

of equipping consoles vs. manufacturing costs, 127 for television comparisons, 181 credits, 139–40, 141–42 CRT display, 180 Crysis, 96 custom gaming PCs, 185–86 customization of cars, 31–32 of characters, 173 CyberLearning Technology system, 157–58 Dance Dance Revolution, 10, 73, 157 DarkBasic, 239 data tables ESRB ratings by platform, 61 online vs. offline play, 36 playday survey, 85 sample racing leaderboard, 163 video game play by age, 206 video game playing tracking chart, 87 database, video game, 211–13 Dead or Alive, 10 death of lead characters, 189–90 deathmatch, 119 debates, 214–15 decision trees, 39, 40 Dede, Chris, 224–25 Degaetano, Gloria, 21 demographics, 20, 34 Designing Virtual Worlds, 109 development teams, 139–40, 191, 241, 242 DevMaster (website), 95, 238 dexterity, 70–71 dialog, 45–46, 52, 77, 146, 194, 234 Dieterle, Edward, 225, 226 directions, 128–29 distribution, 142, 242 DLP display, 180 Doctor Claims 40 Percent of World of Warcraft Players Are Addicted (discussion article), 208–10 Dolby Digital sound, 174 domain names, 236

Index

Don’t Bother Me Mom—I’m Learning!, 21 Doom, 95 Downloads (website), 212–13 drama, 45–46, 52–53, 78, 121–22, 194, 217 Driv3r, 37 driving games, 11, 31, 37, 47–48, 128–29, 162, 182, 191 drug use, 110, 134, 135 DS (handheld platform), 61 DTS sound, 174 Duggan, Mark, 138 DVD-Audio music disks, 174 economic audit, 184 educational games, 11, 109, 155 “edutainment,” 155 Electric-Spin Corporation, 74 Electronic Games, 55 elocution, 45–46, 194 empathy, 68 engines, 238, 240, 241, 242 Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), 14, 23, 26, 59–61, 211, 215 environmental audit, 63 ergonomics, 62–63, 71, 132. See also repetitive stress injury ethics, 20, 25, 53, 55–58, 67, 215–16 Ethics in Video Game Journalism (discussion article), 55–58 Everquest, 208 Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today’s Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter, 21 exercise, 72–76 lack of, 232 Exercise, Lose Weight with “Exergaming,” 73–75 exercise video games, 89 exergaming, 73–75 expression, video games as form of, 67 Falcon Northwest, 185 family-friendly games, 14–15

Ä 249

fantasy, 168, 169 Far Cry, 95 F.E.A.R., 140 Federal Trade Commission, 66 feedback, 241 females, 66, 135 fighting games, 10 FileFront (website), 242 FileMaker Pro, 212 fine motor count, 70–71 finger movement, 70–71 Fisher, Sam, 172 fitness, 72–76 Flight Simulator series, 11, 183 flowcharts, 5, 40, 142 foley artists, 77–78, 79–80 Foley, Jack, 77 Food Force, 124 Ford Foundation, 124 Forza Motorsport series, 32, 182 FPS Creator (website), 239 fragging, 119, 162 free speech, 25 Freedom Fighters, 4 From Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and Video Games, 21 future, 5, 168–71 futuristic games, 6 Gallas, Cathleen, 224, 225, 226, 227 Gamasutra (website), 34, 122, 140, 141 game developers, 140, 141, 229 game development books, 20 game engines, 238, 240, 241, 242 Game Girl Advance, 58, 221 game invention, 88–89 Game Maker (website), 239 Game Studio Express (website), 239 GameBoy Advance, 61 GameCritics (website), 57–58 GameCube, 61 GameFAQs (website), 37, 165, 166, 167 GameFly (website), 211 gamepads, 43–44, 126 GameRankings (website), 57, 144 “Gamers’ Perks or ‘Playola’?”, 55

250 Ä Index gamertags, 235–36 Games Factory (website), 239 GameSpot (website), 35, 56, 57, 64, 106, 122, 150, 179, 195, 219, 229 GameStop (website), 211 GameTrailers (website), 121 gaming budgets, 90–91 gaming stations, 92–93 gangs, 110, 134, 135 GarageBand, 80 Gee, James Paul, 21, 67 genres, video game, 10–11, 232, 238, 239 geography, 13, 33, 40, 47–48, 49–51, 113–14, 115–16, 128–29, 202–203 Gerosa, Mario, 99–102 girls, 66, 135 GlucoBoy, 124 gold farming, 142 Golf Launchpad, 74 Got Game: How the Gamer Generation Is Reshaping Business Forever, 20 GPS systems, 128 grade level 4 and higher, 9–10, 12–13, 14–15, 39–40, 43–44, 70–71, 72–73, 77–78, 85–87, 107–108, 115–16, 126–27, 128–29, 136–37, 151–52, 153–54, 159–61, 168–69, 172–73, 174–75, 185–86, 199–200, 217, 232–33, 234, 235–36 6 and higher, 16–17, 23–24, 29–30, 31–32, 34–36, 37–38, 47–48, 49–51, 59–60, 64–65, 79–80, 88–89, 90–91, 92–93, 94–95, 105–106, 110–12, 113–14, 121–22, 130–131, 143–44, 145–46, 162–63, 166–67, 176–77, 182–84, 187–88, 189–90, 191–92, 194, 195–96, 197–98, 202–203, 205–206, 211–13, 214–15, 218–20, 222–23, 229–30 8 and higher, 1–2, 4–6, 20–22, 25–26, 41–42, 45–46, 52–53, 54–55, 62–63, 96–97, 98–99, 103–104, 117–18, 119–20, 134–35, 139–40, 141–42, 155–56,

164–65, 178–79, 180–81, 201, 207–208 Gran Turismo series, 11, 32, 49, 74, 204 Grand Prix series, 49–51 Grand Theft Auto series, 11, 25, 37, 110, 112, 121, 135 grants, 124, 125 graphics, 94–95, 146, 178 Graziani, Gabe, 215–16 Grossman, Dave, 21 Half Life, 17 Half-Life, 95 Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds, 21 Hall, Justin, 55–58 Halo series, 10, 168, 198 Halter, Ed, 21 happiness, 83 Harry Potter series, 14 Havok, 95 HDTV, 181 heads up displays (HUDs), 128, 129, 205, 206 Health, Education, and Welfare, Department of, 123 health and physical education, 16–17, 62–63, 72–73, 88–89, 136–37, 207–208 Herz, J. C., 21 High Score! The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, 21 historical authenticity, 103–104 historical progress, 179 history, 4–5, 6, 96–97, 98–99, 103–104, 113, 118, 178–79, 181 Hitti, Miranda, 26–28, 80–84 holograms, 96 How Computer Games Help Children Learn, 21 “how to” instructional guides, 20 Hutchison, David, 170–71 Hyperstudio (website), 239 identities, 199 IGN (website), 56, 57, 122, 229 iList Data, 212

Index

Imaginova, 130 Incident Commander, 155 income and Internet access, 82 interactivity, 124 interviews (with gamers), 187–88 Jenkins, Henry, 65–69, 109 Johnson, Lyndon, 123 Johnson, Steven, 21 Jones, Gerard, 66 journalism, video game, 55–58 journals, 222–23 Joystick Nation: How Video Games Ate Our Quarters, Won Our Hearts, and Rewired Our Minds, 21 junkets, 55–58 Just Cause, 197 Juul, Jesper, 21 Kaiser Family Foundation, 80–84 Kasavin, Gregory, 56, 57, 146–50 Kent, Steven L., 21 kid-friendly games, 14–15, 110–12 Kids Health (website), 136 Killing Monsters, 66 Kilowatt, 74–75 Konami, 73 Kunkel, Bill, 55 LA Rush, 129 landforms, 47, 113–14 language arts, 13, 15, 20–22, 39–40, 48, 54–55, 64–65, 93, 105–106, 130–31, 143–44, 151–52, 159–61, 164–65, 166–67, 176–77, 189–90, 195–96, 200, 218–20, 222–23, 235–36 Lara Croft, 16 Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Series (discussion article), 18–19 Laura’s Story (discussion article), 170–71 Lawrence, Star, 73–75 LCD display, 180 leaderboards, 162, 163, 235 learning systems, video games as, 6 leisure time, 34

Ä 251

letter to the editor, 13 licensing costs, 95 light, 180 Limbaugh, Stephen N., Sr., 67 Links, 74 Living in Oblivion (discussion article), 220–21 Llopis, Noel, 192–93 locations, real-world, 115–16 MacDonald, Margaret, 158 Macintosh platform, 74 Madden NFL, 10 manuals, 177 maps in open world games, 128, 202–203 real world, 115–16 reviews of, 230 of school, 40 in strategy guides, 164 surround sound, 174–75 in wargames, 113–14 marketing and brand awareness, 23 by car manufacturers, 32 and ESRB ratings, 59 and game development, 142 of mature games, 66 of original consoles, 126 of original video games, 242 and previews/reviews, 54, 55 of serious games, 156 strategies, 3, 201 Massacre in Winterspring (discussion article), 215–16 MassBalance, 124 massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), 11, 232 and addiction, 208–10 architecture in, 100, 102 character customization in, 173 economic audit in, 184 and ethics, 142, 215–16 gamertags in, 235 review of real life, 146 and social action, 124

252 Ä Index Master Chief, 172 math, 13, 70–71, 85–87, 90–91, 127, 129, 162–63, 181, 199–200 Matrix, 145 Max Payne series, 154 medical treatments, video games and, 156–58 Medium of the Video Game, The, 21 menu interfaces, 241 menu system, 205 meta-analyses, 144 MetaCritic, 57 Microsoft, 23, 43, 126, 157, 201 Microsoft Access, 212 Midnight Club series, 32, 128 military geography, 113–14 military training, 66–67 Minow, Newton, 123 MMOGS (Massively Multiplayer Online Games), 100, 102. See also massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) MMORPGS (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games). See massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) multiplayer games, 119–20, 124. See also massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) multitasking, 82 multiuser virtual environment (MUVE), 224, 225 music, 41–42, 77–78, 117–18, 174–75, 234 Music 4 Games (website), 41 music workstations, 93 MySpace, 225 Myst series, 169 myths about video games, 65–68 National Educational Television (NET), 123 National Science Foundation, 226 Need for Speed series, 32, 128 neurofeedback, 157–58 news updates, 121–22

newscast production, 121–22 Nicktoons Movin’, 74 Nintendo, 23, 43, 126, 157 NPD Group, 34, 36, 206 Numedeon, Inc., 222, 224, 226, 227 obesity, 83, 232 obituaries, 189–90 Olsen, Stephanie, 223–28 1Up (website), 122, 229 open world games, 110–12, 128–29, 162, 222 OpenGL, 95 opinions, 64, 105 organizational structure, 141 Orzack, Maressa Hecht, 209 packaging, 23–24, 59 parents, 66 PC platform, 61, 74 personal beliefs, 107 PG Championship Golf 1999, 178 Pham, Alex, 55 photo analysis, 51 physics, laws of, 153–54 Pinckard, Jane, 220–21 pitching ideas, 239 pitching new video games, 191–92 place analysis, 33, 98–99, 230 place authenticity, 115–16 plasma display, 180 platformer games, 10 play, video games and, 6 Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture, 21 PlayStation, 23, 43, 61, 70, 73, 74, 92, 126, 157, 206, 229 poems, “I Believe,” 107 Poole, Steven L., 21 Posner, Richard, 67 posture, 132, 137 Powergrid Fitness, 74 powers, 240 Prensky, Marc, 21 previews, 54–55, 98, 230 Prima Games, 164

Index

profanity, 14, 110 programming gameplay, 241 Project Gotham Racing 3, 48 Protect Kids from Computer Injuries, Safety Council Urges (discussion article), 137–38 PSP (handheld platform), 61 Psycho, 189 Psychonauts, 10, 13, 154 psychosocial behavior, 20 publishing workstations, 93 puzzle games, 10, 191 Quake series, 16, 95 Quest Atlantis, 224 race and Internet access, 82 race relations, 134–35 racetracks, 47–48, 49–51 racing games, 31–32, 47–48, 93, 154, 157, 162, 163, 174, 175, 176, 182, 183, 186, 232 Rainbow Six series, 56, 145 ratings, 59–61 Real Life: The Full Review (discussion article), 146–50 real world, 145–50 Real World, The, 145 real-world locations, 115–16 realism, 182, 184 Reality Bites: Eight Myths about Video Games Debunked (discussion article), 65–69 recreational activities, 233 reenactments, 217 Reimer, Jeremy, 208–10 Rejeski, David, 123–25 RenderWare, 95 renting vs. buying video games, 90–91 repetitive stress injury, 136–38, 232. See also ergonomics research books about video games, 22 vs. perception of video games, 65 student, 143, 207 Resident Evil series, 151

Ä 253

reviews of books, 20–22 and ethics, 55–58 fact vs. opinion, 64–65, 105–106 of kid-friendly video games, 14–15 of the literature, 144 of maps, 230 music, 117 and newscast production, 122 and previews, 54–55 of real world, 145–50 researching, 143–44 rewriting, 46 and spelling dictation, 161 of strategy guides, 164–65, 230 of television models, 181 templates, 219 of user interfaces, 205–206 by users, 195–96 on video game websites, 230 writing, 218–20 Revolution (website), 239 rhythm games, 11 River City, 224, 225–26, 227 Roberts, Donald F., 81 Roby, Ismini Boinodiris, 18–19 rocket jumps, 197 RockStar, 25, 111, 112 role models, 72 role-playing games, 10, 191, 222 RPG Toolkit (website), 239 rules for architectural preservation, 101 for Gamertag activity, 235 for gaming station use, 93 for media usage at home, 83–84 Rusel, DeMaria, 21 SACD music disks, 174 safety, 227 sales of video games, 34–35 “sandbox games,” 110 scale models, 103. See also 3D models scanning workstations, 93 scary stories, 151–52 scholarly websites, 229

254 Ä Index science, 153–54, 180–81, 182–84 science fiction, 5 science workstations, 93 Scooby-Doo Mysteries, 153 screenshots, 179 Second Life, 11, 124, 157, 222 sensitivity/desensitivity to violence, 26, 27, 68 serious games, 11, 124–25, 155–58 Serious Games Source (website), 156 sexual innuendo, 14, 16, 18, 110 Shaffer, David Williamson, 21 Shahrani, Sam, 99–102 Sherman-Wolin, Judith, 73, 74 shooting games, 98, 103, 119–20, 162, 197 Simpsons, The: Hit & Run, 110 Sims, The, 57, 66, 67, 145 simulations, 88, 145, 155, 182, 225 simulators, 11, 118, 183–84 Smart BrainGames, 157–58 Smart Girls Do Dumbbells, 73 Soaking Up the Media: Full-time Job for Kids (discussion article), 80–84 social action, 63, 124 social experience, 13 social isolation, 68 social studies, 26, 59–60, 107–108, 110–12, 134–35, 142, 145–46, 155–56, 168–69, 187–88, 214–15 software, 239 Solid Snake, 172 SONAR, 80 Sony, 23, 43, 126, 157 sound effects, 77–78, 79–80, 146, 234 soundtracks, 41, 146, 234 special effects, 179 spelling dictation, 159–61 Spiderman, 172 sports games, 10, 88 Star Wars, 140 statistics, 80–84, 162–63 stereotypes, 134 Stockdale, Steven, 158

Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill: A Call to Action Against TV, Movie and Video Game Violence, 21 stories, 200 storyboard sequences, 78 storyline, 217 strategy games, 6, 10, 12–13, 176, 191, 232 strategy guides, 20, 164–65, 166–67, 177, 202, 230 street races, sanctioned, 49–51 stunts, 197–98 Sun, Jennifer, 224, 225, 226 Supercade: A Visual History of the Video Game Age, 1971–1984, 20 superheroes, 172–73 superhuman bodies, 17 Superman, 172 surround sound, 174–75 surveys, 120, 183, 188, 199–200 survival horror video games, 151 SWAT, 10 synthesizers, 80 Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games, 21 system requirements, 94 tableau, 217 tactics, 176–77 Taylor, T. L., 21 television, 123 televisions, 180–81 Terranova (blog), 109 Test Drive Unlimited, 31, 129 testing, 241 Tetris, 10 Therien, Emile, 137 3D design software, 9–10 3D GameStudio (website), 239 3D models, 47–48, 203, 240 3D Studio Max, 241 time, division of, 82–83 time spent on video games, 85–87 time travel, 5 timelines, 4–5, 239

Index

Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Vegas, 116 Tomb Raider series, 18–19 Toyota Financial Services, 224 TrackMania series, 48 Trigger Happy: Video Games and the Entertainment Revolution, 21 tuner games, 182 Turbo Squid (website), 240 turn-based games, 12–13 Ubisoft, 55 Ultimate History of Video Games, The: From Pong to Pokemon—The Story Behind the Craze That Touched Our Lives and Changed the World, 21 United Nations World Food Program, 124 Unity (website), 239 universe, physical laws of, 153–54 Unreal, 95 urban development, 100 urban planning, 51, 202–203 user interfaces, 204, 205–206 values, 107 variable ration reinforcement, 209, 210 vehicular weapons, 104 VersionTracker (website), 213 Video Game Therapy: A New Frontier (discussion article), 156–58 video games controversial nature of, 214 design of, 237–42 genres, 10–11, 232, 238, 239 as learning systems, 6 medical benefits of, 156–58 myths about, 65–68 and play, 6 reasons to integrate into the classroom, 5–6 ways to integrate into the classroom, 130 Video Games May Dull Shock at Violence (discussion article), 26–28 video workstations, 93 villains, 173

Ä 255

violence, 14, 20, 25, 26–28, 59, 60, 65, 67, 68, 83, 109, 110, 134, 135, 144, 215 virtual communities, 6, 20, 184 virtual maps, 202 virtual racetracks, 48 virtual-reality systems, 96 virtual worlds, 11, 155, 222–28 visual arts, 10, 32, 51, 94–95, 126–27, 172–73, 185–86, 205–206 visual effects, 94 voices, 45–46, 52–53 VoodooPC, 185 Wade, Mitchell, 20 wargames, 96–97, 105, 113–14, 119, 134, 145, 155, 174, 176, 229 weapons, 163, 168 weapons, historical, 103–104 website design, 22, 219, 229–31 websites for character customization, 173 checklist, 231 design, 22, 229–31 for newscasts, 121 and reviews, 218 for software, 213 for this book, 131 video game, 35, 164 for video game development, 239, 240 for video game development studios, 139 What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, 21, 67 Why We Need a Corporation for Public Gaming (discussion article), 123–25 Whyville, 222, 224, 226–27 Wii, 23, 43, 70, 71, 92, 126 Windows Vista operating system, 94 Wolf, Mark, 21 World of Warcraft series, 9, 10, 208, 209–10, 215 Wright, Talmadge, 68 Wright, Will, 57, 67

256 Ä Index X-Men, 172 X-Treme Effects, 80 Xbox, 61, 73, 157, 229, 235 Xbox 360, 23, 43, 70, 92, 126, 201, 206 XNA (website), 239

Zimmerman, Eric, 68 Zoo Tycoon, 130

About the Author DAVID HUTCHISON is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education, Brock University. He is the author of Growing Up Green: Education for Ecological Renewal and A Natural History of Place in Education.

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