【新闻】转：Serious Games Interactive On Global Conflicts, Serious Games

silaswu

ased in Copenhagen, Serious Games Interactive is a company focused on the development of that marry the ideas of entertainment and potential for education. The company fosters a strong relationship between game developers, subject experts, and educational game researchers in order to create games based on the company's internal game engine. In 2005 the company began work on its first major project, Global Conflicts: Palestine, with is expected to be released worldwide in 2007 for both the PC and Mac. Recently we spoke with Serious Games Interactive's CEO Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen regarding his company, as well as its work in the Global Conflicts: Palestine project.
       

       

Hello, and thanks for taking the time to speak with me today. Can you begin by giving a bit of your background, both within and outside of the serious games game space?

I started out in psychology but quite quickly I left the more traditional venues of psychology to pursue IT, learning and especially computer games. This led me to one of the many dot coms in those days. This was quite educative years in terms of project work across disciplines in new media, where I also had a chance to do game projects for major companies like Nike and Coca-Cola with a global outreach.

After a few years within this area, I wanted to spent some time thinking more about how to do things instead of just doing them, and took a PhD in computer games and learning. This was also the work that resulted in the founding of Serious Games Interactive in collaboration with the game technology company OverTheEdge.

Can you talk a bit about Serious Games Interactive? What do you feel is the role of your company within the serious games market?

Serious Games Interactive was founded with a strong focus on building computer games with an agenda beyond entertainment without compromising the game quality. To us, game quality is about using game tools and knowing the game business - not ending up with titles that people do not perceive as games. We also have a strong focus on serious games research that is deeply ingrained in our company given my background, and I believe this gives us a unique approach to the area.

Many serious games companies have a strong research component, but sometimes the research angle is lost in the hot pursuit of development deadlines. Also, the serious games space put extra demands on your documentation and assessment that is deeply ingrained in researchers.

On an overall level I hope we can come closer to realizing the actual integration of game and learning that is an immense challenge from our point of view. We feel that there are only a few titles - if any - that actually succeed in combining games and learning. Also, we take a blended learning approach where we do not see games as working independently in the classroom, but as part of teacher lectures, textbooks, primary sources, group work and plenum discussions. We focus very much on providing artifacts from the game universe that can ease the transition between these teaching spaces to strengthen transfer.
       

       

What projects are you working on currently?

We are mainly working on Global Conflicts: Palestine ? a game about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict - but we are also in the early phases with 2-3 other non-disclosed client projects, (which we are not quite sure how far will go yet).

How would you describe Global Conflicts: Palestine? Is it similar to any other games on the market today?

Well, the game has changed very much through the development. It started out as an extremely ambitious project but over the last year we have scaled down a bit. I still feel that there are no similar titles on the market today. We rely quite closely on the adventure and RPG genre, but compared to other serious games that also use this genre we try to keep all game experiences meaningful without ending up separating the game experience and learning experience.

Basically, the game is about succeeding as a freelance journalist that has just arrived to Israel. You have to get good stories by exploring the game universe. To get the stories you need to locate the right sources, build up trust and make the right choices. This is basically done by choosing between different options when talking to people in the game universe. In the end, you have to combine the information from your sources into a newspaper article. As you progress, you will find it hard to stay neutral and you are likely to be sucked into the conflict.

Many developers of serious games have expressed that it is a challenge to create a product that both teaches, while at the same time remains both engaging and fun. Is this a challenge for you as well on your projects?

This is certainly one of the biggest challenges. We have found that in order to achieve creative solutions that work game and learning-wise, you have to know both areas and give yourself time to gain a deep knowledge of the area of your game. Through the deep knowledge of the area you are in a better position to work out creative solutions that are in line with both games, learning and content requirements.
       

       

What has the response been like so far with regards to Global Conflicts: Palestine?

It has been overwhelmingly positive. We are still just building a bit of attention within the serious games community and on a national level to get our approach right, but with talks in Athens, Oslo, Stockholm, Amsterdam, London, Milan and Washington we could not hope for more. We are rolling out early next year on a national level (Denmark), and we have already received good responses through exposure in the major media outlets all the major TV, radio and newspapers.

Earlier this year the game was scheduled to undergo testing as several Danish schools. Did this take place, and if so how did this work out? Was the game as well received by teachers and students as you hoped?

Indeed, we did have a chance to test it on several Danish schools with students from K8-12 and the results were more promising than expected given they tried a prototype. The study was not controlled but more a formal evaluation to provide input about overall game experience. The students recognized it as a game, but it would not be their choice if they were sitting at home. However, almost 90% of the students wanted to try a similar course again, and about 60% found they learned more than usual. We think these findings are quite promising especially given that we found many obstacles that should be removed, and the gameplay needed major development and tweaking in order to make it more open-ended, involving and game-like.

The most important issue is that teachers were also very interested in using the game as it provided a way for students to engage with the conflict on a more personal level and gaining experience with different perspectives. Also, the game supports a critical approach to sources, creative writing, problem-solving and knowledge about the media’s role all of which teachers find extremely valuable.

Looking at the serious games market as a whole, what is your general sense of serious games today?

Obviously, the area is developing quickly and there is a good deal of hype. However, many of the sub-areas within serious games have a long way to go before crossing the goal line. There is definitely a growing interest and demand for serious games, but we still need more thorough documentation that goes all the way to controlled studies showing what exactly serious games can contribute.
       

       

What element do you think is key for the market to grow in the years to come?

I think we need to really keep a close eye on maintaining the qualities of the serious games titles that are developed in order to prevent them becoming caricatures like edutainment ended up in the 1980s and 1990s. Also, we need to continue educating our target groups and remove some of the very practical barriers of using games, like the initial start-up cost and continuing technical issues. The entrenched belief that everyone plays computer games also needs to be revised. This applies both to children, youngsters and adults. All studies show that up to 25% of youngsters do not really play computer games and the number is way higher for adults. Especially within schools this is a major obstacle to using games. It will probably reduce over the years, but it will never disappear, and game competence will continue to vary hugely in a population.

What has been the biggest obstacle your team has come across, either from a development or perhaps political standpoint in the creation of Global Conflicts: Palestine?

The biggest obstacles and maybe also quite boring is funding. It is not a mainstream title, but we have been lucky to receive some public funding. Despite that, the largest challenge is that we insist on keeping all game actions relevant to education and aligning the game goals with learning goals without loosing the gameness. This has turned out to be quite hard on a micro-level when designing missions.

We have not really experienced any problems from a political standpoint. I hope and think that people will appreciate our attempt at keeping a balance and presenting many different perspectives on the conflict.