Educational Game Design

I receive a lot of questions about?#designing?#educational?#games, and most of those questions come from the perspective of?#engagement?increasing

So, I will start this series of posts about designing educational games,

Let’s start with definitions, what are educational games?

Educational games are games designed to teach a specific knowledge or skill as part of a full learning experience.

Therefore, educational games must have a clear goal, and this is the first step in the design process

1: define your game goal: What is the goal that you intend to achieve by designing this game, specifying the set of knowledge and skills that you want the game to help learners acquire or develop.

You can use a number of well-known models to formulate the goal, the most famous of which is the SMART model, which must include a tool to measure the extent to which learners reach the desired goal of the game

A related question "Is fun enough to be the goal of my game?" Of course, fun is enough to be a goal for a game, but it will not be an educational game in this case. "See the definition."

After setting a clear goal from the game, you have to reflect this goal on the gameplay, and the player's experience within the game world that you will design so that the learner feels the connection between the educational experience of which the game is a small part

A related question "Can I present my entire Educational experience in the form of Educational games?" Of course, you can do that while keeping time for review and reflecting the learning on the real life of the learners and how they can benefit from it and adding papers to summarize the learning points that come out of the experience

Upon completion of setting a clear goal that has clear standards and is related to the target players of the game, it does not mean that the goal is not subject to modification later! Rather, it can be modified in all ways during the following design stages, such as developing the idea of the game, implementing the prototype, or even after the testing process

Designing educational games is a necessary skill for educational designers at present due to proving the feasibility of games in increasing the participation of learners and their attention during the educational process

Who is your?#player?

This is the question that we will try to answer today in the second post in the?#educationalgamesdesign?series

To make the players choose to play your game, it should be related to them, so they can understand, and play it smoothly?

?So, the second step to design an educational game is the player's identification. Who will play your game and where?. How many of them what are their characteristics and their level of education? where are they live, what are their psychological and social characteristics? Are they working? or are they still in the educational stages, what is their type and language, and what are the abilities that they have, whether mental or physical?

There is a lot of information that you must know about these players in order to succeed in delivering the desired goal of the game to this selected group

How do you know about the players?

There are many tools that can be used to collect and analyze data about players as follows:

Data collection questionnaires: This is the most popular, fastest, and cheapest method. the advantage of this tool it’s the ability to spread, especially with social media, which allows the dissemination of these questionnaires on a large scale, in addition to many programs that you can use to design, and analyze those questionnaires

Interviews: You can conduct individual interviews or hold a Focus group discussion to get to know more about the players and their characters.

#empathy?and observation: empathy and observation are effective tools, in which you are able to touch the truth and test the conditions and the real life of the players, but it needs time and resources to implement it properly

Now let's move on to data analysis

There are many data analysis tools, and we mention an example of them, which is empathy maps from the?#Design_Thinking?model. Empathy maps allow you to classify and merge the data that you collected about the players and analyze them through 4 main questions: What are the thoughts that the players have, what are the actions they do? and what are their feelings towards the subject of the game? and what they hear from opinions on the subject.

There are also player types tests: these are guided tests in that players answer questions to give you a result in the form of a report on that player's style.

In the end, knowing who you are designing the game for is an element as important as the goal of the game. If your game is the greatest in history from your point of view only, you still need someone to play it?

If you have any suggestions about the content, please leave them in the comments, you can find some resources in the comments for more.

In this post, we will continue our series on?#designing?#educational_games?and talk about the third essential?#element, which is the game's?#story?or?#concept. This element is crucial as it represents the game's structure, format, and the player's journey toward achieving the educational goal.

To develop an effective game concept that helps the player learn, designers need to pay attention to the following factors:

1. Relevance: The game's story should be relevant to the players' skills, abilities, and daily lives.

2. Inclusivity: The game should be inclusive and engage all participants in the learning experience.

3. Fun: Fun is essential to designing educational games as it is the main motivator for engaging learners.

4. Safety: The game should be safe in terms of sensory and material safety.

5. Ease of access and use: Players should be able to access and use the game with ease, without requiring too much effort to understand and start playing.

6. Dialogue and characters: Designers should consider the characters in the game and the dialogue used during gameplay.

7. Feasibility: Designers should consider the feasibility of executing the game concept, ensuring that it does not require complex technology or conditions that are not accessible to the target audience.

In addition to these factors, designers can generate ideas for game concepts by exploring existing games and brainstorming with peers.

Developing a safe, clear, comprehensive, fun, and relevant game concept for the target audience will help them achieve the game's-educational goal. In the next post, we will discuss developing the game concept in terms of mechanics, dynamics, and elements.

To summarize, the game's story or concept is a critical element in designing educational games. Designers need to consider several factors like relevance, inclusivity, fun, safety, ease of access and use, dialogue and characters, and feasibility. By paying attention to these factors, designers can develop an effective game concept that engages learners and helps them achieve the game's educational goal.

Welcome to the fifth part of the?#educational?#game?#design?series. Today, we will discuss one of the most famous game design models, which combines all the elements into a set of steps that must be taken to create a complete game that can be tested. This is the MDA model, which stands for Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics. These three elements are the building blocks of any successful educational game.

#Mechanics?refer to the rules and systems that govern the game, such as objectives, feedback, resources, and other game mechanics.

#Dynamics?are the patterns of behavior that emerge from the interaction of mechanics and players, such as strategies, challenges, and emotions.?

#Aesthetics?are the desired emotional responses that a game aims to elicit in players, such as fun, curiosity, and mastery.

The interaction of these three elements creates the player experience, and game elements such as progress bars, levels, virtual economies, coins, points, leaderboards, badges, and many others can be used to achieve this. You can find more examples of game elements in the link provided in the comments.

The MDA framework can be used to design games from a bottom-up or top-down perspective. In a bottom-up approach, designers start with the mechanics and think about how to create interesting dynamics and aesthetics for the players. For example, game mechanics can be designed to allow players to explore different concepts or scenarios and receive instant feedback on their choices. This can create a dynamic of experimentation and discovery and an aesthetic of curiosity and learning.

On the other hand, in a top-down approach, designers start with the desired aesthetics and think about the dynamics and mechanics that can support it. For example, an aesthetic game can be designed to enhance cooperation and communication between players, as a result of the dynamics of working in groups or forming alliances. This requires the mechanics of limited resources and the ability to communicate with others.

The MDA framework also enables the evaluation of designed games. By developing and testing game prototypes, designers can observe how mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics work together or against each other. It can identify which aspects of the game attract or frustrate players and what changes can be made to improve them.

Excellent game design revolves around the interaction of mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics to deliver an individual, fun, and relevant experience for the player. It is essential to find the right balance between these elements to create an engaging and enjoyable game.