Workshop: ‘Gamification & Cultural Heritage’
Erik Champion, Curtin University erik.champion@curtin.edu.au twitter @nzerik
TURIN September 2018 Summer School
Cities, Cultural Heritage & Digital Humanities
Programme
- Introductions for all (10-20 minutes)
- Overview: games, gamification (50-40 minutes) finish 9:30
- Discussion of technologies, methods + prototyping (20 minutes).
- Group suggest ideas (10 minutes)
- Short break/questions (20 minutes)
- Selection of teams (10 minutes) Finish at 10:30
- Work on game ideas as prototypes. playtest solutions OR describe how DH simulations could be gamified (90 minutes)
- Present prototypes/suggestions in class (30 minutes) finish 12:30
Structuring a serious game- theory for today!
A history/heritage game
Place
- Cultural Significance
- hidden features
Engaging Challenge (Roger Caillois)
- imitate
- compete
- chance
- movement
Core gameplay
Core mechanic
reward
punish
GOAL 1
GOAL 2a
GOAL 2b
GOAL 3
knowledge learnt:
- tools
- strategy
- info
The Game Revolution
Procedural Rhetoric
Ian Bogost (2007) procedural rhetoric == ‘a practice of using processes persuasively.’
1.PR or criticism and dissection of PR?
2.Is it successful if you can dissect PR? What is success, defined by whom?
3.Too formalist? Better just for serious games?
4.How does PR work with agency, freedom of a player to choose?
5.Is Rhetoric empty argument? How does PR differ to Gamification?
6.Traditional rhetoric is speech +writing and oratory also spatial? Can sequentially experienced art be PR? Karnak, Acropolis?
7.Rhetoric depends on memory, does it work for people with different cognitive load, with different strategies/game-play, learning modalities?
8.What if characters to drive PR? (Like competing archaeological theories)?
9.Can it work with real-world input and physical computing?
1. Problem With ‘Rhetoric’
- Rhetoric has a negative connotation.
- In Arguing well, John Shand (2002) declared ‘Logic must be sharply distinguished from what might generally be called rhetoric… rhetoric is not committed to using good arguments.’
- Rhetoric involves the art of persuading, not necessarily the art of opening up games as vehicles of critical discourse (Chaplin 2011)
- Aristotle (dialectical reasoning=universal truths & then rhetoric) vs. Plato (sophists employ empty rhetoric).
- Components: Inventio (discovery of arguments), dispositio, elocutio, memoria, and pronuntiatio develop convincing and compelling arguments
- Anc. Greeks were their own lawyers!
2. Too formalist?
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Miguel Sicart: ‘The proceduralists take their starting point in Murray’s statement that digital games are unique, among other things, because of their procedural nature (Murray, 1998), that is, because they are processes that operate in way that is akin to how computers operate.’
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‘Proceduralists claim that players, by reconstructing the meaning embedded in the rules, are persuaded by virtue of the games’ procedural nature.’
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But ‘Play belongs to players, and the games’ meaning resides in the actions of players.’
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But players often distort or misunderstand the rules!
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Are game designers authors?
3. PR strips agency away?
Miguel Sicart: ‘The proceduralists take their starting point in Murray’s statement that digital games are unique, among other things, because of their procedural nature (Murray, 1998), that is, because they are processes that operate in way that is akin to how computers operate.’
‘Proceduralists claim that players, by reconstructing the meaning embedded in the rules, are persuaded by virtue of the games’ procedural nature.’
But ‘Play belongs to players, and the games’ meaning resides in the actions of players.’
But players often distort or misunderstand the rules!
Are game designers authors?
4. Too Similar to Gamification?
[1]the addition to websites and learning environments of quantifiable actions that can be ranked and processed (and information stored), with immediate and vastly exaggerated feedback and graphically designed in the idiom of well-known computer game genres.
[2] The use of game-based rules structures and interfaces by corporations “to manage and control brand-communities and to create value”, this definition reveals both the attraction of gamification to business and the derision it has received (Fuchs 2013).
Task performance can be graphically rewarded+socially shared. Perhaps gamification can lead to deeper, richer, more engaging learning (Schoech et al. 2013; Betts, Bal & Betts 2013; Hamari, Koivisto & Sarsa 2014). BUT:Many opposed (Bogost 2011b; Deterding et al. 2011b; Fuchs 2014).
SUMMARY: Major features:
- Has some goal in mind, the player works to achieve
- Has systematic or emergent rules and
- Is considered a form of play or competition
Game definitions
A rule-based formal system with a variable and quantifiable outcome, where different outcomes are assigned different values, the player exerts effort in order to influence the outcome, the player feels attached to the outcome, and the consequences of the activity are optional and negotiable. (Juul 2003).
A system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome. (Salen and Zimmerman, 2004).
•Emphasis on conflict (mimesis, vertigo, chance?)
•Discounts games that may never have a final outcome (e.g. cricket)
•No mention of the importance of strategy.
•NB Virtual environments have constraints and affordances while games have risks and rewards. What should virtual heritage have?
An engaging challenge that offers up the possibility of temporary or permanent tactical resolution without harmful outcomes to the real world situation of the participant (Champion, 2006).
Some game design books
VSIR
https://www.disirproductions.se/ App store and Google Play
Video walkthrough
http://publicvr.org/html/projects.html
Especially download http://publicvr.org/html/pro_egypt.html unity
Ancient Greek game
Facade
This Land is My Land
AR Tools
Linked Open Data
https://recogito.pelagios.org/ Work on texts & images, identify & mark named entities. Use data in other tools, connect to Web data, no need for code.
http://commons.pelagios.org/ “Pelagios Commons: online resources + community forum for using open data methods to link and explore historical places”
twine
twine
•https://www.mcvuk.com/development/a-guide-to-twine (many examples)
•https://www.mcvuk.com/development/developer-guide-what-is-twine
•http://www.sfwa.org/creating-interactive-fiction-guide-using-twine/
•Twine wiki and TwineHub
•Free twine hosting http://philome.la/allieisanant/merry-wanderer play free game http://philome.la/allieisanant/merry-wanderer/play
•https://jennaherdman.gitbooks.io/a-digital-humanities-primer-for-english-students/content/Digital%20Mapping.html Digital Mapping Tool Tutorial
nb Twine 1.4.2 is older, you have to download it, but more useful
ink/inkle interactive fiction
more complex, can work with unity
a game for interactive fiction
movie https://youtu.be/bfps2HKE4B4
Interested in Elegy for your classroom? Explore distant worlds inspired by the works of British Romantic era poets, and write fiction about the people who once lived there.
storyboard
Storyboarding tips
•“Storyboards and Sketch Prototypes for Rapid Interface Visualization
–“Describe the task with a series of images, showing the user, the environment, and the computer.” OR
–“Describe the interface with a series of screen images, indicating the user’s representation and the computer’s response.” [“what happens next?”]
•Storyboarding vs. Prototyping: When to Use Each
•https://Create Storyboards for your web comics
–What event or user interaction causes which things to animate
–How said things animate
–Why the animation improves the interaction
•How to storyboard your game tools i.e. Canv
Storyboarding tools
Game card prototypes
•https://streamlinedgaming.com/how-to-make-a-board-game-prototype/ (nanDECK for windows)
•How to design a board / card game: 10 prototyping tips
•http://www.storybench.org/classroom-card-game-teach-digital-storytelling-skills/ (download cards http://storybench.org/docs/storydeck.pdf)
•Card editor https://bitbucket.org/mattsinger/card-editor (https://www.npmjs.com/package/card-game-generator)
•http://www.CardsAgainstHumanity.com Ask a question from a Black Card, everyone else answers with funniest White Card. […] download PDF here
•https://www.patreon.com/paperize (beta) download video or Github
•https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/991506/resources-card-game-makers
Using presentation software
•Using Powerpoint to prototype your UI: http://boxesandarrows.com/interactive-prototypes-with-powerpoint/
Apple keynote
•https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/08/animating-in-keynote/
•https://keynotopia.com/guides/
•For iPhone https://webdesign.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-demo-an-ios-prototype-in-keynote--cms-22279
Drawing tool inspiration
•http://www.drawastickman.com/
•http://www.crayonphysics.com/
•http://42bytes.rocks/two3d/ two3D is a physics-based 2D to 3D “drawing” tool currently in development-create art in a quick and intuitive way. Also destroy it. Set it on fire.
Canva storyboarding
Text
Text
Text
2D games
AR/VR games
https://skarredghost.com/2018/03/03/create-webvr-experience-using-unity/
https://medium.com/@stew_rtsmith/space-rocks-technical-deep-dive-9bf67fb8a467
https://www.pcmag.com/feature/362057/how-unity-is-building-its-future-on-ar-vr-and-ai
https://aframe.io/ Make WebVR with HTML for Vive, Rift, Daydream, GearVR, desktop
Storyboard AR free but windows/HTC Vive only•
Photogrammetry (free)
- https://alicevision.github.io/ software
- tutorials at https://www.blendernation.com/2018/08/26/how-to-photoscan-easy-and-free-meshroom-and-blender/
- Meshlab + Sketchfab+ Regard3D (a free and open source structure-from-motion program.)
Game prototyping (pro)
•GIMP
•BLENDER
•INKSCAPE (a professional vector graphics editor for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux - free and open source) https://inkscape.org/en/
Text
Text
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Bogost, Ian, Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2007).
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Bogost, I. (2008). The Rhetoric of Video Games. In K. Salen (Ed.), The Ecology of Games: Connecting Youth, Games, and Learning (pp. 117–140). Cambridge, MA:: The MIT Press.
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Bogost, I. (2008). Unit operations: An approach to videogame criticism: MIT Press.
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King, M. Procedural Rhetoric:Analyzing Video Games. Retrieved 24 March, 2014.
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Reid, A. (2010, 11 March). post-procedural rhetoric and serious games.
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Thominet, L. (2012). Procedural Rhetoric. Retrieved 24 March, 2014.
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Treanor, M., & Mateas, M. (2009). Newsgames: Procedural rhetoric meets political cartoons. DIGRA, 2009, Japan.
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Sicart, M. (2011). Against Procedurality. Game Studies the international journal of computer game research, 11(3), online.
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Aiken, S. F., & Talisse, R. B. (2014). Why We Argue (And How We Should): A Guide to Political Disagreement. New York: Routledge.
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Betts, B. W., Bal, J., & Betts, A. W. (2013). Gamification as a tool for increasing the depth of student understanding using a and Life Long Learning, 23(3), 213-228.collaborative e-learning environment. International Journal of Continuing Engineering Education.
Gamification References I
Gamification References II
- Bogost, I. (2011). Gamification Is Bullshit. The Atlantic. Retrieved from The Atlantic website:
- Deterding, S., Sicart, M., Nacke, L., O'Hara, K., & Dixon, D. (2011). Gamification. using game-design elements in non-gaming contexts. Paper presented at the CHI'11 Extended Abstracts.
- Flanagan, M. (2010). Creating Critical Play. In R. Catlow, M. Garrett, & C. Morgana (Eds.), Artists Re: thinking Games (pp. 49-53). Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.
- Flanagan, M. (2013). Critical Play Radical Game Design. Cambridge MA: The MIT Press.
- Frasca, G. (2003). Simulation versus narrative. The video game theory reader, 221-235.
- Fuchs, M. (2014). Gamification as twenty-first-century ideology. Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, 6(2), 143-157.
- Hamari, J., Koivisto, J., & Sarsa, H. (2014). Does Gamification Work?--A Literature Review of Empirical Studies on Gamification. Paper presented at the Conference on. System Sciences (HICSS), Hawaii.
- Shand, J. (2002). Arguing well. London: Routledge.
- Shelton, B. E., & Wiley, D. A. (Eds.). (2007). The Design And Use Of Simulation Games In Education: Sense Publishers.
- Stansbury, M. (2013, 19 August). Why you should care about gamification in higher education. Blog.