"Video games usually involve a visual and auditory world in which the player
manipulates a virtual character (or characters). They often come with editors or other
sorts of software with which the player can make changes to the game world or even
build a new game world (much as the mind can edit its previous experiences to form
simulations of things not directly experienced). The player can make a new landscape, a
new set of buildings, or new characters. The player can set up the world so that certain
sorts of actions are allowed or disallowed. The player is building a new world, but is
doing so by using and modifying the original visual images (really the code for them) that came with the game."
Response:
I had never contemplated this aspect of gaming. Various games require particular types of design. For example in Sand of Time there are various quests that require you to place particular items in your own garden. The game allows you to make various choices while still fulfilling the requirements of the game. In a popular Face Book game, FarmVille2, farmers get to choose the crops they are planting and make farm management choices regarding the harvest and use of the crops. There are various consequences of the decisions that are made in both games.
Link:
A friend, Rachel James, is a Civil Engineering student at WVU. She has been involved in a project that involves gaming for research. While her project does not allow the user to create their own environments directly, it is still allowing for a similar concept.
SmartDrive - "Suppose you are driving to work along a certain route. On your way, you receive information that the route ahead is highly congested due to traffic, an accident, bad weather etc. You might want to 'adapt' to the live conditions and change your route accordingly. This is the basis for our study and this game."
As the gamer (research subject) navigates through the traffic patterns they are given information that they then use to make decisions about their next move. While this does not require a permanent placement of an item or create a new virtual world as one sees in Sand of Time, it does create a new set of circumstances.
Synthesis:
With the proper access to technology and programmers complex games can be developed that allow for educational experiences. However, one can also receive educational benefit from commercial non-educational games such as Sand of Time. For instance in the Time Manor component the player must locate grapes in one rendition and currants in another. The item in question in the same, the player is learning without realizing that they have added knowledge. This game is full of similar opportunities. While the access to technology for the SmartDrive Research game is significent it also showcases how it is possible to create an educational experience on a lesser scale.
The correlation betweeen a gamer creating a truly new environment such as in Sand of Time and the cause and effect of SmartDrive, is a further example of how something that seems different is in actuality similar and even the same.
Resources:
Gee, J. (n.d.). Why are video games good for learning?. Informally published manuscript, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, University of Wisconsin - Madison, Madison, WI.
James, Rachel. SmartDrive. Website. http://
