Researching Games

 

For this assignment, I was on the search for games that are directly related to the topic of my client for an upcoming group project. My client is a Dr. Sarah Jacquet and the subject matter is based around the principles of geology, specifically the 4 laws of geology and how they can be used to reproduce the timing of a geological sequence.

Part 1: What did you find?

For this part, I started as most people probably did and preformed a few Google Searches. I soon realized that no matter what terms or phrases I searched for, I was pretty much pulling the same results. One “rabbit hole” did lead me to a game on Steam, so I then did an additional search on Steam to see if there were any more relative games, which I didn’t

The most relative games I found were “The Geology Game” on Steam and a series of learning games on this website: https://www.legendsoflearning.com/. Additionally, I was able to find several resources online of “learning modules” that could be used in helping facilitate outside games for kids. Examples: “Find this type of rock”, “use this information to explain the layers of rocks”, etc.

The Geology Game (Steam) is a turn-based game that appears to put the player in a position of collecting exhibits for a museum. The game teaches the basics of geology and rock identification. The game mechanics look to be point and click type mechanic, with the player picking a location and assigning tasks to their team of geologist to complete. The loop appears to be, pick a site, identify roles, collect exhibits, repeat.

According to the information in the Steam store, the game is suitable for adults, students, middle school, and hobbyist rock collectors. I don’t think the game is specifically meant to be a learning-based game, but it has some aspects that allow for learning.

The games I found on the legends of learning site were clearly geared toward a younger audience with a very simple kid friendly design and either click and point controls, or basic left/right, up/down controls. Some of the games had a very quick trial, which shows the basic gameplay being navigate the environment collecting fossils and repeating. Educational information was provided with a set goal to accomplish, for example: “X layer of rock is the oldest. Navigate to the oldest layer of rock”. Once the objects are collected you can turn them in for money to upgrade or continue the adventure. The other mechanics I viewed in the games were quiz and matching.

I couldn’t get directly to the games through the legends of learning site without signing up, but in 2 different google searches I was able to get “past” the homepage to a subset of the website. This is where I was able to find some of the games.

https://www.legendsoflearning.com/learning-objectives/fossil-record/

Games on this page were: Adrian’s Fossil Collection, Earth Explorers, Tower Puzzle, and Fossil Hunter

https://www.legendsoflearning.com/learning-objectives/geologic-time/

Games on this page were: Fossil Hunt, Lisa the Geologist, Geologic Matcher, and Mission Expedition

I also found a free downloadable “board” game called “Rock Slides and Arrows”. (https://elementalscience.com/blogs/science-activities/free-geology-game-rock-slides-and-arrows) This game appears to be a trivia-based game with learners picking up cards to answer trivia questions, which then allow them to roll dice to move a piece along a track. First player to the end of the track wins the game.

Part 2: What have you learned about games in your topic area?

I have found that:

1.     There aren’t that many games for this subject

2.     The games that are available are very basic in concepts and are maybe meant more to augment in class learning. With some of the games, the mechanics were quiz based, but I wasn’t given the appropriate material to “study”. I was also play just a very quick demo, so the content could have been provided in a more robust version of the game.

I think these points above will be helpful with the client as we address the identified learning objectives and how that content can be delivered. The client is wanting to present more “advanced” concepts of learning compared to the games I was able to find. It will be interesting to take that higher level of content and convert to a more simple concept for gamified learning.