Slides from my MW2012 workshop, "Rules of Play: Design Elements of Addictive Online Learning Games"

1. Rules of Play
Designing Addictive Gameplay
for Online Learning
Museums & the Web 2012
Dave Schaller
david@eduweb.com
Why Games?
“Why does learning have to be a
game?
Why can’t learning just be
learning?”
Museum Director of Education
1997

2. Why Games?
97%
of American teens play
computer games
Games are designed to be
highly compelling and
meaningful experiences
Learning in Games
All games are educational—
to win, you must learn how to play the game
But it’s not always obvious what you’re learning!
America’s Army

3. Learning in Games
It’s good to match gameplay with game content
Learning in Games
"Know" is a verb
before it is a noun, "knowledge."
And something very interesting happens when one
treats knowledge first and foremost as activity and
experience, not as facts and information—the facts
come to life. Facts become easier to assimilate if
learners are immersed in activities and experiences
that use these facts for plans, goals, and purposes
within a coherent knowledge domain.
-James Paul Gee

4. A Series of Interesting Decisions
Narrative Game
A series of events A series of actions
(or decisions) with a (or decisions) within
beginning and (possibly a rule-based system
multiple) ending(s)
Simple rules create complex situations
Making Meaning Within the Rules
For the player: “Games provide situated experiences in
which players are immersed in complex, problem-
solving tasks.”*
To an observer: “He’s just doing the same thing over
and over again.”**
*Kurt Squire
**Mother of 10-year-old gamer

5. What Makes Games Fun
Some of the pleasures that games offer:
• Fantasy: The pleasure of an imaginary world
• Narrative: Dramatic unfolding of events
• Challenge: A problem to be solved
• Discovery: Exploration and secret features
• Anticipation: Knowing something is coming
• Possibility: Having many choices
• Purification: Making something clean
• Surprise: Finding the unexpected
• Thrill: Fear minus death equals fun
• Pride in Accomplishment
• Triumph over Adversity
Designing the Game
Top-Down Development
Content & Audience
Goals
Outcomes
Components
Game Mechanics
Let the gameplay shape
the experience, for a
stronger match between
gameplay and learning Goals
Outcomes
Find the fun! Game Mechanics
Content & Audience
Bottom-Up Development

6. A Game is Defined by Core Dynamics
The core dynamic (not the topic, not the content)
is the single thing the game is about.
It’s what the player spends most of their time doing—
while thinking about how to do it well.
A Game is Defined by Core Dynamics
The core dynamic must be interesting enough
to do over and over and over again.
• Territorial Acquisition (Risk)
• Prediction (Roulette)
• Spatial Reasoning (Tetris)
• Survival (Stay Alive)
• Destruction (Boom Blox)
• Building (SimCity)
• Collection (Pokeman)
• Chasing or Evading (PacMan)
• Trading (Pit)
• Race to the End (Candyland)

7. Elements of a Game
The game dynamics are created by the
interplay of the elements of the game
• Space
• Components
• Rules
• Actions
• Skills
• Chance
Elements of a Game
Space: Where the game takes place
• How do players move through the space?
• What is the look and feel of the space?
www.wolfquest.org

8. Elements of a Game
Rules
Define the goals of the game and the relationships between
components.
• Need a mix of short-term and long-term goals
• A few simple rules can create emergent gameplay
• Rules must be easy to learn and remember
Games can have multiple modes (with different gameplay),
but too many will confuse and frustrate players.
Elements of a Game
Components
Active pieces of the game: player-character, non-player characters,
and other objects in the game world.
The game rules defines the relationships between the components

9. Elements of a Game
Actions
What players can do (verbs), and what happens as a result.
Actions should have clear (and sometimes powerful) effects.
Elements of a Game
Actions
What players can do (verbs), and what happens as a result.
• The more objects that a verb can act on, the better the gameplay
• What would players like to do in the game, and can we enable that?

10. Elements of a Game
Skills
What the player must exercise to play the game.
• Games can exercise physical, mental and social skills
• When the game’s challenges match the player’s skills, the player is in flow
Elements of a Game
Chance
Probability, uncertainty, and human psychology
• Players should have opportunities to take risks
• Randomness should make players excited and challenged,
not hopeless and out of control
• Hidden information (including what other players know or
intend to do) feels like chance.

11. Skill and Chance
Good games balance elements of skill and chance:
• Elements of skill judge the player’s skill
• Elements of chance encourage players to take risks
• Adding elements of chance alleviates tedium
• Replacing elements of chance with skill gives players
greater feeling of control
Examples
sea.sheddaquarium.org/sea/buildafish/
flash.html
buildingdetroit.detroithistorical.org
www.nasm.si.edu/exhibitions/gal208/pioneers/
military06.cfm

12. Balance Skill and Chance
Skill Chance
• Games can exercise • Players should have
physical, mental and social opportunities to take risks
skills • Randomness should make
• When the game’s players excited and
challenges match the challenged, not hopeless and
player’s skills, the player is out of control
in flow • Hidden information (including
• Skills can be either real or what other players know or
virtual intend to do) feels like
chance.
Small Groups: Skills and Chance
Add skills to a game of pure chance.
Physical Skills
Dexterity, coordination, endurance
Mental Skills
Memory, observation, puzzle-solving
Social Skills
Reading an opponent, fooling an opponent, teamwork

13. Designing Skill-Based Gameplay
Innate Skills
Designing Skill-Based Gameplay
Innate Skills Learned Skills

14. Designing Skill-Based Gameplay
Innate Skills Virtual Skills Learned Skills
Innate skills as analogs for learned skills
www.asailorslife.org
“A Series of Interesting Choices”
What makes choices interesting?
Consequences:
• Must be a real choice, not a quiz with a correct answer
• Dominant strategies (clearly better choices) negate the value of
other choices*
• Must have meaningful consequences in the game
Context:
• Game rules and gameworld complicate choices
• Current situation in game affects assessment of choices
Savvy Appeals to Human Psychology
• Gambler’s Fallacy and Loss Aversion
• Choices involving low risk/low reward vs. high risk/high reward
outcomes are highly engaging
* A puzzle is a game with a dominant strategy; once found, there’s no reason to play it again.

15. Interesting Choices
Choices affect progression toward goals—
quantitatively rather than qualitatively
Interesting Consequences
Rewards Punishments
• Praise • Shaming
• Points • Loss of points
• Prolonged play • Terminated play
• A gateway • Setback
• Spectacle • Removal of
powers
• Powers
• Resource
• Resources
depletion
• Completion

16. Small Group: Skills and Choices
Add virtual skills and interesting choices to a skill-based game.
Virtual Skills
• Use innate skills as analogs for learned skills
Consequences
• Real choices, not a quiz
• Meaningful consequences
• No dominant strategies
Context:
• Game rules and gameworld complicate choices
• Current situation in game affects assessment of choices
Human Psychology
• Gambler’s Fallacy and Loss Aversion
• Low risk/low reward vs. high risk/high reward choices
Designing the Game
Top-Down Development
Content & Audience
Goals
Outcomes
Components
Game Mechanics
Let the gameplay shape
the experience, for a
stronger match between
gameplay and learning Goals
Outcomes
Find the fun! Game Mechanics
Content & Audience
Bottom-Up Development

17. Recommended Reading