To this day, people look at video games with the idea that they are just “entertainment”. But we can see that, at the roots of these so-called “games’ ‘, lies a great tool that we can use for different purposes.
Hello! I’m Gabriel Franceschini and today we will talk about a topic that is always trending when it comes to the “Future of Gaming” and how it can help the world, not just as entertainment.
Games can be a tool for multiple purposes
For decades, Games have always been seen as something for people to entertain themselves and relax. Enjoying their moment in the best way possible, creating a comfortable environment.
However, the games and technology world can go far beyond what our eyes can see. Over the last few years, there has been exponential growth in research, discussion, and acceptance of games as a tool beyond people’s entertainment. With a good application, they can turn something therefore taken as a complex, expensive, and slow into something simple, concise, and objective.
How use games to develop people
The environment where people participate can drastically change their behaviour. That is one of the intrinsic concepts in “Serious Games”, which looks to develop a favourable environment to accomplish the main objective. Although, a physical space, teachers, consultants, and all the applied methodology in order to teach and build up people, have extremely exponential costs.
Serious Games is the solution for all these matters.
In the developing world, it is quite common to find words and terms that can cause some misunderstanding or even make people think they have the same meaning.
The terms Serious Games, Gamification, and Game-Based Learning may have similar meanings but, in fact, every single one has its very own concept, to exemplify and clarify the contexts.
The “Gamification” term is used when we want to add game-developed elements to increase engagement, and assimilation and make the process more enjoyable and interesting to the ones involved.
On the other hand, Game-Based Learning is the kind of experience that involves the game developing process with the main goal of teaching something in an organic way, making use of game design elements, allowing to compare and study the individual or group results on that specific matter. Helping the participants develop in a more precise way.
The influence of games on world history
We can see that games are not only developed for people’s idle moments. But also as a great tool, limited only by the ones who develop it.
It’s empirical to realize that Nature itself uses “play” as a tool to develop survival skills necessary for all beings on planet Earth. It is natural for animals to learn to hunt, attack, and defend themselves by playing with other animals in their social circle.
The initial thought about “games being a way of teaching and learning” could be dated since were through “war games”, people learned and taught to fight, to think strategically, and war concepts as a whole.
And one of the first books to cover these terms is Clark Abbott’s “Serious Games”, in the 70s, when the term was something almost embryonic.
And only with the arrival of the 21st century, the market shows great interest, year after year, in research and deep development of the concepts of Serious Games.
Serious games examples
We have wonderful examples of how the Serious Games can make a difference in all areas and markets.
Microsoft Flight Simulator
It is a simulator designed for aeroplane pilots created by the big software company Microsoft, in the 80s. From then, the “game” got updated and re-released. Your most recent version, Flight Simulator 2020, is capable of a realistic experience for plane pilots, as a way to learn and master various concepts and knowledge about aviation.
Remembering that it is actually quite common for pilots around the world to have a minimum number of hours in flight simulators, prior to becoming airplane pilots.
IBM City One
A game developed by IBM, to help with a simulation of city planning, where engineers, politicians, and other competent authorities may experience real-world problems, such as energy usage, water consumption, urban planning, retail planning, and so on.
Minecraft
A game that started following the “normal videogame” shape. A game developed only to entertain that is now globally used for other purposes. Mainly in the education field, game nowadays helps children and adults to develop a series of knowledge and skills. Now having a specific platform for education, called “Minecraft Education Edition”, where people can access different versions of the game, designed specifically to teach concepts, skills, and detailed information about that module.
Ar Room
It’s an Augmented Reality application, developed by Main Leaf. It’s already available for free in Open Beta. The app simplifies the User Experience with this new AR technology, removing experience/entry blocks for new and advanced users.
Creating a platform where users can use the real world to incorporate their ideas, making possible the interaction with a new reality that is only limited by the user’s imagination.
Constantly updated, this tool can help a lot of markets and their users, like education, entertainment, courses, tourism, advertising, content creation, retail, infrastructure, design, and a lot more.
The future is serious
Games as a tool are just starting their journey in the world, helping humanity in all areas, from education, health, economy, and beyond.
And in the actual post-pandemic world, the Serious Games will play a fundamental role in how the information is passed between humans, in an organic way, with low cost and great results.
