What eLearning developers could learn from Independent Game Developers - Freeplay 2010
A couple of weekends ago, I was at Freeplay which is Australia's independent games festival. This blog post is not meant as a review or summary of Freeplay. It's an attempt to distil some ideas that might be useful in the area of eLearning from a dense and exciting weekend.
1) Make things that have meaning
This is where there is an interesting crossover between Serious Games and Independent Gaming. Serious Games are often talked about as games with meaning. One of the major themes that Freeplay explored is how being an Indie Game developer allows creators to make experiences that have meaning to them and their players.
Many Serious Games are commissioned by an organisation that wants to get a message out there or that wants a change to happen. Indie Games are the complete opposite. The content and the development process are all controlled by the makers.
Learning and development are interesting because they really should be passion-driven not profit-driven, but this commissioning process is often more profit-driven for the developers.
2) It's not all about profits
If we think the budgets for eLearning and Serious Games projects are small, think about doing this type of work with no budget at all. Indie Gaming is fuelled by passion. At Freeplay there was a mix of people interested in games as an art form and people interested in games for profit. One thing that was common across both groups was that they are investing large amounts of time and money into projects before they see any returns.
Maybe this is where eLearning is going wrong. eLearning can improve the productivity of businesses, by reducing cost and increasing skills and knowledge. But can it inspire people? Would a company that is owned by News Corp be in eLearning if the main motivation was making the world a better place?
3) What are the verbs for your course?
One of the sessions I really enjoyed was 101 Things I Learned in Game Design School, and a lot of the rest of this blog post comes from this session.
What are learners doing in a course? What is the verb of the course?
Are they reading, browsing, watching? Or are they building, discussing, planning, dreaming?!
I think this is a key to improving the learning experience. Many of our learning outcomes might have verbs. eLearning developers need to think more about the verbs during the actual courses and make sure they are more active than reading and watching.
4) Race to failure
The idea of early prototyping came up a couple of times, in different forms. Normally I use the line "Fail Fast", but I like the line "Race to Failure" and I might start using that instead. I've been thinking about this a lot recently because a number of our projects are at the prototyping stage, and bits are failing (sort of). We are getting some great feedback.
5) The first and last 10% of a project are linked
There were a couple of things in the "The First and Last 10%" session that I think are really important.
- The mistakes that we make in the first 10% of a project when we are designing, planning, and prototyping are what holds up getting the last 10% of the project done.
- If you working with a new bit of technology, then you haven't got the first 10% done until you have a working prototype. While the panel was talking about game technology, I think this works for many (perhaps all) other types of digital content development.
6) Play more games
If eLearning is ever going to go beyond screens of bullet points, more people who make, commission, and use eLearning products need to be exposed to different types of complex interactive experiences. Personally I think I need to play more games and think about how to educate my clients about what types of interactive experiences exist.
7) Think beyond screens
When we think about games, we often think about 3D worlds and people moving around shooting the enemy. But there are other types of games for other types of interactions. This includes new types of screens such as mobiles and new types of controllers such as touchscreens and the Wii. Many of these newer interface experiences can create direct personal connection. There are other games like Alternate Reality Games (ARG) that can sometimes be low tech, cheap, and highly engaging.
8) Unity Rocks
A lot of the focus of Freeplay 2010 was on creativity and not technology, but one of the sessions I really enjoyed was the introduction to Unity, by Ben Britten Smith. I've looked at Unity a couple of times and thought about it both for 3D games and for iPhone development. Ben gave a talk that was pitched at the perfect level for someone like me who knows how to code but doesn't know Unity. From the session I got the overview I needed. Unity has an elegance and, once you understand it, an interface that is really powerful.
For me Freeplay was a great weekend. I walked away with a lots of ideas and new information and I'll be back next year.
