Monthly Archives: June 2008

Gearing up for Class

Posted on June 30, 2008 by Bart Pursel

This Wednesday marks the beginning of 2 6-week courses I’ll be teaching at PSU. Even though it is the same course I taught in the fall (IST 110), the summer sections will be wildly different: Trying to take 16 weeks … Continue reading →

Posted in Teaching | 2 Comments

Serious game design

Posted on June 27, 2008 by Bart Pursel

An interesting conversation took place on the Serious Games list this week. Kam Memarzia put out a great list of ’10 commandments’ for serious game design and development. The list from Kam (truncated a bit for space considerations): 1. Thou … Continue reading →

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My Creatures, let me show them to you

Posted on June 18, 2008 by Bart Pursel

The Spore Creature Creator was released yesterday, both in a free trial and a $10 PC-only version (please release the Mac version soon?). I’ve blogged before about Spore and the creature creator, and I ended the last Spore post with … Continue reading →

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Design Notebook

Posted on June 18, 2008 by Bart Pursel

I recently completed Dan Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind. I found the first couple chapters straight forward and not very engaging, but the final 2/3rds of the book is fantastic. Specifically the chapters on design, story and play. One … Continue reading →

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Achievements, Competition and Learning

Posted on June 11, 2008 by Bart Pursel

For those that do not own an Xbox, Microsoft has implemented an achievement system that tracks various milestones for you when you play through any game. From the Xbox 360 website: Achievements are game-defined goals that are stored and displayed … Continue reading →

Posted in Games, Learning | 6 Comments

Sid Meier on learning

Posted on June 6, 2008 by Bart Pursel

Sid Meier, creator of the Civilization game series, recently keynoted the Innovation in elearning conference. The title of his talk, Help, I can’t stop learning!, deals with how kids are learning from games. Wendy has a great writeup on her … Continue reading →

Posted in Games, Learning, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Games for Change Festival

Posted on June 6, 2008 by Bart Pursel

Friend and colleague Joey Lee sent me notes on a few sessions from the 5th Games for Change Festival in NYC. Sounds like a lot of good sessions and workshops, but one summary from Jim Gee’s presentation jumped out at … Continue reading →

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Gaming at Penn State University

Posted on June 4, 2008 by Bart Pursel

We recently captured an overview presentation on the Educational Gaming Commons (EGC), a project I’ve been involved with for over a year now at PSU. See the clip below to get an idea of what we’re doing. Towards the end … Continue reading →

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