Game Design Process Research Articles

A Digital Simulation Game for Resource Management in Construction Projects

The construction industry is on the verge of a digital transformation. Consequently, the gap widens between industry demands and fresh graduate capabilities. Therefore, there is a pressing need for a paradigm shift in the teaching approach for construction management education. To meet both industry demands and student expectations, Game-Based Learning (GBL) can substantially enhance both technical and transferable skills for digital-native students who struggle with traditional teaching methods. Although the body of knowledge recognizes GBL in general, their utilization remains limited in construction management. Moreover, there is little discussion on the design process of educational games. To address these gaps, this study adopted a unique approach to educational game design by developing a time-management strategy game about resource management in construction projects with unpredictable events. This paper presents the game design process and evaluation results of a single-player digital game called ‘Always Under Stress’ developed using the Godot game engine. The goal of the game is to introduce resource management in construction projects and its associated challenges. The design and development steps, game engine, and workflow are discussed in-depth in relation to the learning objectives. In addition, this study explains how elements of randomness in educational game design can be used to challenge students’ planning and adaptability skills. Various stakeholders (n = 31), comprising of students, professors, and industry professionals, were invited to evaluate the game across six dimensions of educational game design. Results revealed positive reception towards the developed prototype regarding educational value and critical comments regarding user experience and onboarding for beginners. The findings of this study provide invaluable guidelines, considerations and lessons learned for prospective educational game designers and researchers.

Designing and Evaluating Games for Landslides, Earthquakes, and Fires: Lesson Learned from Schools in Nepal

The Himalayan country of Nepal is vulnerable to landslides, earthquakes, and fires. Its inhabitants need to be empowered on how to react in emergencies to prevent fatalities and respond to crises efficiently while promoting longer-term sustainability and resilience. This research project, a collaborative effort involving teachers, students, and researchers, highlights the design and implementation of games for disaster risk reduction tested in remote schools. Three interactive games were developed using an iterative game design process and testing in workshops aiming to ensure the inclusivity and diversity of the project. The games targeted preparedness and response to landslides, earthquakes, and house fires. The outcome has proven that the game-based approach to teaching and learning is crucial in empowering underserved school children often left out in formal and informal disaster management processes. This study has shown that game-based learning of disaster preparedness and response effectively empowers resource-deficient communities and regions of the Global South.

The Perceived Improvement in Learning Competencies of Low-achieving College Students through Participation in a Board Game Design and Development Process

The purpose of this study is to examine the extent to which low-achieving college students perceive an improvement in their learning competencies through their experience of participating in the design and development processes of a board games. The research questions are as follows. First, what learning competencies do low-achieving college students perceive to have improved through the board game design and development process? Second, what are the relationships between the keywords of the learning competencies that low-achieving college students perceive to have improved through the board game design and development process? For this study, reflective journals from 97 low-achieving college students who participated in the board game design and development process were analyzed. Specifically, keywords related to the learning competency improvement were derived, and the relationships between these keywords were analyzed. The findings are as follows First, low-achieving college students perceived that their collaboration skills improved the most through the experience of participating in the board game design and development process, followed by problem-solving skills, communication skills, learning transfer, and interaction skills. Second, the keywords related to learning competency improvement perceived by low-achieving college students were found to be significantly interconnected. Collaboration skills were strongly linked to problem-solving skills, communication skills, learning transfer, creativity, and interaction. Problem-solving skills were closely connected to experience of success and creativity. The results of this study provide valuable insights for designing and implementing tailored programs aimed at enhancing the learning competencies of low-achieving college students.

Enhancing Team Cohesion Through a Custom MOBA Game: Development, Implementation & Impact

The quality of a team in organizations has an impact on the success of the team in achieving their goals. Team building activities are one of the elements which can improve relationships in different kinds of teams. One of those can be playing competitive digital games, whether for teams working remotely or on site. This paper presents a case study that explores the design and development process of an innovative online game that combines elements of third-person action and multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) games to provide an experience that strengthens team cohesion. The game design and mechanics support distribution of team roles based on Belbin's theory, highlighting the importance of diverse roles for balanced team functionality. By integrating unique character functions, the game encourages players to understand and appreciate the different roles individuals play in a team, enhancing empathy and mutual respect among team members. The game is uniquely designed to be simpler and more accessible than typical MOBAs, making it an ideal tool for educational and organizational settings to boost team cohesion and communication skills among people from various backgrounds. The leveling of the playing field allows individuals with minimal gaming experience to participate fully and effectively. The design principles ensure that the core mechanics of the game encourage teamwork and effective communication over individual skill, emphasizing collective success. The case study delves into the development process, the challenges faced, the solutions implemented, and the outcomes observed as part of a research project conducted between 2022-2023. The findings suggest that game-based learning can significantly transform traditional team-building methods, introducing a new paradigm for fostering high-performance teams in an increasingly digital world.

Primary Education’s Stakeholders Behavioural Intention to use Prospective Game-based Learning for Waste Awareness

Despite some efforts to design games to raise primary school students’ awareness of the waste problems, there is a lack of research studying the directly involved stakeholder’s behavioural intention to use the games. Prior studies have explored the users’ games acceptance of the games that have already been developed. However, we believe that understanding the user’s acceptance from the beginning of the game design process is also crucial. This research investigates the factors that influence the behavioural intention to use prospective game-based learning (GBL) for waste awareness among primary school parents, teachers, and students. An online survey based on the UTAUT 2 was distributed to each stakeholder, supplemented by a video demonstrating an Augmented Reality-based mobile game interaction scenario. The sample of participants included 135 parents, 47 teachers, and 129 primary school students from Malang, Indonesia. The internal consistency of game acceptance from the surveys was evaluated through Kruskall Wallis. Results show that Effort Expectancy is the factor with the highest acceptance value while Facilitating Condition has the lowest value. The three stakeholders argued that the prospective GBL seems easy to play and learn, but in contradiction, the adults are concerned that they cannot assist in teaching how to use the game and cannot provide the necessary technology. The cultural background seems to influence user game acceptance. Indonesians are known to be quite open to new technologies like GBL, although the facilitation condition might be low. Furthermore, there are some significant differences between the student-parent and student-teacher groups, but not in the parent-teacher group. Findings indicated that Indonesian teachers are more ready to adopt GBL than students and their parents. By understanding the perceptions and attitudes of these groups, educators and researchers can develop strategies to address any concerns or doubts they may have and promote the benefits of GBL.

Let’s get on-board: a practical framework for designing and implementing educational board games in K-12 classrooms

Educational board games are a promising tool for implementing game-based learning to improve the teaching-learning process. However, the absence of comprehensive scholarly guidance on designing educational board games impedes the effective implementation of game-based learning in classrooms. The sparsely available studies on game design frameworks often confine themselves to the design of the educational game itself, without including guidelines for the classroom integration of such games within the design framework. Additionally, the literature often neglects that teachers, burdened by limited time and excessive workload, are often the sole participants in the game design process. To address these gaps, we introduce a practical framework for educators to design and seamlessly integrate educational board games in their classrooms. Our approach prioritizes minimizing additional teacher workload while using game-based learning to foster student-led problem-solving sessions and game revision. Drawing from game design principles and existing literature on game-based learning, we propose a comprehensive framework that guides educators through the design and implementation of educational board games tailored for conducting problem-solving sessions. The framework is validated and refined using qualitative analysis of teacher and student feedback after its seamless integration into the regular mathematics instruction and curriculum of a Philippine K-12 high school. Results indicate positive student experiences and highlight the framework’s efficacy in promoting student engagement, learning outcomes, and teacher convenience. Thematic analysis of student feedback highlights key design preferences and game features that enhance student experiences in GBL sessions. The study contributes to the advancement of GBL methodologies by offering practical guidelines for independent use by educators and promoting exchanges between teacher colleagues. Overall, the proposed framework offers a systematic and feasible approach to designing and implementing educational board games, fostering effective learning experiences in diverse educational contexts.

Developing a game design framework to embed student-centred learning

PurposeThis paper presents the student-centred experience (SCE) game design framework, which aims to guide the design of holistic student-centred digital game-based learning (SCDGBL) experiences, which fully integrate all seven tenets of student-centred learning (SCL). The paper also rationalises the need for the framework and presents the steps taken in its development.Design/methodology/approachInitially, the background areas of SCDGBL and digital game-based learning (DGBL) are examined, and the need for a framework in digital educational game design that has a focus on SCL is then established. The rigorous and systematic design thinking process through which the framework was developed is then stepped through. The completed framework is then presented, and each section is detailed to explain its utilisation within the process of digital game design.FindingsThe paper presents the completed student-centred experience (SCE) framework alongside a worked example of how it can be deployed in practice. Also included is guidance on the roles of the game designer and education practitioner at all stages of design, development and deployment and how they may contribute their experience during the game design process to create high-quality tools for learning.Research limitations/implicationsWhile the SCE framework presented is complete, it is presented as a first version and will benefit from wider deployment and testing.Originality/valueThis paper presents a new game design framework integrating existing knowledge on SCL and DGBL, which guides practitioners in the design of experiences that fully deliver the techniques of both areas.

Can ChatGPT Match the Experts? A Feedback Comparison for Serious Game Development

This paper investigates the potential and validity of ChatGPT as a tool to generate meaningful input for the serious game design process. Baseline input was collected from game designers, students and teachers via surveys, individual interviews and group discussions inspired by a description of a simple educational drilling game and its context of use. In these mixed methods experiments, two recent large language models (ChatGPT 3.5 and 4.0) were prompted with the same description to validate findings with expert participants. In addition, the impact on the models’ suggestions from integrating the expert’s role (e.g., "Answer as if you were a teacher.", "game designer", or a "student") into the prompt was investigated. The findings of these comparative analyses show that the input from both human expert participants and large language models can produce overlapping input in some expert groups. However, experts put emphasis on different categories of input and produce unique viewpoints. This research opens the discussion on the trustworthiness of large language model generated input for serious game development.

Automata concepts over game design process

Discrete states linked together by events can describe a series of classical video game scenarios. Therefore, the formal concept of automata seems appropriate for describing such games. However, as simple finite automata need to keep track of past events, they are less appropriate for complex designs. By contrast, push-down automata featuring a stack present better capabilities in this context. This paper discusses an enhanced version of the classic PAC-MAN game with push-down automata. The modular design of this game allows the extraction of discrete states, and its minimalist concept enables various approaches and new versions without sacrificing its original essence. Using push-down automata expanded the game with new features, allowing an enhanced game experience. The automaton controls all aspects of the game, ensuring a consistent gameplay. The presented project demonstrates the capabilities of push-down automata in the gaming industry and their potential in future game development projects.

Game Design Based on High-Definition Render Pipeline in Unity

In the last few years, more and more people want to get involved in game production and with the development of Unity, the render result in games are becoming more and more realistic. High-Definition Render Pipeline is the best render pipeline in Unity for present, but High-Definition Render Pipeline is not easy for beginners. Therefore, this paper will go through the game design process of an environmental protection game to provide a simple workflow based on High-Definition Render Pipeline for readers. In this project, Blender was used for most of modeling work, Marvelous Designer for the fabric modeling, Substance 3D Painter for textures making. Finally, the researcher’s friend participated in a test of this game, although the testers say that this game could rise their awareness of environmental protection, but this game use a lot of resources from CPU and GPU due to the large number of models and the lack of optimization algorithms created.

I arrived at the sun! Developing an educational board game with the collaboration of pre‐service art and pre‐service science teachers

AbstractThe aim of this study was to describe the design process of an educational board game, the Planet‐Dart. This board game design is based on the science curriculum and aims to enhance middle school students' basic concepts about solar system. The purpose of developing this educational game was to provide an entertaining way for learning science. A pre‐service art teacher designed the game with the support of two pre‐service science teachers. The pilot study was conducted with two middle school students, and with the feedback based on the pilot study the pre‐service art teacher made modifications to the game. Then, the main implementation of the game was conducted in a real‐classroom environment with 60 middle school students by one pre‐service science teacher and two science teachers. The qualitative results revealed that this game was an enjoyable and effective learning tool to play among middle school students. In addition, the pre‐ and in‐service science teachers emphasized that there was an entertaining learning environment during the play. Based on these findings, the developed educational board game could enhance students' learning outcomes and entertainment.

Learning Newtonian mechanics with an intrinsically integrated educational game

AbstractBackgroundResearch on cognitive effects of educational games in general shows promising results. However, there are large variations in learning outcomes between individual educational games. Research on the design process and different design elements of educational games has led to some interesting directions, but some design aspects remain unclear.ObjectivesWe examined how an educational game designed on the basis of intrinsic integration theory, based on a strong alignment between game and learning goals, supports the learning of Newtonian mechanics.MethodsThis study applied a mixed‐methods approach (N = 223). A pre‐ and post‐test design was used to examine possible learning and transfer effects fostered by playing the educational game, Newton's Race. To examine how players played the game, log data for each player were digitally recorded during gameplay.Results and ConclusionsOur findings demonstrated a significant positive learning effect of Newton's Race (p = 0.003, d = 0.201). This can be explained through the acquired log data. Log data show that players' gameplay mostly matched expected learning during the game, with physically correct game settings occurring more and more as gameplay progressed. The ability to transfer learned knowledge to other situations was shown to be limited to situations closely resembling the game environment.ImplicationsSimilarly, designed intrinsically integrated games on different (physics) subjects could also foster learning in a relative short time. To foster transfer to other situations we propose embedding the game within other instructional activities.

Promoting Healthy Behaviors Through an RPG Videogame: An Elaboration Likelihood Model Based Approach

Serious games, due to their massiveness, attractiveness, and enjoyment, are widely used for education, promoting healthy behaviors, and for the prevention of sexually transmitted infections (STI) . Serious game design includes tailored narratives, game mechanics, and art for their purpose. Nevertheless, using theories of attitude change to create a videogame to promote healthy behavior is less common. Following contemporary theories on persuasion, we developed and tested an RPG videogame for mobile phones, in which participants had to think in favor of the use of condoms through a series of tasks within the game in order to promote positive attitudes and consonant behavioral intention (BI). Results show a positive correlation between thoughts, attitudes, and BI, and that attitudes can partially mediate (account for) the association between thoughts and BI. In this exploratory study, we showed that 1) it was possible to include an Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM)-based approach into a videogame; 2) consistent with previous studies, attitudes partially mediated the association between thoughts and condom use (BI) in a videogame environment; and 3) applications of this strategy can be considered in the game design process to build new serious games for prevention in health care.

Let’s make a game! A case of co-designing with teachers from a research-practice partnership to integrate a virtual reality-enhanced digital game-based learning science unit

This case study analyzed the co-design process of a digital game-based learning (DGBL) unit using a research-practice partnership between a university and a middle school. The study found that the design team paid equal attention to the learning, engagement, and context of the game during the design meetings. The teacher’s role in the game design process was crucial in addressing contextual factors. The R-PP relationship fostered an effective game design process, with both teachers and researchers contributing to the game and DGBL curriculum design. The equal contribution of all team members increased curricular alignment and feasibility in the unit design while providing teachers with a professional development opportunity in DGBL concepts and the design of the DGBL unit itself.

Reflections of art history instructors on an educational digital game: A narrative case study

The current paper is based on a large art-based project that aims to explore the art history instructors’ practice-based reflections on their adoption, implementation, and use of the educational video game, ARTè: Lumiére, which is an exploration game designed to enhance art history and art appreciation courses in the context of the birth of French Impressionism. The data were gathered from three art history instructors teaching in higher education through semi-structured interviews with a particular focus on reflection on their undergraduate students’ engagement and learning experience during the gameplay. Results indicate that there were four major emergent themes, including self-reflection, reinforcement of learning, Lumiére as a game changer, and overcoming the obstacles. Regarding the instructors’ reflections and experiences, we suggest that instructors’ presence during the gameplay and the game design process might have a significant impact on the students’ learning experience.

Preserving Southern Thai Traditional Manora Dance Through Mobile Role-Playing Game Technology

Manora or Nora has been added to the heritage list of UNESCO as Thailand's intangible cultural heritage since 2021. This performance has been presented as a regional form of entertainment and traditionally passed down through generations within certain families. Nowadays, young people are able to learn and practice Manora instructed by their masters or their successors. However, there is currently no digital content of Manora that could support awareness and enrichment of cultural safeguarding, so this article proposes the design and development of a mobile 3D game representing Manora, which is Southern Thai dance-drama performing art. The aim of this game is to increase citizens’ engagement with their intangible cultural heritage and preservation by delivering novel digital heritage content specifically designed for a role-playing mobile game called Nara. The Nara game is used to enhance the perception of Manora dance and provide new experience of playing a culture-based game through costume and its material items. The game design process takes Manora's significant identities, including the costume, dance postures, and music along with players’ requirements to create a game player character, non-player characters, storytelling, challenges, and level design. The development of the game is done on Unity game engine, which provides a mobile 3D game platform to integrate all the designed content and generate the interactive Nara game. The experimentation results conclude that utilizing the unique identity of Manora in gameplay successfully enhances the audience's experience and recognition. This result indicates the effective use of creativity and interactive multimedia technology to create attractive content and enjoyment that can encourage intangible cultural heritage preservation in an innovative manner.

PreGLAM: A Predictive, Gameplay-based Layered Affect Model

We present the Predictive Gameplay-based Layered Affect Model (PreGLAM), an affective game spectator model that flexibly integrates into a game design process. PreGLAM combines elements of real-time Player Experience Models, and Affective Non-Player-Character models to output real-time estimated values for a spectator's valence, arousal, and tension during gameplay. Because tension is related to prospective events, PreGLAM attempts to predict future gameplay events. We implement and evaluate PreGLAM in a custom game <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Galactic Defense</i> , which we also describe. PreGLAM significantly outperforms a random walk time series in how accurately it matches ground-truth annotations, and has comparable accuracy to state of the art affect models.

Students Attitude to Serious Games for Cultural Heritage

Serious games are video games designed for purposes other than entertainment and applied mainly for education or training. In the context of cultural heritage, serious games leverage technology to engage users in educational and immersive experiences related to historical sites, artifacts, and cultural traditions. The paper explores how K12 and university students assess serious games for cultural heritage concerning game experience and learnability. The research focuses on appreciating students learning tangible and intangible heritage by playing two serious video maze games – “The Heritage of Valchan Voivoda” concerning intangible heritage and the “Let Us Save Venice” game about heritage resilience and sustainability. The paper describes the game design process based on an automatic generation of the maze using a formal description, the maze topology, and the methodology for evaluating game learnability and game experience. The analysis compares results obtained by an experimental validation of the two games. The findings prove that serious maze video games, as a part of digital culture, are an appropriate tool for learning the cultural heritage of students of different ages.

AI-Powered Game Design: Experts Employing ChatGPT in the Game Design Process

AI-Powered Game Design: Experts Employing ChatGPT in the Game Design Process

The Funnel of Game Design – An Adaptive Game Design Approach for Complex Systems

Background In a world of ever-increasing complexity, organizations and people have an ever-increasing need for support systems that help them understand and shape the world around them. While simulation game design derived from the very idea to propose an instrument able to address complexity, seminal approaches dealt with a different level of complexity. In a networked, digitalized world, complexity has increased, and traditional approaches towards designing games show certain shortcomings that have to be overcome. Aim This article proposes a new process of game design for complex problems and complex systems that can both be used by game designers as well as the scientific community in the field. This process is represented within a framework, based on two parts. The so-called ‘Funnel of Game Design’ based on the IDEAS approach represents the process of problem derivation, while the ‘House of Game Design’ also covers possible steps towards the final game product and process, including de-briefing and evaluation. Method Based on hands-on experiences and related work, we developed several steps of a game design process (IDEAS approach). In face-to-face interviews, we discussed the first version of the framework with experts in the field of simulation game studies. Results This process led to the framework presented in this article, which shows the steps of problem derivation as well as challenges that can occur, and proposes adaptive methods to overcome these challenges. The framework includes elements that support the definition of complex problems, and their translation into game designs. Recommendation We recommend practitioners and scientists to apply the new framework presented here in their efforts to define the underlying problem that should be addressed by an envisioned simulation game, and in translating this into a valid, engaging and meaningful game experience.