I just attended the Games Based Learning conference in London, where — as the title suggests, the key topics for the presenters were based on using games as a tool for education and training, both to children and adults. I attended as a professional interface designer for web and mobile platforms so my summary and thoughts from the conference are based from that perspective. Most of the ideas I left with were evolutions of my own thoughts and opinions on the subject as, many presentations were targeted towards educators.

Games have an inherit association with entertainment, and a history associated with children’s toys. The market developed there because children had a natural tendency to play and weren’t afraid of technology. This historical association is now limiting the medium’s potential, though that’s expected to change as the children who played those games become decision makers and re-purpose the game content.

Although I’m not particularly interested in education I do have an interest in games as a form of digital media. I’m drawn to them from an entertainment, story-telling perspective that often includes great digital artwork but as a web designer I also believe they provide innovation in, and inspiration for, interface design.

Heavy Rain for PS3 provides a strong story with innovative interaction

Game interface design adds the element of fiction, or narrative, to the user interface (UI). This introduces multiple ways of implementing UI elements, as outlined in my previous post, User interface design in video games.

Games have custom control methods and new technologies are being released that allow haptic interactions. The web still relies on 30-year-old interface technology via a mouse and keyboard. The iPhone has introduced gesture based controls for web and we’re beginning to see this technology on computers but it still falls short of physical interface examples being brought to games consoles — see Sony Move and Microsoft Natal.

Games can humanise technology by presenting an interface that isn’t hostile and complicated. The Wii has successfully achieved this and is perhaps why it’s sold so well. Games are developing new relationships with technology. Flower for the PS3 is a great example of this. The player controls the wind with the push of a button and tilts the control to change the direction.

Games are simply another form of digital content. 100% of children between 6 and 10 play games, and 60% of the UK population admits to playing games in some form. The industry produces £1 billion GDP for the UK and the UK is the third biggest market after North America and Japan. They are becoming just as much a part of our culture as books, film and TV. One of the best quotes from the conferences was from Jesse Schell in the closing keynote when he referred to the popular term used to define people who play games, a gamer: “The term gamer is going to appear just as absurd as the term TVer would now”.

The conference included a series of presentations about what is coined ‘serious games’. Where games are being used for purposes other than entertainment and in this case to educate high-level professionals. These games work as training tools because they imitate reality -– sitting along side on-the-job training as the preferred method of teaching. They reduce the shock, preparing the student for the real task and have a narrative that enguages the student’s attention. The experiences are randomly generated ensuring the courses can be reused to test students, and once the assets are built they can be quickly repurposed to create additional scenarios.

Tauma Trainer is one example from TruSim, there are more examples of serious games on their website.

Maritime warfare is another examples of a purpose built learning environment, this time for the Navy and developed by Caspian Learning.

Games are already appearing as a form on content on the web, either as Flash games or integrated in to sites such as Facebook. Web professionals need to understand how to implement this new form of media, having an understanding of its potential can also create innovative content solutions. When video was introduced as a form of web content Designers were tasked with providing its UI — media player buttons and play heads etc. Then the web appeared on TV and they had to re-think the UI for a larger screen with a different interface.

BBC iPlayer for computer monitor

BBC iPlayer for TV

Web content is also expanding to other mediums — widgets are now part of desktop operating systems, mobile phones and televisions. Social networking has expanded on to every platform. All forms of content are merging and web designers need a basic understanding of how these forms of content behave and interact with audiences. Games have their own user interface — so there’s not only an opportunity to provide an interface outside of the content, but also within it.

Games are not only used for entertainment on the web, but also for topics such as sophisticated advertising campaigns, helping loose weight or providing branded content. The interest in the new genre of serious games also presents opportunities for web-based or mobile delivery. Channel 4 has created an education strategy to connect to its audience through digital mediums by developing several iPhone games as part of it’s 4iP programme: Sneeze, Privates, 1066 and Cover girl are a few examples. With connected devices games are also enabling hybrid spaces, or augmented reality — blurring the lines between what’s real, virtual and fictional, and acting as tools for physical spaces. Tate is introducing an iPhone game called the Tate Tramp that guides players through the gallery as they explore it as a hybrid space.

To provide a seem-less interface that compliments content you need an intimate knowledge of what the content communicates and an understanding of how the media works. As Marshall McLuhan said, the medium is the message. Just as it’s important to read and understand copy before choosing a face and typesetting it, it’s important to understand a game’s fiction before creating its UI. So the web designer of the future will be better prepared if they have a thorough knowledge of different forms of content and games and virtual environments will certainly be one of them.

References: Mary Matthews — Strategy and Busines Development Director, TruSim; Graeme Duncan — CEO, Capsian Learning; Lt Cdr Steve Clark, Royal Navy; Serious Games Institute; Tom Chatfield — Author, Fun Inc; Margaret Robertson — Game Design & Consultant; Jesse Schell - CEO Schell Games.