A Little Fun Goes a Long Way
By William Powell
Corporate scandal, labor reductions, economic recession. The past year has been a sobering experience for the average worker, a return of the nose-to-the-grindstone work ethic, and a time to roll up the shirt sleeves and get serious. You’ve seen your workload increase, your pay frozen, and your training budgets cut. And to make matters worse, you’ve seen expectations for ROI rise and e-learning companies fall.
Need a tissue? It’s not that bad. Honest. Despite what you may have heard, fun is not dead. In the burgeoning niche of game-based e-learning, a group of companies are using the video games kids (and adults) play as inspiration for delivering learning that counters workers’ reluctance towards training and offers an antidote to the stress that many are under. Now that incentives of a pay increase or promotion are being reigned in by higher ups, employees are less enthusiastic about taking time away from their jobs for training--managers even less so. These game-based e-learning applications counter by being fun, engaging, and in some cases, addictive.
But, as can be expected, e-learning that draws heavily on video games in a coat-and-tie culture is often a tough sell. Advanced games and simulations don’t come cheap. Development costs for custom-designed games often top the million dollar mark and purchase prices are typically several hundred thousand dollars. Such an investment matches the cost of in-classroom training. With training budget cuts, companies that are on the fence are unwilling to take a chance on an unproven mode of delivery. Pragmatism and proven technology rule the day, as companies decide what they really need and suppliers figure out how to deliver. For some in the game-based e-learning segment, the mood is rather pensive. For them, fun isn’t dead. It’s just on pause.
For others, it’s game on. Companies such as LearningWare, Corporate Adrenalin, and Games2Train are finding success by delivering within a tight budget and providing back-end data to ensure that games earn their keep. Even in the midst of this economic slump, game-based e-learning is demonstrating its potential to improve the way we train and do business.
Brain freeze
You’re either a believer or you’re not; you either buy into game-based e-learning or you don’t. Ask most game designers about the difficulty of selling game-based solutions in the current climate, and you’re likely to get a variation on that response. Illeana Perez is a believer. As founder of game-based e-learning developer Crania Mania she has to be. But having watched the e-learning market wither she’s decided to change the company’s focus for the near future. No more fun and games; the budgets aren’t there for the type of interactive, multimedia applications and simulations that inspired the company’s creation. “We looked at the feasibility of our company producing the kinds of products that we want and know are effective games,” she says. “We foresaw that in the next five years there just isn’t going to be a high enough price point for us to make a sustainable profit. We found that companies are heading in a different direction.” That direction is leading companies towards spending less on technology for training and moving more development in-house and away from reliance on suppliers, explains Perez, and she’s not alone in her assessment of game-based e-learning’s viability in the current economy.
“It’s a futuristic view of the world,” says Michael Brennan, program manager for corporate learning and performance research at IDC. “Right now, I just haven’t seen much in the way of game-based e-learning revolutionizing the way companies deliver training.”
Child’s Play?
So, you think videogames are just kids stuff? Think again. According to the Interactive Digital Software Association, the average age for videogame players is 29. More surprising, 40 percent of Americans who play PC games are older than 36 and 13 percent of all players are older than 50. And it’s not only a guy thing. IDSA reports that 38 percent of computer game players are women.
So what’s popular with adults? When it comes to PC games, the IDSA survey ranks puzzle/board/card/learning games as the most popular. With game consoles, action games get the nod. But then that’s been the traditional breakdown from software developers. Technical games such as Microsoft’s Flight Simulator appeared exclusively on the PC format, taking advantage of the keyboard’s numerous keys and the PC’s ability to add additional, function-specific controllers. All of which seems more adult. But adult usage of console games is on the rise as well. Studies from Jupiter Research report that 1 in 10 adult users already have at least one of the current videogame consoles, such as Sony’s Playstation 2, Nintendo’s Gamecue, and Microsoft’s Xbox.
When asked why they play, the IDSA survey’s top three reasons fall right in line with what most in-class instructors try to accomplish: it’s fun (87.3 percent) , it’s challenging (71.4 percent), and they like to play with friends (42.4 percent). The last reason looks to be a major breakout area for videogames and learning games alike. If you’ve missed the ads for online game play via Sony’s Playstation 2 or Microsoft’s X-Box you haven’t been watching TV. Though it already has a dedicated audience, online game play is the next great market for the gaming industry. The IDSA research showed a 6 percent increase in online game play among the most frequent users, and 37 percent of Americans who play PC games or console-based games reported they used mobile devices such as handhelds, PDAs, and cell phones for playing games while on the go.
As for the theory that young gamers turn into staid, serious adults, it doesn’t seem to hold water. According to IDSA, nearly 60 percent of frequent game users, youngsters and adults, said that they expect to play games as much or more 10 years from now. Forrester research supports that claim forecasting 40 percent growth in the number of high-intensity users by 2007.
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Like a growing number of workers, Brennan was raised on video games. Yet, the IDC analyst still has his doubts about the ability of game-based e-learning applications to appeal to a large segment of workers, as well as gain sponsorship from upper-level management, most of whom weren’t raised with a game controller in their hand. “Something can be as engaging as the best video games out there, but if it’s not really helping me get my job done, why would I spend my time with it instead of knocking off work and actually going to play video games.” It’s a valid argument, and one that designers of game-based e-learning are well aware of, as are those who make purchasing decisions.
Perez agrees, “Making something fun doesn’t decrease the educational value, but often times there’s a misuse of games for learning. If they’re not relevant to the subject at hand, they can be fun and distracting. And the individual can certainly not learn anything.”
So what’s hot in a market that’s running lukewarm? For Brennan, it’s application training simulations. These multimedia tutorials guide users through the use of a software application. “Think of the Microsoft paper clip but a heck of a lot more interactive and engaging,” says Brennan. Let’s hope so--that paper clip annoyed enough users for Microsoft to offer a “Clippy-free” version of its Office suite.
Here’s how it goes: A company rolls out a new piece of software and wants its 1500 employees to learn how to use it. The simulation leads users through a tutorial, demonstrating the steps to perform a certain task and allowing them a chance to repeat the action, while providing feedback. These simulations are functional, useful, and they deliver tangible results. It’s hard to fault them. As with games, users learn by doing. But they’re not games, and some will argue that they’re only simulations in the broadest sense of the term. Game-based e-learning proponents will wonder where the emotion, the immersion, and the fun is in these products.
Application simulations are, in part, a product of their time. They’re practical; they can be easily used in place of instructor-led training; and their results are easily measured. More important, management understands and trusts them. For many companies that last element is crucial. “E-learning has been under a lot of scrutiny because of promises made by suppliers, and rightly so. It should be put under a microscope,” says Brennan. “Because of poor completion rates and the push of large course libraries that only 4 percent of an organization ends up using, it’s no wonder that e-learning is considered by many companies to be a discretionary expenditure.”
The skepticism of game-based e-learning and of e-learning in general isn’t limited to the United States. In the United Kingdom, game designers are experiencing even greater corporate and cultural resistance. “The market in the United Kingdom is still a few years behind the American psyche,” says Chris Hillman, managing director of Corporate Adrenalin. In fact, the majority of the U.K.-based game designer’s clients are in the United States. “Gaming is always a difficult sell as a serious alternative,” he says. “If you talk to some clients about fun, they reply that they can’t afford to spend money to have their people having fun. Fun and learning and seriousness and development are sometimes at opposite ends of the spectrum.”
But Hillman is optimistic about games’ chances. He notes a massive push by the U.K. government to become an e-learning institution. Nearly US$1 billion is being poured into its government-wide e-learning platform. Once completed, Hillman foresees a greater acceptance of e-learning in general and, in short course, a greater willingness to pursue more creative forms such as game-based e-learning. And Perez is still confident that U.S. corporations will continue to warm to the use of game-based e-learning. “We still really believe in it,” she says. “I think that in five to 10 years from now, it will be the predominant way that people train.”
It’s got game
At first glance it might seem silly to pursue game-based e-learning when companies are struggling to obtain support for more traditional forms of training. But games just might be the cure for what ails you. Here are a few things you should consider.
GBEL is self-motivating and self-marketing. “Think of games as extra motivation,” says Marc Prensky, founder of Games2Train and author of Digital Game-Based Learning. “You don’t need them for things that you want to learn about. It’s when you’re not motivated that games come into play.”
In the current climate, professional development is becoming a matter of personal development in which self-motivation is key. Minus the incentives of a raise or a promotion, finding time for an e-learning session becomes as difficult as fitting in a trip to the gym. It’s not surprising that estimates regarding e-learning completion rates typically hover between 20 and 30 percent.
“Workers aren’t just accepting what’s thrown at them; they have input,” he says. “People are now asking, Is this going to be enjoyable, and Is this going to be something that’s worth my time?”
Games address both questions by offering an pleasurable experience that engages the learner so that he or she wants to spend time playing them. As Prensky puts it, “Games take the pain out of learning.” In addition, a well-designed game strikes a balance between short-term and long-term goals and challenges, which creates a devilish pattern of challenge and reward that pulls players toward completion. The best games put players in a state of flow, or as Prensky explains, “a feeling that you’re in the groove, a sense of heightened productivity.”
“Flow is typically found in sports, games, and hobbies,” he says. “But it can be induced by the right combination of elements within games. So, if you think of training as moving people from state X to state Y, what’s the most efficient method? One way is getting them to move themselves. The way that you do that is to create the conditions for self-motivation and that’s essentially putting people in a state of flow.” And that means games.
Games are also great self-marketers. The challenge of high scores and online game play create healthy competition between users. The shared experience of completing a similar course that’s fun and challenging creates conversation between sessions. Computer game players build Websites with hundreds of participants who generate news, updates, and forums to discuss tips and share stories. Popular online role-playing games such as Everquest have such a strong community that the line between the gaming world and the real world has become inextricable. Particpants in the game frequently sell potions, weapons, and other items on Ebay.
GBEL creates an engaging, emotional experience that enhances learning. Part of a game’s success is in creating emotional buy-in from the participant. Pioneered by Roger Schank, the learn-by-doing theory claims that elements of failure, indecision, and excitement make us more attuned to what’s being taught. “People tend to remember emotional events better,” says Perez. “Think back to the significant memories of your childhood. Most often you’ll remember events that dealt with some kind of emotion, whether it was loss or a very exciting adventure or trip. It’s the same with learning.”
Fortunately, games don’t have to be analogues of real-world experiences to create emotional buy-in from users. Certainly, it helps, but tension, elation, and disappointment are all emotions that can be conjured by even the simplest games. Of course, a little competition, as mentioned, doesn’t hurt. But the important thing to remember is that multimillion dollar simulations aren’t the only game in town when it comes to creating an emotional learning experience.
Games have the Y factor. From six to 25 years old, Generation Y numbers about 78 million, and they’ve just begun to enter the workforce. They bring an intimidating grasp of technology and high expectations for technology-based learning. They’re the first generation to be raised and educated in the presence of personal computers and video game consoles. And it’s safe to say that most of what passes for e-learning today isn’t going to cut it. They’ve grown up with cutting-edge video games and have been taught with well-designed, big-budget learning games from such developers as Lucas Learning. That doesn't mean they will demand to be trained solely by games, or even demand games that mirror what’s on tap in the video game world, but they’re not going to be impressed by applications that throw in catchy graphics or animation as an afterthought. They want to be engaged, and a good way to provide that is through game play. “It’s the idea of the hypertext mind,” says Prensky. “[Generation Y] approaches learning differently. They’re more comfortable with larger amounts of information.”
A tale of two templates
Though e-learning is currently taking its lumps, it’s not game over for game-based e-learning. A number of game developers are finding success despite the reduction in training budgets. They’re doing so, in large part, because the format’s benefits can be obtained through inexpensive, template-based games.
Unlike more advanced, complex simulations and video games, template-based games provide a simple, easily customizable shell that companies can use to deliver content. The game designer is only responsible for creating the vehicle of game play, which often resembles classic arcade or board game formats. Their strength is in testing a player’s knowledge of fact-based information. The depth of play found in today’s video games is miles ahead. But that’s not the point. These games exist to make the delivery of information fun and engaging. Knowledge capture is also a welcome benefit to the approach. Questions are typically posed in a multiple-choice or short answer format, which lends itself to easy assessment of players’ competency and ROI analysis.
For a company interested in testing the waters of game-based e-learning, simple template-based games are an appealing option. Software and licensing for an entire company can cost less than US$15,000. Designers such as LearningWare will even host your Web-based games should you lack the resources. Hardware requirements are minimal, typically call for a Pentium II processor, 64MB of RAM, and video and sound cards.
“One of the problems in designing games for the corporate world is changing content faster than the shelf life of the game,” says Games2Train’s Prensky. His company has designed a wide range of products from template-based games that provide an overview of sexual harassment policies to state of the art first-person shooter spin-offs that use 3-D gaming technology to teach certification and compliance. The solution Prensky and other designers employ is to make the game and the content separate by creating a templated shell. Prensky tries to build in interchangeability for every image and snippet of text. Nothing is built into game play. It means more work up front, but the tradeoff is that a game can be customized overnight. Even in advanced 3-D gaming environments, clients are able to customize question sets, provide links to online policy and reference manuals, and track player progress. Of course, that will cost more. Fully-customized games at that level of design will quickly top the US$1 million mark, depending on the amount of customization required and what elements can be borrowed from previous designs. Regardless of price points, the template-based design keeps games from quickly becoming obsolete, a problem that many e-learning applications failed to overcome.
The bottom line is that it doesn’t cost a lot to have fun, and it doesn’t cost a lot to have game-based training that provides the look and feel of your corporate image. Companies such as Games2Train, Corporate Adrenalin, and LearningWare have made it their business to provide game-based e-learning at prices suitable for any organization. With a reasonable price of entry, the benefits inherent in game play, and the ability to customize and interchange content, games are proving to be an appealing option at some unlikely companies.
Community
The community surrounding game-based e-learning is small but tight-knit. Most developers are well aware of what their counterparts offer, and though they don’t always agree on the other’s approach, there seems to be plenty of goodwill and information sharing between companies and creators. Among them, Marc Prensky, founder of Games2train and author of Digital Game-Based Learning, is becoming the de facto ambassador. For anyone interested in finding out more about this segment of the e-learning industry, Prensky has created TwitchSpeed.com, a Web-based portal devoted to game-based e-learning. On tap are links to companies and game-based learning advocates, an extensive list of resources, and a useful FAQ section. |
At Harmon Autoglass, safety is a priority. But when it comes to assuring that everyone receives appropriate safety training, the Minneapolis, Minnesota-based company faces a classic training hurdle: a large workforce spread over 300 locations and a system of manual reporting that leaves management guessing who received what. To gain feedback on the current program’s effectiveness, the company sought a traditional e-learning solution. However, Ira Kasden had something a little different in mind. Kasden and his company Performance Builders suggested that Harmon try a Web-based game. It was a bold suggestion for a company that typically has only one person per office tied to a computer. Most employees are in the shop or out in the field. In addition, Harmon’s employees are busy. This isn’t a group of men and women with a lot of free time on their hands. “Unlike sales training, safety training, especially in small glass shops, is almost viewed as a necessary evil,” says Kasden. “People don’t relish the idea of running into safety meetings.” So, how do you get employees to focus on the issue of safety training when time is at a premium? Change people’s perception of the process. Kasden’s approach was not to sell Web-based games merely as an alternative medium for training, but as a way of changing participants’ perception of training and their willingness to participate. Harmon agreed to run the game as a pilot.
The pilot ran in three waves, each involving roughly 100 participants from 20-25 shops. The games were based on a template that Performance Builders licenses from the U.K.-based Corporate Adrenalin and then customizes to meet the corporate look of its clients. The game consisted of 50 questions arranged in a maze format. To move through the maze, players had to answer a question correctly. Performance Builders only supplies the template. Harmon was responsible for creating the questions, which covered content that employees should have learned in safety meetings during the prior year. “The idea was to get people online answering questions in the gaming format so that we could get the measurement information on the back side to see what was coming across in the meeting and what wasn’t,” Kasden says.
Harmon Autoglass hoped to gain enough feedback to make adjustments to their weekly safety training sessions, but the data that was generated provided much more. Kasden explains: “The first time players went through the maze, there were 12 of 50 questions that everyone got right. On the second time that increased to 27. By the fifth round, it was 44. We had measurements that clearly showed that as people saw the questions and answers more often, those points got transferred. And so it was really more powerful as a learning tool than what we imagined in the first place.”
In addition, the ability to provide real-time online reporting enabled Harmon to drill down and see which shops were participating, which technicians were participating, and just how well they were doing. “It gives you a very different feeling than what you get most often in the training business, because so often you’re just relying on trust that anybody is doing what you’re asking them to do.”
So how did they do? Through the three waves, the pilot averaged a 53 percent participation rate, with players answering an astonishing 33,233 questions. Participation was voluntary, with a small incentive going to shops with 100 percent participation. Twenty percent of those that played answered 200 or more questions. Considering that it only took, on average, 10-12 questions to complete a game, it’s obvious that quite a few players were playing just for the sake of playing the game. In fact, a handful of employees had played 30, 40, even 50 times. In future rollouts, Harmon plans to gate the application so that an employee can only play once per day.
“We actually called one of the people who got such an astronomical number of points to find out what was going on,” says Kasden. “He had a contest going on with a guy in another shop. That’s the power of competition.”
Survey response to the game was positive. “Everyone who responded said that they felt it was educational. The vast majority, nearly 70 percent, enjoyed the game format over just asking questions,” says Kasden. “It feels like it’s been a win for everybody.” Harmon agrees, and the company is rolling out a series of five games, making games an integral part of its training.
Another company creating success with template-based games that won’t break the bank is LearningWare out of Minneapolis. The company’s latest offerings are a quiz and survey module called Quiz Rocket and a Web-based version of the company’s cornerstone classroom-based application Gameshow Pro. Both use a quiz-based game format in an inexpensive, elegant format that, like Corporate Adrenalin, uses a template-based approach. The games offer easy appeal to older employees and managers that were raised on TV quiz shows such as Jeopardy!
The company’s focus is to avoid designs and technologies that complicate and run up the cost of implementation and confound clients. “We don’t do custom courseware, we don’t provide the content, we only provide the shell and let the clients provide the content,” says Dan Yaman, company cofounder and president. “Our products are designed for anybody that can type into a database and who wants to have a game that runs up on the Internet.”
“We try to take as much of the sting out of it as we can,” says Victor Kluck, LearningWare’s general manager. For both Yaman and Kluck, part of taking the sting out is providing a product that eases the sell by trainers to management who might bristle at the thought of giving the go-ahead to a video game when budgets are tight. Though there’s no question that LearningWare’s products are games, the designers don’t overindulge with lots of animation and complicated interfaces that hog infrastructure resources. “We have to ride the line of making our games corporate and making them acceptable to as many people as possible,” says Kluck. “We have the ability to tweak the graphics if a client wants to bring in its color palette, but the nature of our games is that they’re interactive tests; it still comes down to asking questions and giving answers.”
For Yaman, it’s also a matter of keeping the experience under control. “You don’t want these things taking over training. You want games to support your training, to make your training more effective. I can’t talk to any of my teenagers when they’re playing a game online or on their PCs; they’re just sucked into that environment. We don’t want people to have that experience. We want them to be able to interact effectively with the content without the gaming aspect taking over.”
In many ways, LearningWare’s approach echoes the outlook of IDC’s Brennan and the current attitude towards game-based e-learning in general. It’s safe to have fun, but not to the point where results take a back seat. Companies such as LearningWare and Corporate Adrenalin understand that in e-learning--game-based or otherwise--creating a convincing case for ROI is tantamount to buy-in from learners. Executives, as well as employees, want to know that efforts lead to improvements in the company and for employees, as well as improvement in their standing within the company. If you just want to play, go to the arcade. If you want to learn and have a little fun along the way, game-based learning can do just that.
Can you play it now?
Engaging GBEL is not about fancy graphics or eye candy, as game designers call it. It’s about game play that keeps players excited and coming back for more. A good example is Nintendo’s GameBoy. Despite being well behind its console counterpart in terms of graphics, the portable video game system has sold more than a million units since its introduction. “People will accept an application that’s a generation back in terms of eye candy if the game play is good,” says Prensky. With that in mind, game developers are exploring a host of new options for delivering game-based e-learning.
“Mobile devices are a huge opportunity,” Prensky says. His Games2Train is spending an increased amount of time experimenting with game delivery over cell phones and PDAs and working with Java 2 Micro Edition, a scaled down version of the popular Java programming language. Prensky loses some of the functionality of the original, but Java 2 ME allows him to design for the meager processing power and storage capacity incorporated in most mobile devices.
Currently, pocket PCs, such as the Compaq iPaq, are powerful enough to run games with plenty of graphics and a surprising amount of depth and sophistication that rivals much of what was seen on home game consoles just a few years ago. But Prensky sees the real breakout area in mobile phones. “It’s silly not to use them,” he says. “More people have them than they do computers.”
Games are already being used as a selling point for consumers deciding on their next mobile phone. Verizon wireless currently offers Jeopardy! to its users for a US$2.50 fee per month. The Jeopardy! model has been the backbone for many learning games and should prove to be inspiration for delivering learning games to that medium. Prensky foresees a future where it’s common for sales reps in the field to receive a new game via their phone’s wireless Internet connection. Reps could play mnemonics games to test their memory of contacts in their area or games that test the knowledge of a new product’s features. It’s a niche set to take off in the consumer market. Games2Train currently offers two games for PDAs and cell phones: the G2T Phone Challenge and Idea Tycoon!
A recent study from Ireland’s Analysis, a telecom advisor, predicts that downloadable games will generate an astounding €3 billion by 2005, surpassing the popularity of customization downloads such as ring tones. Forrester Research also foresees a boom in mobile games, forecasting that 45 percent of European mobile phone subscribers will pay to play games on their phones.
Currently most games that you see on mobile phones are embedded into the phone, which is problematic for educational purposes. Content can’t be readily changed. But recent phones, including the Nokia 7560, are Java-enabled, which allows users to download and store a game-based application and then uninstall it just as they would an application on their desktop computer. Other enhancements found on the 7560, such as a color screen and a joystick for navigation, encourage game play.
Last year, IN-FUSIO, a leading mobile games service provider, partnered with Native technologies and launched a vector-graphics engine that enables mobile devices to replay Macromedia Flash animations, another popular tool for designing learning games. The company’s goal is to deliver console-like games played offline. Previously, game players were often at the mercy of playing through a Wireless Access Protocol (WAP) connection. That’s a big step in terms of the economics of game play via cellular phone. No running connection through the phone’s Web browser avoids additional charges.
LearnWare’s Kluck and Yaman are working on other wrinkles in wireless delivery of games to PDAs. The game designers describe an encouraging scenario in which learners in a traditional classroom use PDAs equipped with a Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connection to play game-based learning applications in response to instructor-led quizzes, or gather into competing teams as part of a learning exercise.
Another area to look for learning games might be right in front of you at stores' checkout counters. LearnWare has been investigating solutions for game-based e-learning delivery in franchise or chain locations. “We’ve found that even in companies where you’d expect online e-learning, computer technology is quite minimal,” says Kluck. “In fact, the most intelligent piece of equipment they have in the store is often the Xboxes that they sell.” Without a PC, the only other option for e-learning delivery is the cash register. “It's hooked up to the Internet and constantly feeds the owner reports. If we could somehow integrate a quiz game or a similar solution into the register, we’d have a great way of testing knowledge,” Kluck says.
“During off hours the cash register screen becomes an interactive game environment,” Yaman says. If targeting cash registers as a device to deliver training seems odd, consider as Yaman did, the predicament that many restaurant and retail chains face. “These companies aren’t in the hamburger business or whatever business, they’re really in the training business, because their turnover is so high.”
It’s no coincidence that Yaman mentions hamburgers. Companies such as McDonald’s that have a large workforce of young people and a high rate of turnover are perfect candidates for LearningWare’s approach. In fact, the Golden Arches is already using an animated simulation on how to use the cash register and its different functions. “I think there’s a lot of opportunity there,” says Crania Mania’s Perez. “The question is how to get young employees up to speed quickly. When many of them haven’t even finished high school yet, are you really going to sit them in a classroom and make them read a brochure? Probably not.”
So, how far off is LearningWare from implementing cash register-based learning? In as little as six months, says Yaman. Hughes Satellite Networks, a LearningWare client, is already using satellite technology to deliver private intranets to food-service companies. LearningWare feels that it can tap into that technology to enhance e-learning content solutions with its template-based games.
Another advancement is the delivery and play of learning games in a real-time, online, multiplayer environment. As mentioned, online games are already hugely popular with some PC-gamers, but with the imminent release of several console-based titles featuring online, multiplayer play, online games are set to reach an even wider audience. It’s an important feature because it encourages competition and community. Even with the simplest games, the addition of a high score and some friendly competition can result in multiple plays well beyond reason. And with a little luck, a sense of community between employees and departments in disparate parts of the country. “You’re either competing against individuals or you’re competing against a high score,” says Corporate Adrenalin’s Hillman. The company is using online games to facilitate virtual teams before onsite training events. “These people don’t work together, they’re geographically apart, but by playing online they learn who is in their team, and they start sharing information and networking and that’s really what businesses want to do,” he says. “A guy in New York has a great idea, why doesn’t he share it with his colleague in San Diego? They’re not in competition with each other as far as pinching business. So if we create a friendship, a team element, the chances are they’re going to be more likely to share information.”
Just push play
When asked why he feels that games will become the predominant mode of delivery for the way we train, Prensky doesn’t hesitate to answer: “Because people will demand it.”
Just in the past few years we’ve seen the emergence of three competing video game console formats, obsessive online gaming communities, and the capability to deliver games to almost any device with a screen and a few buttons. In 2001 games brought in US$10.8 billion in revenue, making it larger than movies. And as the days dwindled down before Christmas, cable channels such as MTV seemed at times to be nothing more than one big video game commercial--though it would be a mistake to assume that the MTV generation is the only one that’s playing.
Peter D. Hart Research reports that sixty percent of all Americans play interactive games on a regular basis. That means every other man, woman, and child you pass in the office, the airport, or the shopping mall spends a portion of their spare time playing games. Does that mean that the world of e-learning has to be game-based? Not at all. But it does mean that when it comes to engaging learners, the bar is not being set by what learners find at work, but what they find at home. Game designers such as Prensky understand that and are eager to get the message out to e-learning providers. “The goal is not to build games,” says Prensky. “The goal is to get to the training as quickly as possible. The reason you add engagement is because people want to stop before they get to the end. As for games, they typically stop other things to get to the end of the game. That’s a big difference.”