The following is a short segment from my 2010 editorial in PSQ which discusses video games as potential models for research behavior and the general research process. This segment is focused on categorizing different types of choices players make. These three categories originate from Charsky's 2010 article "From edutainment to serious games: A change in the use of game characteristics" in Games and Culture.

Video games are a shared experience that require interaction and engagement from players.Players are actively engaging with the game, making decisions based on the information available to them, and shaping an experience that may be different for each player. While there are interactions in games that the designers force on a player either for the sake of gameplay or narrative, there still remain choices left in the player’s hands.

Charsky(2010) discussed how games provide players with three types of choices:

· Expressive

· Strategic

· Tactical

Expressive choice allows the player to create a character and personalize that character looks and abilities in order to create a sense of ownership over the character.Gee (2003) talks about this same idea when he discusses how games create a sense of agency for players. This expressive choice helps to create a personal connection with a character that a player may spend 10 – 50 hours with depending on the game.

Strategic choice discusses the technology and systems within the gameplay mechanics. Strategic choice creates systems for players to approach challenges in various ways and still arrive at successful and satisfactory outcomes. This is often done through branching paths and open ended choices that players must decide upon.Bogost (2007) discusses how games create systems for the player to apply various potential solutions to. This idea of systematic thinking that Bogost discusses creates the framework to allow the player to reach a conclusion with the given information, apply it to the game’s situation, and evaluate how successful the choice was.

It is these smaller individual choices that Charsky (2010) describes as tactical choices.These tactical choices are where information literacy skills are applied. Evaluating which piece of information or experience is essential to solve a given challenge.

Succeeding in these challenges requires the information literacy skills of collection, evaluation, organization, and application. Johnson (2005) sites these skills as how video games help players develop organizational and problem solving skills. Gee (2003) looked to these series of decisions and interactions as the ways in which games create good pedagogical models to engage and teach. De Freitas and Oliver (2006) describe the tactical choices in video games and the feedback they provide the player, as a way to create effective learning activities. The unique attributes, interactions, and choices video games create provide justification and interest for libraries to explore ways to integrate video games into learning.

I will be discussing more about these types of choices and what they can mean for library instruction during Friday's ACRL panel session with Neal Baker from Earlham and Katherine Todd from Manhattenville College.

Bogost, I. (2007). Persuasive games: The expressive power of videogames. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Charsky, D. (2010). From edutainment to serious games: A change in the use of game characteristics. Games and Culture, 5(2), 177-198. doi: 10.1177/1555412009354727

DeFreitas, S. & Oliver, M. (2006). How can exploratory learning with games and simulations within the curriculum be most effectively evaluated? Computers & Education, 46, 249-264. doi: 10.1016/j.compedu.2005.11.007

Johnson, S. (2005). Everything bad is good for you: How today’s popular culture is actually making us smarter. New York, NY: Riverhead Books.

Over the course of this summer and fall, I have worked with a student researcher to create a video game experience that will help demonstrate information literacy skills. I will go into more detail about the project in the coming posts, but I wanted to start off with this video mapping out our character interactions.

After spending a few months this summer looking through online games and not finding anything that provided the depth we wanted within a limited playtime experience, we decided to mod an existing game. After creating the characters and most of the dialogue, we needed to see where our gaps in quest logic and character interactions were.

Student Fellowship: Morrowind Critical Thinking Mod from Paul Waelchli on Vimeo.

Mapping it out allowed us to identify that our critical thinking quest was too straight forward and made creating more characters and dialogue easy to plug in. With the additional characters and dialogue, I think that we've created a quest that will force players to question and evaluate the information that they receive.

We kicked off National Gaming Day a little early last week with a gaming event on Friday night. Since we ran the event past midnight, we were able to help kick off National Gaming Day @ your Library.

We had a variety of board games brought in by our local Green Bay games store: Gnome Games. Students brought in materials to play Warhammer 40k. And we had various video games going: Goldeneye on the Wii and Halo Reach and L4D2 on the 360 played in each of our classrooms. And students even brought in a PS2 and N64 to hook up in our smaller study rooms. It was a good turnout for our first game night.

The students' overwhelming response was: "When can we do this again."

National Gaming Day @ the Mulva Library from Paul Waelchli on Vimeo.

In the process of writing the last post, I was reminded of my political roots. A loss doesn't mean you roll over and except the result. A loss means you pick yourself up and work again for the next fight.

I know I share some of the blame for the loss of the "research intensive" designation. I could have lobbied harder and stayed more on top each phase. I assumed too much.

As I finished my last post, I started new emails to the committee members and outreach to the incoming Writing Center director. This should start laying the groundwork for the next phases.

I'm thankful for my political losses and for those organizers that shaped me. I've even brought the pin I was given after my first loss. Don't mourn - organize. This discussion may not be the focus of Research Quest, but I needed place to voice my thoughts and pick myself back up.

Now back to the general focus of Research Quest, even if it's been almost six months...



image via: www.laborarts.org

Recently, part of what brought me to my current position was lost. The straight forward path to curriculum integration was offered up as a political sacrifice. My route to formal integration has now become longer and more convoluted. But there is still a path. And since I still have my job, I will continue to work toward the goal of formal curriculum integration of information literacy.

For the past few years of the college's general education revisions, information literacy was on par with writing and communication as skills valued across the new curriculum. This focus was written into the working documents and the structure of the new core programs. Courses were to be designated as "writing" "research" or "communication" intensive courses. Each representing valued skills for students across disciplines to learn. This was good structure that insured the emphasis on information literacy. While many would rightly argue (myself included) that many courses currently offered could be considered "research intensive," the benefit of parity was that information literacy was a formal objective that stood on its own in the curriculum.

When I started back in the summer of 2008 I met with the chair of the committee who was and I believe remains committed to the ideas of information literacy within the curriculum. I spent the spring of 2009 meeting with the committee and working with the Writing Center Director, who sat on the committee, to draft language for the "writing" and "research" intensive designations. Unfortunately, the WC director left in the summer of 2009. In the fall of `09, I again worked with the committee chair to finalize draft language for the "writing" "research" and "communication" intensive designations. This was the draft language that was moving forward in the committee.

During this academic year, the general education changes left the committee and went before the full faculty. As with any general education curriculum changes, everyone has something at stake. What proceeded were faculty meetings spent debating the larger structure of the new curriculum. This debate and suggested changes focused on the organization, naming, and focus of 4 or 5 "pillars." Writing, Research, and Communication were left relative untouched in the formal debates.

That is until recently. In between the discussion at division and full faculty meetings, the committee dropped the "research intensive" designation. When the curriculum structure came back up for discussion in the last faculty meeting, only "writing" and "communication" intensive courses were listed. After talking with the chair of the committee, it is clear that there was a need to trim the curriculum structure. And the "research intensive" designation became one of the first trimmed.

As the debate and concern over the expansion of the curriculum grew, it appears that information literacy was the easiest piece to remove. Without a department to speak up or faculty to vote, the library holds little political influence. With only the library director holding faculty status, we became a convenient sacrificial offering.

It is still my intention to continue advocating for the inclusion of information literacy into the writing and communication intensive courses. Now the lobbying effort and demonstrating the value has become a larger focus.

Below is part of the draft language on how information literacy was planned to be integrated into the curriculum. There was/is more to the document, but this provides a quick outline of what was planned. There were certainly concerns and areas that needed work in the text, but since this text is no under consideration, I would like to share it with others. Or at least preserve it in memoriam:

Research

All students at St. Norbert College must complete a minimum of four research-intensive (designated RI) courses according to these parameters:

* One of these RI courses must be outside of the student’s major;
* One of these RI courses must be in the student’s major and in the upper biennium;
* Students with double majors must complete an upper-biennium RI course in each major.
* Students may transfer one RI course in the lower biennium, but not both.
* Students may transfer one RI course in the upper biennium, but the second RI course must be in the student’s major so that transfer students must complete at least one RI course at SNC within the discipline.

In every Core Program, research-intensive, major, and minor course, students should devote energy to targeted stages of the research process—planning, searching, evaluating, revising, organizing, and documenting. The research products, in various forms, are the natural reflection of the research process.
LOWER COURSES

All RI Core Program courses will have a dimension, which includes research exercises, application of resources outside of course material, and a formal out-of-class research assignment. These research requirements must be described in the course syllabus.

Students at the lower core will be able to:

· Communicate a basic understanding of what information is needed
· Apply a variety of types and formats of sources to locate the information
· Identify gaps in the information and revise the search
· Describe and apply criteria for evaluating the information
· Combines new information with existing knowledge to construct individual analysis
· Communicate findings and conclusions to others through various methods
· Follow institutional policies to acknowledge where the information originated from

Students can meet these skills by:

Research Exercises

Courses should promote the concept of research and focus on the research process as a means to understanding course content. A traditional research based term paper is one of the exercises that meet the RI designation. Other possible research focused exercises include:

· annotated bibliography
· research journal/log
· research paper outline
· literature review
· author tracking review
· identifying major journals
· comparison of internet/database searches
· poster presentation
· oral presentation
· journal/book/article review
· research trend analysis

Application of Resources Outside Course Material

Exams should include at least one essay question that requires students to write a paragraph or more to demonstrate information literacy and critical thinking skills (e.g., incorporating external sources, evaluating ideas, explaining concepts, synthesizing material, arguing a thesis, etc.) Though instructors are urged to incorporate an essay component on every exam, they may modify this component to meet particular exam needs.

The idea of pacing within a game is not new and certainly not unique to one genre or another. Action, adventure, role-playing, and even puzzle games all require a consideration of pacing. How the player progresses, how the action moves, and how layers of challenge are added are all pacing concepts within game design. The idea of pacing in lesson planning and classroom instruction is not new either, pacing set by teachers, students, or combinations of both are all applied. Education literature has witnessed pendulum swings back and forth between rapid teacher-directed classroom pacing and student-directed variable pacing. Two separate math classrooms found different results in pacing. Sangster (2007) found a quicker paced classroom was beneficial. Vaughan (2005) found that students were more successful when they were able to set their own pacing of a unit before beginning.

Tomb Raider: Anniversary’s challenge in pacing stems its’ heritage and its’ isolated atmosphere. The game throws a large and seemingly open area to explore. The player can explore every gap, cave, and reachable outcropping trying to find artifacts, ammo, and other hidden items. Or the player can seek out the most direct and efficient route out of the room puzzle, progressing forward to the larger goal. This initially creates the feeling of a large area to explore, but quickly the player learns there is typically one, and only one, way to get past the puzzles. There are frequent dead ends for players exploring the area seeking out additional health, ammo, or “lost artifacts.”

The level design does give the player the ability to set their own pace, exploring the open areas for every item or seeking out the solution to the next area. Unfortunately, the level design often creates conflicting pacing. Those looking for the direct route end up exploring because the solution is not immediately clear. And those seeking out each item may stumble upon the exit only to have to return for missed exploration. Over the course of the first half of the game, I’ve experienced both situations.

I believe the game is designed with a slower, methodical pace. A pace that encourages exploration. A pace that reminds the player of how isolated the explorer/robber Lara is. And a pace that was born during an area of game design when there were not clear (or even often stated) objectives, tutorials were not common place, and the rise of game walkthroughs (and sites like gamefaqs.com) were only beginning.

The result of this perceived exploratory freedom is my frequent frustration about where to go and frequent restarts due to missed jumps. The ideas here of pacing tie directly into the directions (and lack of) given to the player. The game asks the player to explore the surroundings and enjoy the journey. While I enjoyed the journey in the first area, by the second area I was focused on the outcome rather than the journey's exploration. I was just trying to get to the next area and goal.

The recent Destrutoid rant on exploration and my classes this week shifted my experience and expectations with Tomb Raider's pacing. The Destrutoid rant talked about exploration in games as a means to either power up and add abilities or as simply as a means to explore and discover. The contrast of exploring to discover and exploring to achieve a goal are at odds with their pacing. When a player's goal is finishing the level or gaining the new ability a tighter, faster pacing keeps the game moving forward and the player engaged in progressing. When the goal is exploration the pacing can be more open and set by the player. These two paces echo Sangster (2007) and Vaughan (2005) from above. The challenge for Tomb Raider: Anniversary is meeting the players' expectation of pacing. When my goal shifted from enjoying the journey to reaching the next area and objective, I was at odds with the game.

Being at odds with the game's exploration pacing, paralleled one instruction experience this week. An undergraduate art history course was looking specifically for articles and resources on their paints and were struggling to find more than a few exact matches. Their goal was to get the required sources and move on to the next assignment and area of their work. The project required them to find tangential sources exploring themes and imagery. The students expectations of classroom pacing were not to search and expand their knowledge and understanding, they were searching to complete the assignment. This difference in research goals effected their expectations on exploration of resources.

In tightly focused research session, the student is able to quickly and efficiently find resources needed. Unfortunately, this can often be interpreted by students as doing a search and finding the closest articles within the first page or two of results. This is not a new concern or expectation by students. Librarians often struggle to help students dig deeper than the top results or to refine a search beyond the "good enough" articles. But when the exploration goal is a quickly paced task to the next assignment, their expectations are at odds with the frequent messy reality of a research journey.

We must also realize that our expectations can be at odds with the students as well. Just as I was frustrated with Tomb Raider slow exploratory pacing, our students get frustrated with libraries with vast resource options to explore. They just want clear directions through the assignment to reach their goal. Not every class can enjoy the journey as much as a Master's of Education class I worked with this week. After three hours of research exploration, and two reams of paper later, they were still enjoying the exploration of every resource and treasure hunt for each new piece of research.

That is the pacing and joy of exploration Tomb Raider: Anniversary expects of its' players. But I was the undergraduate student who just wanted to find my way out of this research cave and out into the daylight of the next assignment. This is a lesson in pacing and exploration that I can take with me into each classroom setting. While I can attempt to inspire the joys of exploration in students, I can also help them understand which path out of their research is the most effective. Just as Tomb Raider's series of jumps, climbs, and ledges may not always feel like the fastest way out of an area, it is often the most effective. In research, sometimes the required information is direct and accessing it is quickly paced. But there are other times when we can help students through the most effective path, which often includes jumps from one database and source to another.

But unlike Tomb Raider's isolated environment, we can help our students understand why this winding research path is important to achieving their desired goal. Unlike Tomb Raider, where the Sherpa died in the opening scene, the individual student is not alone on this exploration. Librarians are there to help pace the exploration, providing both a growing understanding of the journey as a process and effective routes through the deep caverns of research projects.




Cited:
Sangster, Margaret. 2007. "REFLECTING ON PACE." MT: Mathematics Teaching no. 204: 34-36.

Vaughan, Angela L. 2005. "The Self-Paced Student." Educational Leadership 62, no. 7: 69-73.

images from TombRaiders.net

With today's opening weekend kickoff to the new NFL season, it's worthwhile to review some of the information literacy skills millions of fantasy football players will be engaged in over the next few months. This past summer I was one of the many guest videos (guest speakers) in Scott Nicholson's Gaming in Libraries online course. The brief video walks through much of what I've written and spoken about in regards to information literacy and fantasy football.

After 6 months of no activity on this blog, the growing assumption is a slow quiet internet death.

But I'm hear to say that it is not the case. I'm not dead, yet. There are still people finding the site and emailing about posts, articles, and classroom ideas. In the words of my colleague, I was on a blogcation. There are plenty of others who took planned and unplanned leaves from their writing. And we all have reasons.

Mine... the sudden death of my father. He died a few days after my last post. I am thankful to have had an open relationship with my father and we never hesitated to say "I love you." That being said, rarely a day goes by that I do not think of him in some fashion or another. In addition to this emotional tramua, as the Spring Semester wore on, the entire library began the preparation for a moving our existing collection and staff to a new library building. All in all, I was not in a mental or physical mindset to write.

I did continue to research and present. And I am back to needing a place organize, share, and shape my thoughts and ideas. Thus, I am back writing again. Over the next few posts, I will catch things up and talk more about my renewed energy and focus for video games and information literacy.

Starting up with where I stopped 6 months ago is a good jumping off point. My post on the state of video games, learning, and academic libraries was responded to by Christy Sich over at Bibliographic Games. Christy had one of the earlier articles about video games and information literacy and her experience and insight are appreicated. She ended her post with:

It's important to imbed information literacy into the curriculum - so a game-based information literacy approach should also be embedded.

Our campus is in the process of revising it's general education requirements and information literacy is currently included at the same level with writing and speaking/communication across the curriculum. Working on a draft of information literacy objectives, outcomes, course requirements has taken time away from video game research, but it has also allowed me to begin looking for games that fit these outcomes. Over the course of this academic year, I will write more about how I'm incorporating games and gaming strategies into the structure information literacy objectives and hopefully curriculum.

But for now, I'll catch myself and anyone else up on the last few months. There are also some new projects that I will be writing about, researching, and reflecting on.

Hello again to anyone who hasn't updated their RSS feeds in a while. And hello to anyone new out there reading.




image from Pythonline

The following is an email I sent out to various academic librarians working on gaming and learning in libraries, with a focus on information literacy. I hope that by posting it here and as others post their responses on their own sites this discussion will grow. Please join in this conversation. Nicholas Schiller has already added his thoughts to the dialog.

I hope this email finds each of your semesters going well. I want to ask each of you to consider taking part in a dialog about the current position of games for learning within higher education libraries. Recently, I was asked what the most innovative application of gaming in academic libraries was in 2008 year. While I turned to the work of many of you, I was struck by how fewer projects there were compared to 2006 and 2007. This perception played out through many of conferences during 2008 and was something that struck me during GLLS in November.

While more and more libraries are getting involved with gaming through events and even collections, are we seeing the same growth and adoption with gaming and instruction? Has gaming and learning hit a wall within higher education? If so why? If not, where is it evolving?

Each of you has had some part over the last few years researching, producing, and presenting instructional games and applying gaming strategies in academic libraries. Creating gaming nights is a straightforward process. Creating learning games and lessons with gaming strategies on the other hand, is an involved (and sometimes time consuming and/or expensive) creative process. But many of you are doing it on a variety of levels. My question is if our work is spreading or are we just talking to ourselves?

Now is the time to ask questions, discuss, and look to the future. Nick and Mary both have gaming presentations/posters at ACRL at the end of the month. But these are the only two gaming sessions in Seattle. According to the early program for this year's LOEX conference, there are no sessions on gaming and instruction. There are a number of gaming sessions at ALA Annual, but most are focused on public libraries. Where do we fit?

Discussion Questions:

1) What is the current state of games and learning in academic libraries?

2) What are some of the factors to that current state?

3) Based on your experience and research, what are the next steps?

4) What are the factors supporting or preventing those "next steps?"

5) What do the finical and economic situations at many institutions mean for instructional gaming in libraries?

6) What other issues/questions should we be considering?

Thank you all for taking the time to consider taking part in this discussion. I know that there is much work to still be done in our field, but I am hopeful that through collaborations like these we can continue to move forward.

Thank you,

Paul Waelchli

I spent the night glued to twitter feeds and message boards last night reading about the UGO buy out of 1up and the cancelation of EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly).  The writers there consistently spoke with a unique voice in video game journalism and I’m sorry to see many of them go.  Their writings, shows, and podcasts were a part of my routine.  Three of their podcasts filled my MP3 player every week for the last two years.  Over that time, people came and went.  Relationships were cultivated.  Trust was built.  I’ve told many people that I spend more time writing and reading about video games than I do playing.  The 1up.com staff was a large part of my gaming experience.  They will be missed.

EGM was a video game institution.  It was about to enter it’s 20^th year with its final issue.  I remember seeing the very first issue of EGM on newsstands as a kid, but it wasn’t until issue number 4 that I became a regular reader.  Even as a middle school kid, I was reading about games from numerous magazines (Nintendo Power, GamePro, EGM,  Computer and Video Games, Computer Gaming World).  One perspective was not good enough even back then… it’s no wonder I’m teaching information literacy.  But EGM stood out above the rest.  Nintendo Power was for the fan in me, Gamepro had a fun kid friendly style with reviews, but EGM felt honest, harsh even at times.  Video games got poor ratings.  And who didn’t wonder who Sushi-X and Quatermann were?

EGM is a part of my gaming history as it is for many video game players.  While the death of EGM and print video game magazines was written on the wall for a while now… the loss is not softened. 

Thank you to all the EGM writers and editors over the years.  Your work has helped video game players question sources, look for additional perspectives, and see their hobby and passion as something more than the electronic “toy” it was back at the start of your run in 1989.

The January epsoide of Games in Libraries podcast was released today.  The podcast itself is filled with a number of good interviews including one with the Video Game Librarian.  The final segment of the podcast includes a discussion about the multiple literacies being put into practice by some of the bigger games of the holiday 2008 season.  I talk about the traditional, media, visual, and information literacies at work within the following games:

• Little Big Planet
  
• Banjo-Kazooie
  
• Prince of Persia
• Mirror’s Edge
  
• Left 4 Dead
  
• Call of Duty: World at War
  
• Animal Crossing: City Folk
  
• Fallout 3
• Fable II
• The World of Goo
  
• Braid
  
• Valkyria Chronicles
  

(info links provided by CrispyGamer, if you haven't read some of their freelance content now is the chance

 I had initially hoped to get something posted here discussing of number of these games during the holiday season, but time got away from me.  My segment on the podcast is a condensed version of the possible discussion about the literacies at work within these games.  And that’s a discussion I’d like to come back to during this month. 

But until then… enjoy the podcast and please give me any thoughts or feedback on the connection between the video games discussed and literacy.  I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Over a month and a half since my last post.  I’d like to have some wonderful story to go along with my absence, but the end of a semester at a new institution brought a number of unexpected surprises.  But the end my first semester came with a number of good results too. 

A 100% increase in the number of instruction sessions taught from Fall 07 to Fall 08.  Granted we started with a tiny number compared to what I was doing at the University of Dubuque.  UD’s 450 plus sessions for a student body of 1200 is an amazing number.  But still I managed some good growth and have hopefully laid down a foundation for future semesters

An initial campus assessment of some information literacy skills was conducted during the semester.  888 students from across all four grade levels (an easy 222 class average) answered a series of questions dealing with evaluating sources, identifying keywords, and plagiarism.  The results we mixed, good in some areas and identifying areas of need in others.  This initial round of data gives me numbers to work into conversations with faculty about their students and the benefits of information literacy.

I organized and ran a student study break on the Sunday before finals week.  There were snacks and sodas for the students along with board games and Mario Kart Wii.  We had a very successful night  and ran out of soda within the first 20 minutes.  I hoped for about 100 students and ended up with 192.  Hopeful the good buzz generated by this event will lead to good things this coming semester.

My one disappointment with this semester was the lack of involvement with the general education committee.  They are changing the curriculum and the chair was vocal with me and the library about supporting information literacy.  While I may be disappointed in the progress, it is a committee working toward change – change moves slowly.

My goal and dream for this semester is not only to continue to build on the success of the fall and to push myself and the library with the changes in the general education.  Therein lies my dream.  My ticket out of hit or miss one shot instruction.  A curriculum where information literacy is tied into it.

We’ll see.  But until then… welcome back, welcome back, welcome back.

Library Voice's Chad added his thoughts about SRPGs and grinding. He's having a good and long experience (50 hours) with Disgaea, but his narrative progress has recently come to a halt. This has changed the game for him, but also opened up new gameplay elements for him, including the following:

However, once I got to Episode 11, I found that my Brawlers, Warriors, and Scouts (all traditional weapon wielders with swords, guns, and axes) would not cut it. As result, I’ve spent the last 5 hours in the game leveling up my new Mages and Clerics.

Now going back to the drawing board here might really frustrate some gamers, particularly after the amount of time invested in the game. Going back to a beginning level may seem pointlessly redundant, and I could easily become frustrated that I did not create the right characters in the first place. Some may find that leveling up can be a ridiculously boring process, since you simply play previous levels in order to strengthen the weaker characters. I initially thought I would feel the same, but I’m actually enjoying the process of level grinding. And believe me, it is a process...

...As such, I’m seeing and learning things about the game, and about myself as a player, a bit differently. In other words, I had gotten quite comfortable with how I was playing the game. The game shocked me out of my comfort zone at Episode 11, which caused me to stop, re-evlaulate, and play the game in a different way.

Chad's gaming experience translates well to a variety of learning situations, including research. His experience parallels that of an upper-division student I worked with earlier this week. She was very comfortable with the ins and out of EBSCO based databases, but moving her into more subject specialized databases opened up a new realm to explore and search skills to built. Obviously, some of the same skills and strategies still applied but new combinations of subject terms and other search strategies created a new and different experience for her.

In both cases, players and students relying on the familiar and understood skill set created a situation where they needed to expand their existing skills and knowledge base in order to progress. They were able to do a lot with a common set of tools (character classes & databases), but for true mastery and quality of gameplay they needed to add to that skills set- learn new techniques, practice them in a safer area to build them, and eventually apply them to the overall project.

Research can be a grind. But just as Chad has found satisfaction in the act of grinding and slowly advancing his characters, our students can derive the same sense of satisfaction. Granted, not all students are interested in a slow progression and quick results are sometimes needed. But framing a research project in the minds of gamers as a way of leveling up their work is a mindset worth discussing. Grinding research can be a rewarding experience, and one that doesn't need to take the 50+ hours players invest in video games.

Versions of Disgaea are available on the PS2, PS3 PSP, & DS.
Screenshots of the DS version are via RPG Fan

Last week I wrote about the embedded narrative in Syphon Filter for the PSP.  Chad over at Library Voice followed up my post with an excellent one of his own.  He talked about the game and related some of the games’ experiences to library services.  The four points he made are not isolated to the Syphon Filter series but can be applied as general lessons that games provide for library services.

Chad and I are both currently playing strategy role playing games (SRPG).  Here’s a quick link to define what SRPGs are.  But for me, SRPGs have always felt like a complicated version of chess

.  The player moves each character around a map (traditionally a grid) with a set movement distance and attempts to clear (or take) the opponent’s characters.  I’ve played and thoroughly enjoyed a number of games in this genre including Final Fantasy Tactics (PS1, PSP) and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (GBA).  Last fall I wrote about how the Final Fantasy Tactics series offers players a number of ways to practice their information literacy skills.  A large part of my enjoyment of the series is the numerous layers of depth and skills applied during the preparation and execution of each battle.

In addition to the Final Fantasy Tactics series, the publisher Atlus and developer Nippon Ichi  have also pushed the genre forward with games like Disgaea, Phantom Brave, and La Pucelle: Tactics.  Chad is currently playing Disgaea on the PSP currently.  I’m playing another SRPG, Jeanne D’arc, published by Level 5, that was released for PSP last year. 

Based on my post last week about the embedded narrative, I wanted to look at the narrative of SRPGs, but realized that I couldn’t without talking about the gameplay as well.  Often in SRPGs, as in traditional RPGs, there is a degree of grinding and character building involved.  Leveling up your character is important to being statistically strong enough to defeat the opponents’ characters.  Yes, with good tactics it is very possible to defeat an opponent at a level or two higher, but often grinding is a potential solution to a challenging battle.  The difficultly with grinding is it tends to delay the narrative of the game.

When a player needs to spend time leveling up, the central story arc takes a backset.  The political fighting of Final Fantasy Tactics or the magical interpretation of the Joan of Arc story slow to a crawl as a player spends time leveling their characters.  This past weekend, I was trying to push ahead with the central story only to continually get defeated in a specific battle.  The solution was clear – grind, level up, and try again.  Doing so I made the intentional choice pull myself out of the narrative and dive into the chess-like strategy of individual battles.

Upon doing so, I instantly recalled where my emotional investment came from in previous  SRPGs.  It is not the game’s narrative that held me in the game’s world, it was my emotional connection with the individual characters.  Like many role-playing experiences, the enjoyment is derived from the expanded story and characterization created by the player.  Grinding has built up a camaraderie between the game characters and myself.  While the game’s attempt at developing relationships has slowed as I’ve continued to grind, my emotional investment with the characters has continued to grow.

As I develop a personal investment in the characters, my commitment to the game and the success of each character grows.  This isn’t a unique experience for video games.  And the debate over which is more engaging: an open ended user created narrative vs. a tightly channeled game narrative is one that fills message boards on a regular basis.  There is clearly a place for both.  And some games find a balance between the two (the 12  million playing WOW’s new Lich King expansion are an example).

Is one narrative experience more valuable than other?  

Or is it a matter of taste?  

I’m curious what Chad and others have to say.

Tomorrow I’ll come back to SRPGs and focus more on the tactics and strategies and how that can relate to our students’ searching experiences.

images via Gamespot

Cold. A brisk winter wind. A night filled with anticipation. Excitement both for the new gaming experiences and potential profit. Two years ago this week, the Sony PS3 and Nintendo Wii were released within days of each other. 

Over the weekend, I had a challenging conversation with a elementary school librarian. He's plays video games with his children at home and likes the idea of gaming in libraries, but is struggle to see how it fits in at the elementary level. We talked about the challenges he sees with bringing gaming into their curriculum.

Our conversation was cut short, as our kids debated who was controlling who was controlling who in Mario Party 8. But I was able to bring up the excellent work that librarians are doing bringing in a variety of game experiences into their libraries. The work done by Chris Harris and Brian Mayer mapping board games to AASL Standards. The work of others holding Alternative Reality Games (ARGs) focused around classroom content. Made for good talking points.

I did give him the link to a good K-12 online presentation on educational gaming that could help support his points when talking with his teachers:

Games in Education: Myths, Realities, and Promise by Sylvia Martinez

While much of it is review for those engaged in the dialogue of games and education, it provides a good entry point for those in K-12 education. She brought up many good points including how traditional edutainment games fail:

“These games fail as authentic learning experiences and do nothing to change the way students learn.”

Martinez also spent time talking about how games in education cannot be isolated just to the game, but need to flow over into peer and classroom discussion:

“As you can see, the role of the teacher is extremely important in balancing gameplay with reflection on the experience.”

“As with many games, the playing is not the power, the learning happens as you analyze mistakes either alone or with friends.”

Martinez treats video games in education like any other instructional technology. Application and reflection are equally important parts of the learning experience. But she points out the same challenges that arose in my conversation with the school librarian:

“The question is: Are games useful in learning or are games useful in school? Right now, unfortunately, these are not the same thing.”

Finding ways to fit games with content and experiences with the existing curriculum as Harris, Mayer, and others are doing is the first step in a long process.

I'm thankful for the challenging conversation about gaming in school libraries. After spending most of my time talking about the educational benefits of gaming, being confronted with the challenging realities of school district pressures, curriculum conflicts, and tight budgets is good. I'm looking forward to continuing our conversation, bringing in other area school librarians, and hopefully (eventually) making some applications for gaming in their libraries.

Martinez's closing thoughts provide words of encouragement for my continued conversation with my discouraged school librarian friend:

“Games are a way to bring joy and excitement into learning, but they need adequate time, matching assessment strategies, and reflective extension activities to make them really worth it.”

Over the last week or so, Chad Boeninger, from Library Voice, and I discussed the game Syphon Filter: Logan's Shadow for the Sony PSP.  Both Chad and I finished the game this week and spent some time talking about the narrative of this game and other games in the Syphon Filter series.

I wonder if there is a way for students to play a game on a different topic that would enable information literacy skill development and in which success is dependent on high levels of information literacy abilities?

The next step to gaming within the higher education curriculum is to create games, as you said, "on a different topic that would enable information literacy skill development."  If we think of gaming and information literacy, than just like info lit, the more it is tied to meaningful content the more successful it can be.  

While I've been fortunate to help highlight the work of libraries creating info lit games, we are missing a larger potential.  We can remove the game out of a library context and still teach info lit skills.  And by removing the library context it is possible to remove some of the reluctance that Jenna describe.

There's a lot of work to do on that end, but it's work worth doing.