Beyond Fun: Serious Games and Media

by Drew Davidson (editor)

This book focuses on strategies for applying games, simulations and interactive experiences in learning contexts. A facet of this project is the interactive and collaborative method in which it was created. Instead of separated individual articles, the authors and editors have orchestrated the articles together, reading and writing as a whole so that the concepts across the articles resonate with each other. It is our intention that this text will serve as the basis of many more discussions across conference panels, online forums and interactive media that in turn will engender more special collaborative issues and text

Genres: Game Design

206 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[Aglaia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beyond Fun includes several very cogent, well-formed essays. There is, however, some unevenness to the collection. Many of the essayists are not writers, and the informality of their writing styles can be distracting to a critical reader.

Several essays stand out as noteworthy. Drew Davidson's "Why Create a Media and Game Center?" provides an introduction to reasons for and ways to set up a media and gaming center at a university. Michael Mateas's "Procedural Literacy: Educating the New Media Practitioner" discusses procedural literacy and its relationship to education. Jill Walker's "Weblogs: Learning in Public" offers an analysis of blogging and its potential use in the classroom.