Customer Reviews

Story and Simulations for Serious Games: Tales from the Trenches

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In this far-ranging investigation into narrative strategies and their applications for new interactive media, Iuppa and Borst offer several books in one. Foremost, they present a methodical guide to the use of story elements in videogame technologies, particularly as a means toward pedagogical goals ("serious games"). Also, they illustrate from various angles the mechanics of storymaking, how it can work from the creative standpoint as well as its benefits for engaging players on a more substantial level than they might experience in non-narrative games. And, not least, this book provokes us to consider the age-old human need for stories, which ultimately connect us to each other even as they educate and entertain us.

The point of departure for the book is a series of case studies analyzing three projects that Hollywood creative teams, including the authors, developed for the United States Military in its training programs for various crisis situations. From there, subsequent sections branch out to cover all the inherent components of such virtual reality type of training, whatever the domain. In so doing, the discussion keeps an eye toward the most effective ways of involving participants, and seeks always how best to control a given simulation in meeting the desired pedagogical results while allowing for maximum freedom of choice in playing the game.

Throughout, Iuppa and Borst master a wealth of technical details and prove well-informed about the latest software and hardware innovations that the prospective serious game developer might wish to draw on. And yet, despite very specific aims, their discussion is not weighed down by practical concerns. They manage to remind us, in spite of all, why writers will always be necessary: who else has so well learned somehow to keep nimble their narrative reflexes, to subvert expectations, to keep us guessing?

I learned more in my seventh grade english class. You can teach plot and setting, but you can not teach creative. This narrow minded book inspires people not to come up with an original idea. Why do exactly as everyone does?