Law-Play - Serious Game Ideas
- Alejandro L. Ruata
- Feb 27, 2018
- 6 min read
Updated: Aug 17, 2020
Date: 02/26/18
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Entity for Project 3
Becker College Law Program
Goal: Improve retention of material and pass rate of certification exam
Audience: Undergraduate law students studying for the first level certification test [multiple choice] ~120 questions in an hour with 80% passing score
Budget: $5k grant and matching educational resources such as student development, temporary use of hardware and software. Example test questions are provided.
Timeline: 2 semesters
*Note: Next week's brief will NOT be about one of these ideas and possibly not even about this entity. We will be given the ideas/entity of another group to create a brief out of.*
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Idea 1
Genre(s):
Trivia
Core Mechanic(s)/Explanation:
Trivia Wheel - Wheel will include relevant categories that will actually prove useful for the intended audience.
Timer - This is a fast paced trivia game where each multiple choice question will only have 30 seconds attached to it for answering! Long form questions provide players a minute to answer.
Difficulty Select - So as to not overwhelm players, lower difficulties not only provide easier questions, they also have more time to be answered.
Create Your Own Trivia - These will be added to the wheel as category “other”. Create your own relevant questions to target specific areas of knowledge you wish to share with fellow players.
Ratings - Optional rating of questions to better tailor future trivia to what players want/need to learn (balanced with what is required to be learned, ideally they’ll be very similar)
Options - Include ability to remove/alter timers, edit categories on wheel, add your own categories, connect with specific players, etc.
Game(s) with similar mechanic(s)/Explanation:
We’re looking to emulate the mechanics (and look, as you’ll see later) of ‘Trivia Crack’, a fun, engaging mobile game designed to creatively draw in with players through entertaining and colorful trivia questions that range through a wide variety of topics.
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDxGSp38brw [WARNING: He does not get ‘Star Wars’ question right!]
Image:
Game with similar look and or style/Explanation:
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jxoim1uLUnw [‘Trivia Crack’ game trailer]
As stated earlier, we intend to use Trivia Crack (in mechanics & look) as our foundation for a game that will be appealing to all members of the intended audience for this game.
Image:
Serious Game Objective/Explanation how the chosen genre/mechanic will meet objective/goal:
To provide a fun, engaging, and aesthetically pleasing form of relevant knowledge retention among intended audiences by creating a fast-paced and colorful online “study group”.
The relevant trivia provided, as well as providing the tools to create your own trivia, alongside the fast paced, competitive nature of trivia games like ‘Trivia Crack’ will foster relevant knowledge retention among players of the intended audience.
(Unique) Attributes List:
Live Camera/Microphone Compatibility - allows for answering of Long Form Questions where fellow players are the judges (judges will receive a written correct answer and have 45 seconds to decide if the verbal response was correct - does not have to be word for word correct, but the general idea must be in the ballpark to be considered correct - and verbally respond themselves as to why or why not - limited to 15 seconds).
Robust Categories all having to do with relevant subject matter for the intended audience (unlike Trivia Crack, which can bounce you from one extreme to the other)
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Idea 2
Genre(s):
Adventure
Core Mechanic(s)/Explanation:
Dialogue tree - When the player talks to other characters, he or she selects one of the possible reply to the situation or prompt. The reply from other characters are usually a facts or informations that are related to the MA Law test.
Information menu - You can access the past conversation, document, and information that you have collected. It helps the player to review the information that they might have forgotten about.
Game(s) with similar mechanic(s)/Explanation:
We wanted to emulate the same mechanics as Sherlock Holmes vs Jack the Ripper game. It is an interactive story where the character informs the player with relevant information regarding the topics.
Image:
Game with similar look and or style/Explanation:
As for the art style, we wanted to keep the same reference as Sherlock Holmes vs Jack the Ripper. We wanted the gameplay to use some of the real-world images. Nevertheless, the artstyle of this game has some kind of dark or gloomy feeling which it gives us, the audience, some kind of justice atmosphere.
Image:
Serious Game Objective/Explanation how the chosen genre/mechanic will meet objective/goal:
One of the strategy to improve our test taking experience is putting your knowledge to the test. To provide fun and engaging experience, we put all the information into a form of story that allows the 4 different type of learners (visual, auditory, kinesthetic, and reading) to comprehend the informations.
To put the relevant information into a story, the player uses his or her knowledges to progress in an interactive story while driven by exploration and puzzle-solving.
(Unique) Attributes List:
Character view - The player can play in a first-person or a third-person perspective.
Narrative - The player has an option to let the game to read off the prompts or texts.
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Idea 3
Genre(s):
Edutainment
Core Mechanic(s)/Explanation:
Four Areas - The game will feature four areas of mysterious ancient kingdoms that you must explore and in those ancient kingdoms players will learn all about massachusetts law
Difficulty Select - There are three different difficulties in this game, easy, normal and hard; easy helping you understand helping you on what massachusetts law is and normal and hard testing you on advanced concepts of massachusetts law, the difficulty can be switched when ever you want to
Fast Travel - You can fast travel to certain areas in the kingdoms when you first get to that area, but only in that kingdom, not in the others.
Collectable Items - there will be six different trials in each kingdom each giving you a different colored object that relates to the final trial of that kingdom
Final Trial - the final trial has six different parts that uses a different colored object from that kingdom, this trial has a different focus on massachusetts law that tests players on their wisdom on the subject, the different colored objects are finite use so if you didn’t complete the trial you would have to go back to one of the trials that gave that same colored object for one of the final trial and complete it again; however, your progress on the trial is saved and you can stock up on multiples of an object when you complete one of the main trials multiple times
Free Mode - You can play any trial you want to even the final trial and keep testing yourself as much as you want to, also the stock of colored objects are infinite
Game(s) with similar mechanic(s)/Explanation:
We wanted to emulate how clue-finders did education as a fun PC game that any student taking Massachusetts law can enjoy and learn so they could pass their first level certification exam with ease
Image:
Game with similar look and or style/Explanation:
We are also emulating the artstyle of cluefinders as well, the artstyle of cluefinders does not have much detail, but it works for a game all about educating players on massachusetts law, also we can reuse assets as needed lowering the cost of making the game
Image:
Serious Game Objective/Explanation how the chosen genre/mechanic will meet objective/goal:
To provide a fun way to help retain knowledge on massachusetts law and help undergraduates pass their first level certification exam
To provide an alternative way to help others with learning/studying
(Unique) Attributes List:
Another Problem Button - Unlike Cluefinders where you would have to leave the area and come back to do another problem if you wanted to grind out for colored objects, there is going to be button to do other problem in that same area if you want to keep doing problems to grind for colored objects
Narrative - The game will have a story about these kingdoms and the context of why the protagonist and there friends are here. It will also be a mystery themed to keep players who are studying massachusetts law engaged.
Study Booklet - All of the answers that they have solved will be transferred to a in-game notebook so the player can review Massachusetts law when they need to.
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Serious Project 3 - Member Blog Links
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Research Citations
Ericksen, K. (n.d.). Rasmussen College. Retrieved February 26, 2018, from http://www.rasmussen.edu/student-life/blogs/college-life/most-common-types-of-learner/
Finals Strategies to Improve your Test Taking Experience. (n.d.). Retrieved February 26, 2018, from http://washburnlaw.edu/news/2013/12/concannon.html
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