The Dangers Of Implicit Bias - Week 2 Of 2
- Alejandro L. Ruata
- Feb 5, 2018
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 17, 2020
Date - 02/05/18
The following is a game brief based off of Idea 3 from last weeks blog post. After an open discussion with the class and group, it was decided this idea had the most potential to meet the objectives outlined last week. Without further ado, I invite you to take a look at our final idea for Serious Game Entity 1 - Study Rush.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Game Title: “Study Rush” - A Game Brief
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Member Blog Links
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General and Specific Information
Genre: Strategy; Time Management
Audience: This game will be presented to undergraduate and graduate students of University X’s Teacher Training Program. The game is intended to replace the material covered in the training topics final lesson - that material being a series of stories covering the dangers of various forms of implicit bias (implicit bias being a topic of the program covered over the course of a week). The game intends to educate - and ideally - entertain those of the education major before taking an online test at the end of the week.
Primary Objective: To show how implicit assumptions made about students solely based on their looks and initial attitude can lead to problems in actually resolving situations.
It’s fascinating that teachers juggle hundreds of students (personalities) a day, their behavior having to constantly change depending on the kind of environment and people surrounding them. For some, it’s quicker to expect, and react, to what students may or may not do depending on their implicit biases.
While the intended audience plays the game they will be able to see what kind of innate biases they may fall victim to, and the consequences that can happen when acting on them. They will also see the rewards that can come for positively making a change in the students when not acting on those instant assumptions.
Introduction to Game: We are drawing heavily from the game “Diner Dash” (link in another section of brief), as such, “Study Rush” will be light on story. Players will be provided context, of course, as to the purpose and incentive of playing the game.
You, the player - as Oran High’s newest “Study Monitor” - must work to make Oran High’s Study Hall - “The Study Zone” - a safe and fun place for all students and advance your career as a fair and even minded student monitor.
“Study Rush” is 2D with animated sprites; the game is intended to feel light and fun (while the lessons learned are serious and pertain to the welfare of numerous communities of students, the method of teaching here is fun and engaging gameplay that will demand the attention and concentration of the intended audience).
The game will look bright and colorful, but will feel frantic and fast paced as the gameplay will force players to find fast solutions to problems that arise between students, to prioritize and decide which problems to tackle first, to (obviously) not base solutions on your own implicit bias, to recognize possible implicit bias in problems that arise between students during gameplay and decide on solution(s) that won’t encourage that level of thinking (from you or them) again, and to manage students coming in and out of “The Study Zone” and their satisfaction with their time spent there (will affect rank/student & faculty review score).
Gameplay Mechanics Include…
Students randomly moving to different seats
Various behavior types depending on what student is in what location.
The “Dispute”, “Answer”, and “Instruct” mechanics.
Punishment events for interrupting a table of people where no event is happening.
The “Referral” mechanic - an emergency mechanic to remove students from the class
Game Control
Mouse Clicks (this will be a PC game) - The player moves from one student/table clicked to another, mouse clicks are also used in menu pop ups in game to decide on solutions to problems. The mouse clicks are also used to interact with UI elements like Rank Viewer and the on screen pause button (more on the these in another section of the brief).
Score/Objective/Winning/Losing/Competition
The goal of each level is to meet a certain value to progress to the next stage in a limit of time.
Certain value in this case means rank - a certain rank must be met to move on to next stage .
To earn points for rank:
Resolve the dispute at each table
Bonus points for completing the task in a short amount of time
Interface/Information: Game UI Includes…
Student Counter - Shows number of students in Study Hall
Rank Viewer - Shows current rank based on your gameplay; allows for players to determine if a restart is required to achieve a better rank to advance to the next stage.
Sample Reviews - Like rank viewer, this is an in-universe representation of your rank; clicking on this will take you to a screen with online reviews by faculty and students regarding your performance (players see rank, monitor sees reviews).
Pause Button - This is a very fast paced game, at times pausing to take stock of the situation is necessary.
Remaining Time in Stage - Timer at the bottom before the stage ends and final rank is determined.
Student Satisfaction Levels - Clicking on students will let you peek at their satisfaction levels (measured in a 5 star system); final levels seen at the bottom right corner when student leaves.
Overall Satisfaction Levels - Pausing the game will give you the option (among other options like resume, quit, settings, etc.) of viewing overall hall satisfaction levels.
Student issue upon clicking on them - Clicking on students in distress or causing distress will provide a brief explanation of the issue, allowing you to approach and attempt to resolve it.
Main User Mechanics/Actions: Based on the 10 block foundation, “Study Rush” falls under the elements/blocks of ‘Management’ & ‘Select’. As future educators, the intended audience of this game must accustom themselves with managing a large amount of people & things while retaining a level head and an even mind.The select feature allows for players to practice prioritization, another important skill for future educators. Being able to identify problems, and prioritizing which to tackle first, second, etc. is a vital skill that “Study Rush” seeks to emulate in an engaging manner (by having you play the role of a monitor whose purpose is to scope out and solve problems in a study hall among a group of diverse teenagers). This combination of fast paced management (as this will be a real time strategy game) and prioritization gameplay will ideally emulate the stresses the and trials that actually being an educator to a diverse group of students would entail (stopping arguments, preventing and identifying varying forms of bullying, etc.).
Levels/Environment: “Study Rush” - as it currently stands - will not feature “levels” in the traditional sense. Instead progression will be measured in how many problems you, the player, are able to solve. The better you do (i.e. the more problems you solve between students - specifics in regards to “how” covered in other Game Brief sections) the more students will pour in to the game arena (meaning screen, the screen will consist of an overhead view of the Study Hall you will be monitoring) and the more difficult the problems the students need solved will become. This is not an endless runner, you do not keep playing until your score is completely depleted - “stages” last about 5-10 minutes (depending on difficulty) with your rank in constant view should you want to try again at any point.
Study Zone aesthetic traits will include at least 5 tables and at least 10 students (of varying ethnicity, races, and income backgrounds) to start. After a randomized amount of seconds (between 10-30) problems will begin to pop up and you will need to begin addressing them. The more addressed, the more students leave happy and the more will come in, leading to progressively more difficult and subtle problems to solve - in terms to gameplay, the more you solve and address, the better the rank/reviews at the end (tables will be brought in when more than 30 students inhabit the study hall).
Obstacles, interactive elements, enemies, collectibles, NPC’s, etc
Students & Tables - NPC’s and Interactive Elements, this is the main element of the game apart from the player themselves
Game UI (Described in another Game Brief Section) - Interactive element, as this is a time management and strategy game, the UI is vital to experience.
Sixty seconds of play: From the start, students will begin to pour in and start taking seats at the initial 5 tables in the hall. From there, things will be quiet for a few moments, giving players time to look over the area initially. After a few moments, squabbles and issues will begin to pop up with the initial students (you will see the issues play out in front of you - ex: Someone starts yelling at another person) and by clicking on them you can choose from a simple drop down (real time) menu to approach or receive a description of problem (eventually, players will recognize problems well enough that they won’t need to use this option).
When players approach they will be provided on screen options that can be picked from - these are the solutions to the problem playing out, some resolve issues quicker to address other problems, some are slower acting but provide better student satisfaction, most hold some form of implicit bias that players must identify and strive not to pick (it will look just as legitimate a choice as the other 2 to 4 options.
When a problem is solved, you move on to the next you want to tackle, again, and again, until the stage timer runs out.
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WHY OUR IDEA WORKS
Lets present an example. If a monitor looms around a desk where no activity (no aggression by the students) is happening, the following events may occur: points will be reduced, students will become a state known as “rebellious” - in which case actions will become unusable on that specific student for a period of time - and rebellious students might cause trouble for other students, in which case, players will have to ease the other students until the "rebellious" student is ready to be interacted with again. Rebellious students impede the point-scoring progress, and will refuse to listen to the player on account of their feeling badgered by the player.
However, if the player finds it too much, they can sacrifice some points to refer them to the office and to leave the class. That sacrifice multiplies more and more each time that it happens, and the player will have to make a risk in order to continue settling the other students. The reason these mechanics exist is because in real life, some students are intolerable and simply have to be sent out of the office, or they potentially cause even greater strife in the classroom.
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Reference
Video of similar gameplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aPCrIJhpc0
["Diner Dash"]
Video/Uploaded images of similar look/style
“Diner Dash” - Our foundation and direct comparison for the look, feel, and mechanics of “Study Rush”
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Production Estimates
Estimated number of Developers/Designers
Producer - 1
Artists - 2
Designers/Writers - 2
Programmers - 2
Audio - 1
Any special licensing, expertise, or permissions needed
Unity Collaborate
Adobe Photoshop Licenses
Estimated length of time for development in 3 phases
Concept - 1 Month (MAX)
Pre-Production - 1 Month (possibly 2, AT MOST)
Production - 4 to 6 Months
* Time for phases can take half the time listed above if this is the Production Team’s only project.
Estimated cost for software/hardware
Total: $500 for software licensing
Estimated cost for phase 1 (Concept) production
Total: $24,000
(8 members for concept at $25/hr each for 3 weeks)
Estimated cost for phase 2 (Pre-Production) production
Total: $32,000
(8 members for pre-production at $25/hr each for 4 weeks)
Estimated cost for release and maintenance
Total: $5,000
Release cost: $3,000
Maintenance cost: $2,000
Plan for post release: Post release plans include additional patches (to cover up bugs and other issues), and free DLC (since our audience is a particular group of students) expanding the game with additional stages and challenges that continue tackling the objective - Showing how implicit assumptions made about students solely based on their looks and initial attitude can lead to problems in actually resolving situations.
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