I am very excited to completely re-work my class for next year and I have enlisted the students to help me. Next year we will still have a gaming class with the amazing culture that we've built this year but in addition we are working towards complete gamification of the course. I sought out the students input along the way because, as always, I want to hear their input. The students created the "game mechanics" and badges that would be awarded and we worked together to build a gamification process to motivate students to go above and beyond. It is important to note that the XP and badges they earn will not be for completing regular course work. You only get awarded XP and badges for going above and beyond which allows me to post the leaderboards for motivation. Students do of course have have the option to "opt out" of the leaderboard if they do not want the other students to know how much XP they have earned. Next post I will go into more detail about the usefulness of gamification but here are some of the things my students and I came up with for next years game!
Student Created Badge Examples:
Below is a summary of how rules and
descriptions of the overall "game":
Story (fictitious):
Tencent Holdings Limited has left
the video game industry and now the remaining companies are vying to control
the industry! Test the strength of your company and individual game
development skills to try to prove your company and division is the best!
Rules:
You earn badges for various things.
You can’t be rude towards other
players and or not showing sportsmanship. This is for fun.
Each player must cooperate with
their division (group) and company (period).
No cheat codes.
Leaderboards:
There will be four different sets
of leaderboards. One ranking the companies (periods) as a whole against each
other, one ranking the individuals in their respective companies against
everyone else in that company, one ranking the individuals against everyone in
all three companies, and one ranking the members of the divisions/departments
in each company against the rest of that respective company. You can
opt-out from the individual leader board rankings if you wish- see Dr. Kirk to
do so.
Leaderboard Descriptions
1. Companies (periods)
2. Divisions/Departments
(groups of 5)
3. Individuals (from all
three companies)
4. Individuals (only listed
with others from their own company)
The rankings will be based on XP.
Each individual’s XP is added towards their division and company. Say, SONY had
200 XP total, and a division in that company had 20 XP, before one of their
members, Sharon, earned an extra 5 XP, giving their division 25 XP and their
company 205 XP.
Each company’s XP can be raised or
lowered at any time if each company does not have the same number of players
participating.
Levels:
Level 1 (50 XP) - Entry Level QA
Tester
Level 2 (75 XP) – Game Designer
Level 3 (100 XP) - Lead Designer
Level 4 (125 XP) - Project Manager
Level 5 (150 XP) - Creative
Director
Level 6 (175 XP) – Chief Executive Officer
(CEO)
Chief Executive Officer is the
highest level/title but you can continue to accumulate points.
XP:
The XP earned through the badges
will grant the player access to any reward that the card specifies, if
specified, plus an XP bonus depending on how quickly the badge was earned and
how much XP it was. There shouldn’t be a bonus for a card easily obtained/able
to be normally achieved in a day.
Starter Badges:
Self-explanatory. Players only gain
these badges once at the beginning of the game (school year), and cannot be
earned later on.
Leader Badges:
The same Leader Badge can only be
earned a limited amount of times. The limit depends on the badge itself. If
it’s a badge that can easily be exploited by offering max XP (15), only allow
each player to earn it three-five times (depending on how difficult it is to
earn said badge).
Mini Badges:
This type of badge can be earned up
to 10 times (depending on the badge- only badges 5 points or less). Keep in
mind the limit, especially if it offers the max XP (10) to prevent exploitation
of the system. Mini badges worth more than 5 points can be limited by the
teacher at any time but to start we’ll put the limit at 3 times per year.
Participation mini badges (worth 1 point each) can be earned each
day.
Side Quests:
Players can only complete a
specific Side Quest once. If the player decides to complete the same Side Quest
more than once, they will only receive that badge once, regardless of the
amount of XP the badge is worth. The side quest they choose must be good
quality that took time outside of class to complete.
Negative Badges:
Players earn this type of badge
which removes XP from their overall XP for ignoring assignments, being a
hothead, watching too many hours of unrelated YouTube, being rude, etc.
It pays to work hard and be kind to others!
Boss Level:
Divisions will face against each
other in their own company over large amounts of XP. These competitions can
range from constructing a specific game to creating the best assets. It’s
somewhat like an Olympics. It challenges each division on everything that’s
expected in a decent game. The winning division in that company will receive a
fixed XP boost and will be able to compete with the winning divisions from the
other companies. The overall winning division will receive a bigger XP boost
and earn a pizza (or some kind of relatively universally appreciated food stuff
like that). The XP earned will not go towards individual scores but it will go
to the divisions.
Winning Condition:
To win this game, the
player/division/company must have more XP than anyone else. There will be
different awards for the winners of each section, but each award will be
different, the grandest one going to the player with the highest overall XP.
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