Game Goal vs. Design Goal

My students who are studying MMD1033 Game Design Principles always mix up two different matters--the game goal and the design goal when they write their game design document (GDD).

Game goal is what the player or avatar that represents the player intends to achieve in the game world. In most games, that would mean winning the game. In this sense, the designer should put himself / herself in the player's shoes when setting the game goal and any associated objectives.

Design goal is what the game designer intends to challenge players in the game world. Game challenges are formed by setting the game rules (what players can and cannot do) and the game goal, after considering the level of skills, knowledge and progress of the players.

To contrast the game goal and design goal, herewith an example that involves both of them:

• Game goal: Mario to rescue the Princess Peach from Bowser and save the Mushroom Kingdom.
• Design goal: to challenge the speed, accuracy and consistency of player's hand-eye coordination in controlling a game character (Mario) in a 2D or 3D game world.  

To players, they might not be able (or needed) to differentiate the above mentioned differences, especially when they play through first-person perspective. But it is important for game designers, and those who intend to re-purpose games (e.g. GBL teachers) to understand and take advantage of the differences.

The differences are obvious in games that feature background story or narrative (e.g. God of War, Super Mario Bro, etc). However, in games that were constructed with the three classical elements (rule-based, goal-oriented and feedback-driven), the delineation becomes implicit or blurred. Still, it is essential to separate game goal and design goal, particularly in diagnosing the success or failure of a game.

Goal and rules setting might be easy to game designers, but balancing the goal and rules with players' progressive enhancement and accumulation of knowledge and skills is tricky, because it involves tracking the learning progress of players, and learning happens in games through feedback mechanism. In other words, measuring players' learning progress over their in-game achievement is the key to get the game goal fits with the design goal. And this is very important to GBL or LBG practices--the design goal has been tuned towards education. 

In a word, game designers should be well-versed with the structural elements of games. By well-verse, I mean not only knowing what they are, but also knowing what they are not.

Gamification: Turning Activities in Daily Living into Games

Gamification is a term I heard of alongside with "edufication". Herewith my understanding of these two concepts:

Gamification is a process of turning non-game playing activities in daily living into game-like activities. The root word, gamify, means turning something into games.
In contrast, edufication is a process of turning non-education matters--mainly formal and semi-formal--into educational matters. The root word, edufy, means turning something into education matters.
The relationship between gamification, edufication and game-based learning (GBL) could be explained in a funnel diagram:



Both gamification and edufication need subject matter contents, and they can complement or even support each other. For example, car driving activity can be gamified into a car driving game, and the game can then be edufied to be used in a GBL practice. The subject matter contents of the car driving activity, including fundamental car mechanics (knowledge), manuvearing a car (skills), and driving etiquette (attitudes), can be restructured to form the six structural elements of games, as shown in the following diagram:

How to gamify and edufy? Different game experts would take different approaches. To me, I will first deconstruct the subject matter contents into measurable or operationable units, and then classify these units into the six elements of games. To achieve these tasks, one may need the knowledge and skills of instructional systems design (ISD) for the deconstruction, and game design and development (GDD) knowledge and skills for the reconstruction. In other words, this involves two fields of studies.

Once the game is ready for playing, then it can either be used for teacher-less GBL practice or teacher-led GBL practice. And GBL would be a field of study that combines ISD and GDD.

Matt in Knowledge Nation Inc. introduced me to a fantastic gadget for gamification--the FitBit, in which it claims to be able to fit (read as gamify here) fitness into your day.

Prior my trip to San Francisco, I've signed up for a free online Gamification course, offered by Prof Kevin Werbach from University of Pennsylvania. The course will be started on 27 Aug 2012. I am eager to learn about Werbach's views on gamification.