Role-playing games

You might remember that last week during our presentation I talked about a couple of games which I haven't properly introduced yet. I think it's high time I did that so this post is going to focus on various role-playing games, or RPGs for short.

 

What are role-playing games?

Nowadays many types of games include role-playing elements but in the traditional sense, an RPG game is where you follow a character's life unfolding before your eyes while you alter the story by your own choices. Choosing to go on a different route or saying something hurtful to a character can greatly affect how the game progresses. Another important aspect of RPGs is that beside story development, the characters also develop, as the player is given experience points so that they can level up their characters. Experience points are gained after every battle and levelling up occurs in a point based system, in categories such as attack, defence, magic and so on. Based on how the player distributes these points, their character can become a strong warrior, a powerful wizard or anything their heart desires. However, just as with music games, RPGs have many subcategories too which I'd like to introduce in a bit more detail now.

  Click the image to get a general idea of the flow of an average RPG.

Traditional RPG

There is a clear distinction between Eastern and Western RPGs. Japanese RPGs tend to focus more on the plot and the personalities of characters, and they are usually more linear than their Western counterparts. You can decide for yourself where to go and what to do but only to a certain degree. Usually you'd find paths being temporarily closed until you acquire a specific skill or in other words, proceed further in the story. Besides providing a good reading material, the main goal of these games is to prevent some evil plan by building a strong team, whose members compensate each others' weakness. The most popular traditional RPGs have become serialized, like Pokémon or Final Fantasy.

Pokémon Black & White: Battle, catch, and collect monsters to be the champion of the region while you're saving the world from an evil organisation!

 Final Fantasy XIII: Each game tells a unique story of heros and evildoers, full with wonders, magical creatures, treason and friendship.

Tactical/Strategy RPG

 

In strategy role-playing games, or SRPGs for short, the main element becomes the battle part of the game, pushing character development to the back. Although the freedom of wandering around the world is taken away from the player, they get more choices during battle this time.

The most vital part of these types of games is to place your units in strategically favourable positions at the start of the battle. One wrong decision can have dire consequences in games such as the popular Fire Emblem series, where dead parties cannot be resurrected even after the end of the fight. But luckily you don't have to make these kind of decisions on a whim. As opposed to many traditional RPGs, the battle system in SRPGs is turn-based, giving the player plenty of time to carefully plan their moves. This kind of game-play could be best compared to chess, which also requires lots of tactical thinking and planning ahead.

 Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn: Place your units on the grid and move them into battle! Losses are sometimes necessarry to win the war but it's always for the greater good.

Disgaea: Join the crazy adventures of demons and angels in this fun little game with hilarious dialogues and amazing fighting moves!

Hybrid RPG

As I said before, there are big differences between Eastern and Western RPGs. American publishers usually incorporate other genre specific elements to their role-playing games, such as shooting or action. They also give you more freedom in movement, as you can wander around the world, doing small quests for fun until you decide to continue the main plot from where you left it off.

The point based levelling system is still present, but the battle system varies from game to game. For example in the Fallout series, the perspective of the game is from a first person view, giving the impression of a first person shooter game, or FPS for short. Another example is Diablo where the player has to control their character in a point-and-click environment.

It's also important to mention that while traditional Japanese RPGs have lots of playable characters and the player controls a whole party at the same time, American hybrids tend to have only one main character and no other team members. Fight scenes in a traditional RPG are more often than not turn based and you make choices by clicking on key words like "Attack" or "Magic". In an American game however, battles are set in real time so instead of timely calculations, you have to use your wits on the spot.

In conclusion, I think both game styles have good and bad characteristics so it's impossible to decide which nation does a better job of creating more enjoyable and better role-playing games.

 Fallout 3: Set in a retro-futuristic world of 2277, this game deals with the after effects of a "what if" situation of atomic devastation. Truly a masterpiece.

Diablo: Fight your way through Hell in this dark and action packed dungeon crawler game.

Summary:

As I mentioned in my presentation before, playing these type of games will eventually give the player better decision making skills, tactical thinking, and overall patience. Since the completion of an RPG is roughly estimated around 50 hours, patience is just as vital a part with these games as the ability to come up with strategic battle plans or make the best decision during a conversation. Due to the massive amount of text one has to read, I'd say that a player finding at least one unknown word whilst playing is inevitable. I myself have encountered many words unbeknownst to me while playing Fire Emblem for example, which is plagued with formal jargon.

So in other words, RPGs go beyond the benefit of helping with language acquisition - they also teach you some useful skills for life.

Christmas on Graham Stanley's Blog

Hello everyone! I wanted to conclude my presentation last week by telling you about a really cool competition on Graham Stanley's Gaming Blog. As you all know, Christmas is coming soon, and the Internet is of course full of festive little games for the occasion. Graham Stanley thought  these could be used to good advantage by any like-minded people. All you have to do is find a Christmas game that you like and come up with an original idea on how it could be used for language teaching. It's fun, and you can win a signed copy of Graham Stanley's book Digital Play: Computer games and language aims! The deadline couldn't be closer, it's tomorrow in fact, so hurry up!


Cheers,
Tomi

Presentation's Eve

All right, so this is it. The time has come for us to deliver our presentation tomorrow in class! :)

I am sure we will do well, because the topic is interesting to all of us. Come on, everyone loves games, and anyone claiming not to like them is sure to be a secret-gamer, really.

And while we are at it - gaming, I mean -, why not use these pastime activities to our advantage? They can be used for language learning purposes in surprisingly effective ways. Our presentation will hopefully shed light on many of these.

That's all for today, because a good night's rest is essential for our rhetoric side's flourish tomorrow! :D

Good night,
Tomi

IMHO

Okay since i believe this will be the last post for this semester, I will give my two cents on the matter.

Gaming for language learning
This is definitely an area that can be exploited to great results. However, it must be said that the students themselves must be interested and motivated enough to learn. If not, it becomes just another mindless game. I have to admit, I myself used to play Sims for a good 6-7 years and it has never occurred to me to use this as a language learning tool.

Can we replace traditional classrooms with virtual ones?
I highly doubt that will happen. It could happen, however, in extreme circumstances such as a place where the language learner has absolutely no other source of acquiring the language. However, I doubt that things such as prosody, intonation and perhaps even grammar can be acquired adequately. As such, games and virtual reality can only act as a supplement for traditional teaching as best. It needs to act on a basic knowledge of the language and serve as a tool for practice and enhancement instead of a total replacement of traditional methods.

What are the most important factors in a game for language learning?
I believe if a game specially catered to language learners were to be made, it shouldn't present tasks that are too daunting for the language learner. I liked the idea of using visuals and feedback from characters (such as in The Sims) to provide external feedback and corroboration for the game instructions. It might also be good to include voicing to provide speech samples of the target language so as to give the language learner a sound production to strive for.

However, it must be said that as in all forms of learning, the most important factor and largest motivating force is possibly the interest and will to learn. Even in playing games, hard work is needed in order to succeed in one's aim. (:

Music games, part 3.

Better late than never, here comes the final part of music games! Last week we left off at rhythm games which required arm movement, and today I'd like to talk about one of the most famous members of this sub-category.

Guitar Hero:

It originally spawned from a Japanese idea of having plastic guitars and drums as controllers, and is the most famous party and music game in Europe. Older versions of the game only included guitar and bass play but the newer instalments also have a drum kit and a microphone too. You can play alone but naturally it's more fun if you have 3 or 4 people to really simulate the feeling of having a band.

You're not just simply enjoying yourself during game-play but also polishing your reflexes, and developing great leg and arm coordination while on the drums. Specific sounds are associated with their appropriate coloured buttons on the guitar and items on the drum, such as the high hat, the bass drum and the other parts of a drum kit. It takes some time to master this game but once you've got the hang of it, you've acquired some useful skills for life.

 The upper pitch line is for the singer, while the other bars are for the bass, drums, and guitar, respectively.

III. Whole body movement:

The last sub-category in rhythm games is the one where you have to move your whole body to the beat, according to the indications on screen. I'll introduce three games, made for three different platforms with slight modifications.

Dance Dance Revolution (DDR):

Originated from Japan in 1998 as an arcade game, this franchise has spread to America, Europe and even Australia over the years. Undoubtedly the most popular dancing game in the whole world, which is available in arcades, on the PC and on almost every gaming console. In fact, it has gained such popularity that some schools in America have started using DDR for their physical education classes. It was even awarded with the title "The most widely used video game in schools" by the book of Guinness World Records.

Several clones exist for this game, such as Stepmania, a free open source PC version, or the Korean counterpart, called Pump It Up. Despite the abundance of games available, the core game-play is the same in every version. Arrows pointing to 4 directions are coming up on the screen and as soon as they reach a certain point, you have to step on to the corresponding arrow on the dancemat. These chains of steps then evoke a full dance pattern with occasional jumps and spins. It probably goes without saying, but just like Guitar Hero, DDR is quite hard to master as well.

If you want to try this game, you can do so at Westend City Centre.

Just Dance:

 

A similar dancing game for the Wii, but instead of stomping on a dancemat, you have to swing the Wii's motion detecting controller, the Wiimote. In this game you have specific moves to copy shown on the screen. Accuracy is key importance here because you don't just have to reproduce the steps on time but also accurately. In other words, you can have a good sense of rhythm but if you swing your right arm instead of the left one, you still get 0 points!

Dance solo or in pairs; up to 4 players can join the fun!

Dance Central:

One of the Kinect's launch titles, this game was made for the Xbox360 and uses its brand new full body motion detection camera, the aforementioned Kinect. You don't need any controllers for this game, since the Kinect detects your whole body movement, as long as you stay in front of the TV, within its range.

The game-play is similar to Just Dance, where specific dance moves come up to the screen and you have to follow them. An added bonus of this game is that the moves now have their own names written above them, such as "tap front", "step side" and so on. You also get to initiate your own dance moves during the song, in the special freestyle mode.

Playing without a controller feels like you're just doing a dance instead of a game.

Summary: 

In conclusion, I think we can state that music games have greatly shaped our lives. Nowadays these games are more than just free time activities for the kids; they appear in schools, worldwide competitions, and are targeting adults and children alike. Music games are not just great fun but they also bring people together with their multiplayer abilities, and they better our reflexes, singing, and sense of rhythm. For a language learner, they provide easier learning with the aspect of playing, motivation, and interactivity. All in all, I think it's worthwhile to use music games in the world of education and sports for their useful characteristics.

Presentation pre-cap

Hey all! I thought it would be right on time to devote this week's entry to the upcoming presentation. Last week I have taken the brave step of coining a title to our little talk, which would be: What You Play Is What You Learn, or WYPIWYL for short. If you girls agree to it, that is. :)

So, what we know already is that we will have app. 20 minutes altogether. That would mean about 6 minutes for each of us in turn, plus a little introduction in the beginning, and a summary at the end of it. We also know that we need to merge our ppts into one whole. I think the best would be if all three of us made a short ppt for our own topic, so that we have something to merge. :D I think we should be ready with this part by Sunday the 27th.

I hope to meet you all tomorrow, when we will have a chance to discuss how we are to go about all this personally.

Cheers,
Tomi

Introducing... Simlish

Hi! The second part of my research involves simulation games. In this genre i will be focusing on two main games: Second Life and The Sims.

Firstly, an introduction. As nicely defined my wikipedia, "a simulation game attempts to replicate various activities in "real life" in the form of a game for various purposes: training, analysis, or prediction. Usually there are no strictly defined goals in the game, just running around, playing as a character." Hybrids of such games may arise, and one example is Second Life.

Second Life
Second Life marries simulation games with MMORPGS, allowing you to create an online version of yourself in a virtual world that mimics the real world. Where does language acquisition come in? In Second Life, players can literally enter a language classroom to learn language. Besides these online lessons, teachers have also used this as a platform to branch out into other modes of teaching (such as via Skype or Msn Messenger. The MMORPG platform also allows users to communicate with each other in the target language, as well as communicate with native speakers of the language! While this is a rather straightforward method of teaching, popular computer game The Sims provides a more indirect form of teaching.

One of the most popular computer games, The Sims is a simulation game where you create characters and basically 'play God'; that is, you control their lives. In Sims 3, EA games has even incorporated MMOG into the game, allowing you to share your Sims online. Here is a trailer:



One of the most fascinating things about The Sims is also the fact that the language they speak in the game is one that was invented by EA games. Simlish, the language used by the Sims, was created by experimenting with fractured Ukrainian, French, Latin, Finnish, English, Fijian and Tagalog. The purpose of this was to create 'gibberish words that couldn't be translated, so that its meaning would be left open to the imagination of the player.'

So far, this seems to be posing no problem in gameplay for the game's legions of fans.

So, how can this be used as a language learning tool?
In this paper, Ravi Purushotma outlines how he had set the game's instructions in the target language (german), then had a separate laptop by the side to translate lexical items he was not sure about. In addition, the gameplay would also provide clues as to what the instructions were. For instance, if one were unable to understand the meaning of the 'Energy' bar, the Sim would first yawn and draw attention to itself with a large red bubble containing a bed above him. Upon depletion of the energy bar, the Sim would simply fall asleep on the spot. Such extralinguistic clues would reinforce the learner's knowledge of the language, providing a graphical representation of the happenings in the game.

Based on the popularity of the game alone, (according to The Realtime Report, The Sims Social on Facebook has 4.6 million players daily), using The Sims as a platform for language learners to practice using a language is a highly advantageous situation. With some modification, this could morph into a very powerful language teaching tool indeed.