This article explores the boundary between the world of simulation games (referred to as « serious games »), and work. Our interest was in examining a helicopter simulator integrated game used to train 350 managers per year. This qualitative research, based on the theoretical and methodological framework of the psychosociology of work, aims at understanding the perception which professionals, namely managers, have, of the device and its environment, as well as the way they
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Keywords : game, exercise, serious game, training, playful attitude
This article questions the place of games in language teaching and more specifically examines how the transition between the use of traditional games in the classroom and their adaptation to digital media has been carried out. Are these games the same or have they changed ? Has the digital switchover preserved the entertaining aspects of these games or have these aspects changed in order to accommodate more serious content ? We will thus examine the potential added value of digital ver
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Keywords : learning games, language learning, tasks, action-based learning, playful attitude
If you like books and are into video games, then this resource may interest you. Ludoscience is building a big list of books about video games. It currently features more than 150 books dealing with various topics: history of video games, game creators biographies, Game Design, Serious Games, video games studies & analysis... Each book is presented through a personal abstract, as we have read each book before adding it to the list :). It gathers books in English or French
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Keywords : bibliography, videogame, books
This book focuses on a little known and hardly discussed period from the history of video games: the ends of the 70's, and more specifically the 1976-1980 years of the home consoles. The books explains how, after Ralph Baer's pioneer invention of the Magnavox Odyssey, and the success of Pong in arcades, home video games takes over TV sets around the world thanks to... General Instrument. Indeed, the introduction of a new integrated chip, copying Pong and sold for a few dollars only, allowed many
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Keywords : pong, globalization, economic history, home console, 70's, japan, france, usa
Following the first book in the series, this book continues to explore the history of controversial video games. This second volume focuses on games about "torture" (Mortal Kombat, Night Trap, Chiller, Manhunt, Mad World...) and horror-themed games (Resident Evil, Silent Hill, The House of the Dead, Sanitarium, Rule of Rose...). Each game and the media controversy that accompanied it are presented using a variable number of pages. Here, this book tends to suffer from the same flaw as t
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Keywords : violence, torture, horror, controversy, addiction, media
"Les Oubliés de la Playhistoire" is French TV show broadcasted over the Nolife network, that highlights many unknown and intriguing video games. This companion book is packed with two DVDs gathering the 41 episodes of its first season. The books first details the birth of the TV show, thanks to the interview of the various people involved in the project. Each game featured in the first season of the show is then presented over two pages with a short text and several images. The
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Keywords : oublies de la playhistoire, nolife, underdogs
A 260 pages book dedicated to the history of the Genesis / Megadrive, the famous 16 bits Sega home console. The book is divided in 4 sections. The first one details the birth of the machine, while the second one is focused on the ads used by Sega to promote it ("Genesis Does!"). The third section presents a selection of emblematic Genesis titles. Each game is described over a single page with a short text and several screenshots. As this section is organized chronologically, it's a gre
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Keywords : history, genesis, megadrive, sega, sonic, streets of rage, advertising
This book presents 100 music albums based on famous video games original soundtracks. The author reviews each album over two pages, featuring beautiful illustrations. The author successfully shares his passion for video game music through this book. The text is easy to read and full of interesting information. My only complaint lies in the author's choice to focus on game OST published in separate CDs, which tends to heavily bend his OST selection towards Japanese console games, and J-RPG in par
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Keywords : music, video game, album
Eric Chahi, a famous video games designer (Out of this World, anyone?), recently took part in the Retro Game Jam, a 32h video game creation competition held during november 2013 in Montpellier (France). In the video below, he discusses his feelings about this experience and presents the various prototypes of his game in order to explain his personal game creation process. A rare and very interesting testimony from a living videogame legend about the recent "Game Jam" phenomena (video i
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Keywords : eric chahi, game jam
This book deals with the public scandals that struck video games in France since the 80's. The author begins with an analysis of the public image of video game players broadcasted by the industry-produced ads, and compares it to the way general media dealt with video games. It actually sown the seeds for a moral crusade against video games, such as the one conducted by the Familles de France association. The book then studies the reasons, the details, and the outcomes of this famous episode of t
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Keywords : politics, industry, moral, scandal