Trevor Burnham

Sure, it works in practice…

Entries Tagged as 'games'

Portal: Play it

May 12th, 2010 Comments Off

It’s been widely known for a while now that Valve was porting their smash hit Portal (among other games) to the Mac. Now here’s more: Until May 24th, it’s free. For Mac and PC alike.

Now, I’m not much of a gamer these days. But Portal may well be the greatest game of all time, a pure pleasure and a chal­lenge. Its only flaw is that it’s too short, taking a mere four hours to play through. It’s to Valve’s credit that they didn’t add any filler just to extend the playing time, as is de rigueur in the game industry. The bar for Portal 2 has been set very, very high.

Tags:  

Calculus: The Videogame

January 9th, 2010 Comments Off

Last semester, I took a graduate-​​level course called Videogames and Learning, taught by Barry Fishman of the UMich Edu­ca­tion depart­ment (who also teaches an under­grad version). Needless to say, the class is widely beloved, despite its dense syllabus of readings on the theory of learning and moti­va­tion. I decided to write my final paper on the question, “Why aren’t there any games that teach calculus?” (At least, not any suc­cess­ful ones.) There are some terrific games, like the Zoom­bi­nis series, that teach basic logic; and there are some com­pelling games, like the free online Lure of the Labyrinth, that teach arith­metic and algebra; but no one seems to have made a game that goes past the 8th-​​grade level. At the same time, no one has made an edu­ca­tional game as rich and immer­sive as, say, Mass Effect, a game so slick and well-​​written that it’s like living in the best sci-​​fi movie since The Empire Strikes Back.

Over time, I realized that this was not a topic con­ducive to academic pub­lish­ing, so the project drifted from a research paper to a design one. The result is an attempt to describe how a game could be made to teach calculus, proof method­ol­ogy, and ways of math­e­mat­i­cal thinking—all within the context of a gripping adven­ture. The paper is called Math Effect. I hope you enjoy it. And if you’re a game designer, I hope it gives you ideas.

Tags:    

Game of the Year

December 26th, 2009 Comments Off

Machinarium screenshotI frivoled away most of my high school years on video games. For­tu­nately, I managed to overcome that par­tic­u­lar addic­tion and learn to do other things with my spare time—like read books and make websites for instance. Still, I’ve main­tained an interest in games for their remark­able ability to keep the atten­tion of even the most frazzled Gen Y-​​er. So when the oppor­tu­nity to take a graduate-​​level course entitled “Video Games and Learning” from the UMich Edu­ca­tion depart­ment came up, my first thought—after the req­ui­site bemoan­ing of the state of American edu­ca­tion today—was: How can I refuse?

I’ll talk more about that course later, but for now I want to name the best game of 2009: Machi­nar­ium. While the inno­v­a­tive mechan­ics of the indie darling plat­former Braid made it the best game of 2008, Machi­nar­ium rep­re­sents a delight­ful throw­back to the simple, story-​​driven adven­ture games of the ‘90s, combined with mind-​​bending puzzles that rise to the level of such classics as Myst. It’s kid-​​friendly, has a unique visual style, and offers a clever solution to the patience-​​trying ruts that sunk the adven­ture genre to second-​​tier status: a “walk­through book” built into the game, always avail­able in the upper-​​right corner, that requires you to complete a one-​​minute mini-​​game to open it, ensuring that you only consult it when really, truly stuck.

But what impressed me most about Machi­nar­ium, which was painstak­ingly devel­oped over the course of three years by a handful of Czech devel­op­ers, is the superb way it tells a rich, involv­ing story without words. In a world where video game stories are usually crafted by gluing clichés together into a long, tired strings, Machi­nar­ium is truly a breath of fresh air.

A close runner-​​up is Tales of Monkey Island. It not only revi­tal­izes the long-​​dormant Monkey Island fran­chise; it’s the best in the series, full of cute laughs and clever chal­lenges. Telltale Games has estab­lished itself as the Pixar of modern adven­ture games, creating one high-​​quality, whim­si­cal, family-​​oriented game after another. Tales of Monkey Island is avail­able as part of the Telltale Every­thing Pack on Steam, which is an unbe­liev­able value (in terms of $/​game-​​minute).

If there’s one thing my game addic­tion taught me, it’s that you should never waste time on having the same expe­ri­ence twice. Playing Bejew­eled yet again is point­less. Games, just like books and movies, are worth­while in pro­por­tion to the amount of sheer imag­i­na­tion that went into them. I’m glad to report that the simple, story-​​driven adven­ture game is alive and well. The best games of 2009 are triumphs of storytelling.

Tags: