'Half the Sky Movement: The Game' Review

Originally posted on the Games for Change website.

Having worked in Social games for the last few years I was very eager to see how this project would transpose to Facebook. However, in all honesty I was slightly aprehensive as to how much the game would utilise some of the more frustrating social game features which have become all too common on the Facebook platform. I needn't had worried, 'Half the Sky Movement' has completly surpassed my expectations and delivered a very solid social game. The game introduces a great narrative thread which is broken up with fun little missions and mini-games creating this balance of story and action. This si all held together with beautiful artwork and strong character design, making an otherwise difficult world a joy to step into and be a part of. The social features are integrated nicely and the fact that every action you make is contributing to unlocking a gift donation makes all the tasks even more meaningful. My main criticism however is the repetitive nature of the mini-game to collect books and fruit. I would have loved to see some variation on this type of collect/match mini-game. This aside I would highly recommend giving 'Half the Sky' a try.

Escaping Death: Why We Play Games

Originally posted on Gamasutra (04/04/2013).

We all have our own reasons for playing games, but if I were to ask a room full of people I can safely assume that there would be many common answers. Relaxation, fun and the sense of achievement would probably be key reasons for most people, along with competing with people, and taking your mind off of things. These are all fair and justified reasons, and ones I can relate to as a gamer myself. However, why does competing with people or achieving things in a virtual world feel so damn good? What is the cognitive emotion behind these kinds of experiences?

 

Notice Me

Most species are sensitive to their own mortality and spend a great deal of time either escaping or postponing death. Most animals have built in primitive drives such as ‘fear’ which tells them to flee when a predator is near, or ‘hunger’ that tells them they need to eat to sustain life. Even the basic Darwinian ethos of procreating to carry on our DNA (and in a way ourselves) is wired into every species on the planet. However, where humans excel is that in addition to this we also have the privilege of being aware of our own existence, which results in this drive to make a mark upon the world before we take that inevitable plunge into the great beyond.

Many cultures completely revolve around this notion of the ‘self’ and our society has been set up to honour and notice the individual. This is why we strive to be the best in our respective fields, or apply to reality TV shows like X-Factor, so we become “someone” and therefore leave our mark on the world. Unfortunately only a small percentage of the population will leave enough of a mark to be remembered hundreds of years from now, and for the average joe (ie: most of us), there are limited opportunities to prove their self existence. This is where games come in. Games provide people with that much needed self-affirmation of actions being “noticed” and that our existence has some meaning on the world...even if it is just a virtual one.    

 

Most of our drives are based around postponing the inevitable and “Escaping Death”.

I Exist

From the very first arcade games proof of existence has been core in the gaming world. Leaderboards existed to be able to prove that you were there and achieved what you said you did, which in turn reaffirms the self. We have come a long way since the time of arcades and games now revolve around constant reinforcement of actions and awareness of presence. Achievements are a regular addition to most games and sharing stories on social networking sites remind us once again that we are here and have done something which is now "written in stone". Game communication is laced with self-affirming feedback such as “Great”, “Well done!” “You achieved this” and “You have done that”. Many social games on Facebook include customizable avatars and areas where you cannot only see an in-context progression of what you have achieved in game, but also a visual representation of how you have changed the (virtual) world. It is constant affirmation of your existence and presence and that not only your existence in the world matters, but that it has been "set-in-stone" to be remembered for all time. The perfect formula for affirmation of the self.   

Since the time of arcade games players have always wanted to prove they were there.

Reflection

One of the other important things about self affirmation is being able to see yourself in the eyes of others. Most of how we perceive ourselves is made up from the perception of those around us. We base our opinion of ourselves by the attention of others, whether it’s our attractiveness; “People tell me I’m beautiful, therefore I must be attractive”, our intelligence; “I received a good grade in school, therefore I must be clever”, or our personality; “People laugh at my jokes, therefore I must be funny”. This type of self-reflection needs to work well in games, not only through basic feedback from the game itself, but also from peers and friends. Games are powerful when it comes to reflection, with many different ways of providing feedback of actions to the player such as animations, scores and encouraging words, but at the back of your brain you always know that it is a computer telling you these things, which therefore loses some of its reinforcement. To really make it stick you need a friend or peer to tell you the same thing. This is the difference between hearing “You are an amazing person” from a computer, or from a real person. With the many tools available to use now such as online forums and social networking sites (which are the epitome of self-reflection) games can offer players exactly what they need. Post, tweet, update, whatever, players can first self affirm themselves in the game then prove their existence where people can reflect back to them how “real” it is. This is an incredibly important factor in modern games and you can see that most really successful games are ones with huge communities behind them that enhance connections with real people. This is really important.   

Confirmation of the self is ultimately constructed by the reflection from others, whether in games, or in real life.

Conclusion

Although this a philosophical analysis of why people play there are some very real things that can be done in games to help satisfy and connect with players. 1. Notice every action a player accomplishes in game, not just the big meaningful ones. This is one of the reason social games on Facebook have been so popular because every minor action is praised (sometimes overly so) and noticed. 2. Show the progress of the player so his impact on the game is not forgotten. This may sound like an obvious one, but it can sometimes get forgotten. This can be anything from seeing previously completed levels, a customizable area in which to build upon, or simply an experience level to feel proud of. 3. Use social networking, online leaderboards and fan websites to build communities. Players need to be recognised by real people for the achievements they make in-game, as you can only truly feel proud of an accomplishment in context to other people. Although these are simple conclusions to a fairly complex analysis of why people play I think it is important to know the basic drives of people in general to reach a real understanding of why people play the games they play.

The Curfew Review

Originally posted on www.gamesforchange.org



A wonderfully innovative approach not only to the subject of social change but to video games as a whole. The game seamlessly incorporates interactive actions with real video footage to create a compelling and interesting story. The characters you encounter are well-scripted and you quickly find yourself becoming engaged in each one of their stories. Each person you speak to seems to fit perfectly in the futuristic big-brother style world, whilst still maintaining a down-to-earth and "real" nature that you can relate to. Everyone should play this game!

CBT in Games: How Games Can Change the Way We Think

Originally posted on Gamasutra 29/1/13

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) is the process of changing people’s thought patterns, often to create more positive reactions to difficult situations. It is commonly used in therapy to help people change their outlook on life and to help them get through hard times. For example, a patient (let’s call him Mario) is seeing a therapist because he has an unhealthy attitude towards relationships. Mario has been seeing the same woman on and off for years, but each time they get together he loses her again which has left Mario feeling very insecure and negative about the future of their relationship. Due to the repetition of this behaviour Mario has adopted a very negative thought process in association with the situation: “She will just leave me again. I am not worthy of her. To prove my worth I will need to complete a series of skill based challenges which for some reason involve a lot of jumping”. This negative thought process is a learnt behaviour pattern due to the repetitive nature of the situation, something which Mario would like to change with the help of his therapist. This is where Cognitive Behavioural Therapy comes in. CBT is the process of changing thoughts to learn new ways of thinking. This needs repetition, perseverance and practice over time, but can be successful and has given many people who are suffering from depression and phobias a new outlook on their lives. This is great and everything, but haven’t games been doing this from day 1? In fact games could arguably be one of the biggest influences in changing the way we think.

Hey, I learned something today!

Positive Example 1: Rayman Origins and the lesson of “Persistence Pays Off”
In the last few years I have not had any game wring the words “just one more try” out of me so often as Rayman origins did. It was a wonderful example of ‘fun failing’, as failure would directly result in learning to “avoid that enemy” or “jump at that moment” which created a brilliant feeling of accomplishment. This is the type of thought process that, through repetition, can be learnt in a response to failure, and one that would have a positive impact in the real world.

Positive Example 2: Professor Layton and the lesson of “Thinking Things Through”
The puzzles in the Professor Layton games are designed in a way that creates the feeling that all of them can be solved eventually, they just need some time and a bit of work. The fact that time-limit is not a factor in completing a puzzle presents the opinion that taking the time to do something properly is much better than doing something rushed and messy. This is proven in the careful design of the puzzles, which if you ever have tried to solve too quickly often results - at least in my experience - in a wrong answer and a very sad Professor Layton (which nobody wants). The puzzles therefore promote this sense of thinking things through properly before you speak, act and react. A very valuable lesson not just in games but in life as well.
There are many examples of how games can positively change thought processes but it would be naive to ignore the fact that by letting in the good you sometimes have to let in the bad as well, and if games have the power to positively change thoughts then they have the power to negatively change them as well.

Negative Example 1: The Legend of Zelda and the lesson of “Good Always Defeats Evil”
Sometimes games provide us with an unrealistic expectation of the world, such as good will always win as long as you fight hard enough. This is not the case and the need to “pick your battles carefully” is much more appropriate for the real world than it is in a game context. Good does not always defeat evil and bad things happen to good people and vice versa. Both films and games provide a warped version of the world as we see it, that people are always athletic and beautiful, relationships are like hollywood romances and everyone lives “happily ever after”. It is easy to see why games are addictive when the world they portray is much more comfortable than the one we live in, but it is not necessarily a good lesson to adopt.

Negative Example 2: Almost every game ever and the lesson of “Achievement Recognition”
One of the great things about games is that nothing you do ever goes unnoticed. There is constant feedback and consequences for every action and you manage to build up this strong relationship of input and output. It is wonderfully reinforcing to see your impact and influence on the world, real and virtual, as it helps confirm our own existence. This is why we like to make footprints in newly fallen snow, why we grow plants for leisure, or why we sign up to social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. It is nice to hold up a mirror of yourself and have others project a reflection back at you. Unfortunately achievements have got to a point where you earn one for nearly everything - particularly in social games - and this undermines the value of real tasks and gives us an unrealistic expectation of achievements in the real world. In life not all the hard work you do goes noticed and unfortunately game achievements just seem to emphasise this fact.

Where’s the line?
As shown above games have a lot to teach us, but are these lessons actually life lessons? And how do we define the boundaries between virtual and reality so that we know how to use them out of context? Obviously there are some lessons that will naturally transpose into life and some which are strictly learned in context of a game world. For example, I assume that in the real world gamers don’t go and investigate every shiny thing that catches their eye as they are walking around the streets, in the expectancy that it will result in some kind of fantastic treasure. I also assume they don’t go around tapping shifty looking walls, listening for an echo as an indication of secret chambers. This means that there must be 2 levels of lessons learned in games; the primary (literal); and the secondary (subconscious). The primary will be lessons that are learned strictly in context to the game, and secondary will be underlying lessons which inadvertently get taken through to the real world. Where the boundaries are I cannot say as it is so specific to people and cultures that is must surely be a huge spectrum, but I do believe that we as designers are not always aware of the lessons we are teaching our players.

With great power comes....
As we can see games have the power to change how people think with a mixture of repetition, perseverance and practice over time. This is very similar to the processes used in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, so imagine the possibilities of what we could achieve by consciously using this method. Addicts could play games to help them with their cravings; people with crippling phobias can learn not to be afraid of their fears; or just everyday people can learn to be a bit more positive and a little bit less negative. But at the same time games can teach us unwelcome lessons as well. With the current industry highlight on the relationship of games to violence it would be naive to present this theory without saying “Yes it is possible that someone could learn through games that shooting someone is rewarding”. However, this would rely heavily on the individual not being able to distinguish between game context and real life and as stated above it is not clear where those boundaries lie. But I do feel that we as designers need to take responsibility of the lessons that we teach in games and how they could affect and change the way a player will think, and make sure that it is always beneficial as opposed to damaging.

Conclusion
Games are an incredibly powerful tool and like all powerful tools they can be used for both good and bad. I have already discussed in a previous article how games have the potential to help people suffering from depression, but they could potentially do much more than this. Games could be one of the greatest therapy tools in this modern age. People are already playing games because it is “therapeutic”, or because it helps them when they are sad/angry/stressed/all of the above. All we would have to do is be a little bit more conscientious of the lessons we are teaching players and games really could change the way people think for the better.