Playing America’s Army
This weekend I’ve been playing the videogame America’s Army. It is a competitive online game developed and freely distributed by the U.S. Army.
First of all, a brief disclaimer: Although it is marketed as a tool to learn about the life in the army, strictly speaking it can’t be considered as an educational game. Actually, the game is designed as a recruitment tool, giving a very partial view of army life mixed with highly patriotic messages about honour, duty and the pride of being an American soldier.
However, there are very interesting things inside it that anyone interested in the field of “serious gaming” should take notice of:
First and most important: The game is FUN. This is the part that many educational games often forget. A boring game is not better than a boring lecture. In AA we find cooperative factors, teamplay with other humans, ranking systems… all these factors make the game attractive and urge the player to progress in the game and replay the missions again and again.
Also very important: It is a high quality product with a high level of realism. It features state-of-the-art graphics, realistic 3D sound, elaborated smoke and fog effects, etc. It truly feels professional and could compete in shelves with A+ games (remember, the game is distributed free of charge).
Its quality, its widespread success and the big entity behind the game (Department of Defence) make AA a reference in the field of serious games.
As of learning value, the game itself includes some training lessons to be played offline before deploying into online matches. These lessons are practical (like the typical videogame tutorial) and some others are theoretical, with the objective of transmitting that a military career includes a good deal of interesting studying. The theoretical lessons are studied inside the 3D game world, with the player entering a classroom where there is a teacher and some slides are presented on the wall. After a few minutes of lecture there is a short assessment.
This theoretical part is as boring as a regular classroom, although very condensed. And it is always possible to find amusement in watching the body language of the NPCs in the most realistic representation of the classroom ambient that I have ever seen.
It is also interesting to point out that the game imbues some additional knowledge in a subtle way. The stereotypical videogame portrays the player as the absolute hero, which obviously doesn’t happen in modern armies. The realism of the game makes it impossible to win any kind of mission on your own and it is imperative to cooperate deeply in order to achieve good results. In addition, once the results are achieved, the entire team is rewarded. Here you have a rich and successful tool to teach the importance of team play.
And for the end, a small rant: Playing this game helps in my research and is as relevant as evaluating a tool or reading an article. Why do I see myself forced to play the game at home during the weekend? We must not forget one of the greatest barriers of game-based learning: The social perception of videogames as simple entertainment.
