Fear of Games

Once in a while The Beast Rears Its Ugly Head; violence in games. A tiring debate. This time the Minister of Justice vocalises his concerns. Should we not ban violent games?! The young pure soul is threatened and corrupted.

First of all, the introduction of any new medium (and yes, in this case I treat games as a mass-medium) leads to this kind of discourse. And it has been of all times. Plato and Socrates were concerned. People writing things down would mean the end of civilization as they knew it: the Loss of the Oral Tradition. The introduction of Photography in the 19th century lead to a frantic debate about the death of Painting. And more recently, television (and violent cinema movies) were a threat and inspired kids to do Evil Things.

Researchers have  never been able to conclusively state that television and movies had a causal effect on some deviant behaviours of youngsters. Of course some research outcomes state this, other research state the opposite. The minister handpicked some publications in one camp, overlooking many others. His agenda might be influenced by matters of taste, christian values, but facts and figures are a different realm.

I think ignorance, a lack of knowledge, makes people fearful. The fear of the unknown and a feeling of a lack of control on the matter. I have introduced the notion of game temperature earlier on this blog, where you can rank games on a metaphorical temperature gauge. Why? Because I believe people fail to identify a difference between violence and arrousal.

Steamtravel update

This morning I had the final assessment of the student team. They did a wonderful job  despite the incredible amount of first time experiences in a complex group project setting.  As all designers know there is a gap between dreams and reality and not all their  wonderful ideas made it in the final version. This weekend will see that last integration  work and polish up, monday we will meet the wonderful people of the Spoorwegmuseum.  We all keep our fingers crossed they will like it. As a supervisor, I think they maxed  out their abilities given the time frame, the stage of their development (they are third year  students after all) and their ambition. It was a difficult assignment to start with.

You might want to keep an eye out on this website where we will launch the application,  probably on Monday or slighty later.

Check here later for the final result.

Steamtravel

Currently I am working on a project with students for the National Railway Museum. Although it is work in progress I am getting more excited with every day passing. The assignment is to unlock the more hidden gems of  the museum in order to attract new visitors. A difficult assignment, especially since I work with third year students. But they are talented, devoted, and work overtime.

How to find subcultures?

It has been far too long since GDC (gosh, was it March?). Recently I have been more than before involved in the Art education sector. I am worried on that subject. Of course, there is the current gloom and doom on the economic crisis effecting everybody, but major budget cuts tend to hit hard on the arts. But is this the only threat to their existence or relevance?

GDC2010: the show is on

The GDC is now well under way; we are on day two Since there is always so much going on,  blogging is a challenge while being there. Since WordPress is slightly more work than iWeb, I  decided to do a quick an dirty round HERE for the time being. So jump there for the actual news (  (although it is in Dutch for now). I will revisit it later and edit it here to summarise and digest all  the information.

Countdown…. 4 days to GDC 2010

Bit quiet in Blogland due to other parts of work. But this is about to change. In 4 days time I will travel to the States, and my beloved San Fransisco in particular. After skipping (and deerly missing it) last year I will again attend the Game Developer Conference. A week of programming madness since there is far too much and the programme guide is as thick as a telephonebook. I will try and capture / post coverage of the event here. Stay tuned. Tuesday it will start. 10….9….8….7….6….

Be aware: Werewolves in the clinic…

Why are werewolves on the prowl in a clinic? Here is another example of the matchmaking between therapeutic practise and the application of play and game design principles. This recent example is the result of  a collaboration between HKU and the ABC unit, part of Altrecht. This health care organisation treats patients with mental health problems. ABC focusses particularly on young people (in the age bracket 18-26) with psychosis disorder. This is a severe mental disorder in which thought and emotions are so impaired that contact is lost with external reality.

In an exploratory phase I gave lectures and workshops for the healthcare professionals at Altrecht. Based on a final workshop, the ABC team decided to continue working on a case they had submitted in the last workshop.