1. Serious Games Network
Mar$n Sillaots 02.11.2012

2. Terminology
• Serious Games
– Games for serious purpose
– Not only for entertainment
– E.g: educa$on, defense, health care, …
• Network
– Share informa$on and prac$ces
– Not to produce something

3. Goal of the Presenta8on
Share Tallinn University experiences
in serious games

4. A: Jump, B: Shoot
What more could you need
Wery Demo$va$onal.com

5. Tallinn University Experiences
• Past
– Seleag and Time Mesh
– PayTec and Interac$ve Learning Desktop
• Present
– SEGAN – Serious Games Network
– iTec scenario ‐ Students designing educa$onal games
• Future
– siLang project
– Game Interac$ons course

6. 2009 – 2011
www.seleag.eu

7. SELEAG Goal
Develop educa$onal game for teaching history of
Europe
• 12‐15 age students
• 1400 ‐ 2000 period of European history
• Mul$disciplinary: history, geography, economics,
social and cultural aspects
• Mul$lingual and Mul$player
• Online
• Extendable

9. www.timemesh.eu

10. Goals of the History Curriculum
• Rise the interest
• Understand main terminology of history
• Acquire chronological framework
• Know the map
• Understand the connec8ons between present and past
• See the connec$ons between different historical events
• Understand that one event can be interpreted differently
• Develop skills needed for jus$fying personal opinion
• Put learners in the posi$on of people lived in the past
• Defines itself as a member of Europe

11. Important Processes that Shaped Europe
During Last 600 Years
• Reforma$on
• French revolu$on
• Industrial revolu8on
• The born of na$on based countries
• Mari8me History and Colonial countries
• I World war
• II World war
• Cold war
• European Union
• Collapse of the Soviet Union

12. Scenario of the Game
• Something went wrong in the history
• Game reality is different from the real reality
• Player has to go back in $me and find out what
went wrong
• Fix it through several tasks
• Get to know the history
• Pass the game

14. Interac8ve Learning Desktop
Tool for suppor$ng kids development
2011
Enterprise Estonia Innova$on voucher grant
PayTek

15. Problem: small kids are not able
to use keyboard and mouse
Solu$on: use RFID for star$ng soware
and touch screen for manipula$ng the
applica$ons

16. PayTec Goal
Create interac$ve desk for making connec$on
between computer environment and real
world and support kids mental and physical
development

17. How it Works
• RFID card is glued to the toy
• Kid is placing the toy on
RFID reader
• RF signal starts the soware
• Applica$on is manipulated
from the touch screen

18. Final Outcome
www.paytek.eu/en/our-products/kidstable

19. Serious Games Network
2011 ‐ 2014

20. SEGAN Summary
• Start: 01.12.2011
• Finish: 31.11.2014
• Dura$on: 36 m
• Budget: ~ € 0.6 m
• Partners: 13 = 10 Universi$es + 3 SME’s
• seriousgamesnet.eu
• Segan group in FB
• seriousgamesnet.eu

21. SEGAN Partners
• ISEP ‐ Ins$tuto Superior de Engenharia do Porto
• VC ‐ Virtual Campus Lda. ‐ Portugal SME
• UoL‐FEUL ‐ University of Ljubljana
• UCLAN ‐ University of Central Lancashire
• KAHO ‐ Katholieke Hogeschool St. Lieven
• UNIZAR ‐ Universidad de Zaragoza
• Tallinn University
• UTH ‐ University of Thessaly
• AET ‐ Andamio Educa$on and Technology ‐ Spain SME
• Accord ‐ Accord Interna$onal s.r.o. ‐ Czech SME
• Corda ‐ Cordia a.s. ‐ Slovakia SME
• CIT ‐ Cork Ins$tute of Technology
• UCM ‐ Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Baltasar)

22. SEGAN Goals
• Systema$ze the European approaches to
Serious Games
• Crea$on of European Associa$on of Game
Based Learning

23. SEGAN Tasks
• Combine theory, research and prac$ce
• Coordinate communica$on between projects
• Promote community of prac$ce
• Evaluate exis$ng project and results
• Exchange ideas and exper$se

24. SEGAN Methods
• Virtual communica$on
– seriousgamesnet.eu/community
– www.facebook.com/groups/segan
• Face to face mee$ngs
• Publica$ons
• Conferences
• Summer schools
– 2012 – Zaragoza
– 2013 – Tallinn
– 2014 – Cork

25. seriousgamesnet.eu/community

26. SEGAN Tallinn Summer School
• Integrated with Tallinn Summer School
– summerschool.tlu.ee
• 15‐20 July 2013 (1w)
• In English
• Target groups:
– teachers interested in GBL
– interna$onal students interested in game development
• Schedule
– 1st day – intro lectures
– 2 – 4 day – developing educa$onal games
– 5th day – closing conference

27. summerschool.tlu.ee

28. Innova8ve Technologies for an
Engaging Classroom
Learning Scenario:
Students Developing Educa$onal Games

29. iTEC Summary
• Innova$ve Technologies for an Engaging
Classroom
• Framework: 7 FP
• Start: 01.09.2010
• Finish: 31.11.2014
• 5 cycles
• Partners: 27 from 15 countries
• Main contractor: European Schoolnet
• From Estonia: Tiger Leap Founda$on
• itec.eun.org

30. itec.eun.org

31. iTEC Goal
Develop engaging scenarios for
learning in the future classroom

32. iTEC Ac8vi8es
• Design innova$ve learning scenarios
• Develop tools that support scenarios
• Pilot scenarios and tools in schools

33. iTEC Scenarios itec.aalto.fi/scenarios

34. Students Developing Educa8onal Games
• Introduc$on of educa$onal games
• Evalua$on criteria for games
• Selec$on of the curriculum topic
• Game design
• Develop e.g. with <eAdventure>
• Involving experts
• Published games in Internet
• Evalua$on of games
• Younger students test games

35. e‐adventure.e‐ucm.es

36. iTEC Game Scenario Pilo8ng
• May 2012 – pre‐pilot
– In Estonia 1 teacher
• Oct – Dec 2012 – pilot
• Jan – Feb 2013 ‐ evalua$on
– In Estonia ~20 teachers
– Teachers from 12 countries

37. Games Introduced by Students During Pre‐Pilot
• Estonia board game
• Listen CD dame for learning words
• Domino board game
• Professor Layton adventure hqp://professorlayton.nintendo.com
• L.A Noire detec$ve hqp://www.rockstargames.com/lanoire
• Sims 3 hqp://www.thesims3.com
• LiWle Big Planet puzzle hqp://www.liqlebigplanet.com
• NBA 2k12 sports hqp://www.2ksports.com/games/nba2k12
• FIFA11 sports hqp://www.ea.com/soccer/fifa
• Portal 2 puzzle hqp://www.thinkwithportals.com

38. Pre‐pilot Student’s Game Designs
• Escape from the Zoo
• Angry Dog
• Dog board game

39. siLang Project
Serious Games on Language Learning
2012 ‐ 2014

40. siLang Summary
• Framework: Life Long Learning
• Start: 1 Dec 2012
• Finish: 30 Now 2014
• Dura$on: 24 mo
• Kick off: 10‐11 Dec 2012 Volos
• Workload: 1502 D
• Budget: 399 071 €
• Partners: 6

41. siLang Partners
• UTH ‐ University of Thessaly (Greece)
• HCT ‐ HiST Contract Research (Norway)
• CERETETH ‐ Centre for Research and Technology
Thessaly (Greece)
• Università degli Studi “Guglielmo Marconi” (Italy)
• TLU ‐ Tallinn University (Estonia)
• EWF ‐ European Welding Federa$on (Belgium)

42. siLang Content
• Serious games on language learning
• Used in army to train soldiers rapidly
• Working language ‐ vehicular language ‐ bridge
language ‐ lingua franca ‐ third language
• Cultural issues, non‐na$ve speakers, field of
engineering
– e.g Greek use English in Spain ‐ specific
pronuncia$on, cultural prac$ces that affect
communica$on, …

43. Who Says
Videogames don’t pay off in real life?
Mo$fake.com

44. siLang Goal
• Develop serious game for learning vehicular
languages (lingua franca) in the work place
(taking into account cultural aspects)

45. siLang Tasks
• Analyze current status of language learning
• Develop sound game‐based didac$cal framework
• Technical implementa$on of the game
• Learning ac$vi$es
• Valida$on of the game
• Dissemina$on
• Exploita$on

46. Game Interac8ons Course
2013

47. Course Summary
• Previously taught by Ulf Hagen
• Belongs to master curriculums:
– Interac$ve Media and Knowledge Environments
imke.tlu.ee
– Bal$c Film and Media ‐ Cross Media
www.bfm.ee/programmes/crossmedia
• Feb – May 2013
• 3 EAP

48. Course Goals
• Game research and theory
• Game design
• Game implementa$on

49. Game Interac8ons Course Design
• Gamifica$on or Game Based Course Design
– Using game mechanics and elements for course
design
– Mul$‐player real world educa$onal game
• PhD thesis
– Research project for designing and running the
course

50. Game Mechanics as Course Elements
• Luck – random exercises
• Leadership – team and produc$on management
• Strategy – planning ac$vi$es
• Compe$$on – vo$ng, reviews
• Diplomacy – interac$on with students
• Resource management – collec$ng study
materials

51. Game Elements in Course
• Learning environment – Game World
• Students – Avatars, players
• Teacher – Game master
• Grades – Points and Levels
• Tasks
– Quests
– Defeat NPCs
– Collect items
– Cra items
• Exam ‐ Boss Fight

52. Game Over
Demo$va$onal.com