Learning Things - Learn to Play: Designing Tutorials for Video Games - page 44

irst-person shooter, this topic covers it all. All of this is put together
by something we will discuss in the next section, motivation, which is
analogous to the computer's power supply. This probably doesn't make
a lot of sense right now, so check out the figures and reread to really
clarify things. The cheat sheet at the end of the chapter defines many
of the terms used throughout.
Why People Choose to Learn Stuff
Mark Twain told us that work is whatever a body is obliged to do, and
that play is anything that a body is not obliged to do. Unfortunately,
when it comes to video games, things like grinding and repetitive play
maintaining player attention sort of make that definition incorrect,
and the answer becomes more complicated. Given that I teach peo-
ple how to make video games, naturally I get many questions about
games: why they motivate people, whether they are “art,” whether they
are harming children, and more. Often when I am teaching younger
students, I have parents ask me two questions more than any others.
The first is “Should Timmy be playing so many video games? When
I was a boy…” which is a complicated question with a complicated
answer, but generally the answer is “It's probably fine—at some point,
someone somewhere thought baseball was a waste of time too!” This
question is mostly included to demonstrate how frustrating it can be
to give a concrete answer. The second question, and one that I think is
more germane to this topic, is “ Why does little Betty love video games
so much but hate school work? If I could get her to focus on reading
with half as much intensity…” or some variant of this question.
A game does something that schoolwork can't: it reacts instantly
to your individual level of skill. The levels get harder as you get
better, and they get easier as you fail. There are games for everyone:
some play Angry Birds while others play Call of Duty . The level of cus-
tomization is astronomical. Games fit the needs of the player in the
way a single teacher inundated with 20 to 30 (or more) students simply
can't. Until we develop some kind of mechanical psychic cybersquid
teacher, it is simply impossible to expect a human to know and react
to your every want with instant gratifying feedback. To this end, I tell
parents that it is not fair to compare education and games as oppo-
site ends of a spectrum, because ideally, you are learning playfully at