I want to recommend an online book that may be accessed at the following URL:
http://www.vancouver.wsu.ed/fac/peabody/game-book/
The title of the book is The Art of Computer Game Design. The author is Chris Crawford. If you are not interested in the entire book, which is very readable, and you are a ‘gamer’, Chapter 8 is fascinating; it is about The Development of Excalibur. This is an example of a free on-line book that can be downloaded, read on the computer screen, or printed out as a hard copy from the screen. It requires only your PC or MAC.
Many people play computer games, some people want to design them. Playing and designing games take special SKILL SETS. A Skill Set is a group of skills that you have, or you may want to develop for a specific job.
There are three different types of skills: personality traits; transferable skills; and job specific skills. You can find out more about this by going to Google and using IDENTIFYING YOUR SKILL SET as your key words. I did this and found a very good introduction to the topic published by Youth Guide. There are a number of resources regarding skill sets on the web.
What does Reading have to do with all of this??? An adult, active reader inherently has a number of reading skills that may be transferred to computer game design. Many of the higher order thinking categories of Benjamin Bloom’s revised taxonomy play a part in computer game design. Look at some of the verbs in the subsets of higher order thinking. Use them as a checklist to gauge your thinking skills.
Compare your personal profile of higher order thinking activities/skills (HOTS) with the profile of a computer game designer that emerges from Chris Crawford’s on-line free book. Do you share some of the characteristics of Chris Crawford? Or, does your higher order thinking profile equip you for another area?
Maybe you have no interest in computer games. For an overview of one of the new 21st century careers (computer game design) and avocations (computer game playing), find Chris Crawford’s book on the internet. You can select only ONE chapter to read to inform and educate yourself about this important element in 21st century culture. Even if you never play a computer game, or think about yourself designing a computer game, read one on-line chapter for the experience of learning something new, and reading off of the computer screen.
What do you think about computer games?
Do you see yourself as a computer game designer?
Consider both William Perry’s Classifications of College Student Thinking and Benjamin Bloom’s Revised Taxonomies (reading & digital). What transferable thinking skills do you already possess and continually use that would be helpful in computer design?
The act of reading, the material read, and your world view directly affect your thinking skills.
Please share your thoughts, ideas, and experiences.
Dr. CW
I have an opinion about computer games,I think they are ,some of them extremly violent. I remeber when pac man came out that was fun and I would say benign but the computer games of today are filled with violence I was in school not college at a time when students never would have thought to bring guns to school. We have an out of control societal shift of violence amongst our younger generation. This violence is alarming.I wonder what we are teaching children when we allow them to play computer games where people are killed are we teaching that killing is a game I don't know I do know if I had children they would not have acsess to these games. Rather they would ride bikes skate ,read and definitly have lots of art type activities to enjoy as I did as a child. They would watch very little television as well except for PBS which has a great selection of things for viewing pleasure. I don't like computer games that's the long and the short of it.....
ReplyDeleteI have never been a huge fan of computer games, I was always more interested in console games, however, when I heard your staement about games becoming too violent, I had to make a response. I would have to agree that some games can be viwed as violent and give way to the idea that killing is a game, but I know from personal experience that it doesn't just lead you on a path of destruction and on a killing spree. The idea of killing is premeditative and although it may be influnced by violence in games and the media, it does have its consequences which people are aware of. Other than violent games there are computer games which are puzzling, intriguiging and demand mental strategies in order to successfully beat the game or level up your character.
ReplyDeleteI do not like computer games either. I have two boys one 14 and one 21. They both live in their rooms after school and work, playing games. When I was a kid, we did not have TV's and Playstation's in every room of the house. One TV was in the den and all program content was supervised. My youngest is next to me in the house. I constantly hear him, talking loudly with his friends while playing games. Granted he is communicating with others, but is this contact healthy?
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