Gamification: Pervasive User Centric Design

Pervasive User Centric Design Gamification Pervasive User Centric Design

A spelling mistake, auto-correct and a lack of concentration led me to researching totally the wrong thing recently.  I was looking into a blog on Persuasive design, but ended up looking at articles on Pervasive design by mistake! It triggered some ideas and things I had been thinking about a while back, so I ran with it and am glad I did.

A few years ago, I remember reading about Pervasive Games. The difference between a pervasive game and a “normal” game is that the pervasive game breaks the magic circle and integrates in some way with the players real life and world. You may remember I wrote about the magic circle a while back. This is essentially the barrier between the virtual world and the real world that most games don’t tend to cross. Read More ...

Why am I interested in Gamification?

1389645 14492518 Why am I interested in Gamification

This is a question many ask me – including myself!

The answer is complicated I suppose, but worth mentioning here.

Many feel that gamification is nothing more than an invention of consultants hell bent on making money from corporations who want to control their employees. In some instances this may even be true!

The fact is, I got involved because of a love of games that goes back over thirty years. I have always loved games, playing them , creating them and learning from them. One of my earliest memories of gaming was my father creating me a maths games. It was very simple, on an early Spectrum. All it did was ask you maths questions and you had to answer. It would congratulate you and I seem to remember there was some graphic representation of your success. Read More ...

Nabu Smartband from Razer

Nabu 3 Nabu Smartband from Razer

I don’t often post press releases here, but this one excites me! Razer is a company that has produced gaming peripherals for years now. Used by pros and casual gamers alike, they always produce distinctive and interesting kit.

So when they announced they were going to release a fitness like band, I had to find out more!

It turns out they have made a competitor product to the likes of FitBit (which I use) and Nike Fuel Band (which I can’t afford!!). Not only does it look really cool, it has a boat load of features.  Rather than just a fitness tracker, it is a full features smart watch, showing you incoming calls and notifications. It is a fitness tracker, with location awareness and all sorts iof other bio data. Finally it is social, with band to band communications. Read More ...