What Would Mario Do – A Simple Decision Tool!

Mario 1 1 What Would Mario Do 8211 A Simple Decision Tool

Super Mario Bros on the NES has been around for a very long time now, yet still, it exudes class and is a masterclass in game design. One of the reasons for that, in my view, is the simplistic choices that Mario has to make in the early stages of the game – especially the first screen. He has essentially four choices, two when presented with a bad guy and two when presented with an obstacle.

  • Obstacles: Use it, avoid it
  • Bad guys: Kill it, avoid it

So, when Mario is faced with an obstacle, he can try to break – which might yield goodies or just clear his path. He could try to just move around or over it, or he can use it to get to higher parts of the screen (or lower if you consider a pipe taking him to bonus sections). Read More ...

Learning From Games: Onboarding and Mario

Mario 1 1 Learning From Games Onboarding and Mario

I’ve probably mentioned this in the past, but Super Mario (for me) has one of the best on-boarding experiences of any game I’ve ever played.

But let’s start at the beginning.

What’s On-boarding?

On-boarding, in this context, is the way the game introduces the player to the rules of play. It is how the game teaches you what to do, without having to rely on pages and pages of text in a manual.

Mario, designed by games design genius Shigeru Miyamoto, was one of the first games I played where the instructions consisted of only the most basic information (what button to press to do what). Read More ...

Are Mario, YouTube & My Little Pony killing my Daughters Imagination?

Imagination 1440664813 Are Mario YouTube 038 My Little Pony killing my Daughters Imagination

I am a huge advocate of the benefit of games. They are amazing and I would quite happily argue with anyone shouting about games and violence, or games being bad for kids. I am also not against T.V. My youngest has amazing shape recognition, counting and even spelling and maths abilities – at three – thanks in large part to Team UmiZoomi!

However, I have started to notice a slightly concerning issue with my eldest daughter. She seems to have no imagination any more, or at least a very reduced functionality one! Read More ...

Purpose – A little bit can go a long way

Epic1 Purpose 8211 A little bit can go a long way

Recently I have been thinking about purpose or meaning a lot. It’s one of the four motivators from RAMP that seems to be the hard to explain and achieve.

When I first started looking into gamification, people used to talk about Epic Meaning when speaking of game mechanics (incorrectly, but that is another story).  This is the feeling of being part of something greater. An example I often use is Wikipedia. People contribute to that, freely, because many of them like to feel that they are contributing to something that is larger than themselves and has great meaning to others. So for Wikipedia contributors that is their purpose – “epic meaning”. Read More ...