Digital
gaming is prevalent throughout our society, especially with the millennia
generation. The most popular video games are those that utilize the Internet
which allows a massive amount of gamers to participate in various games simultaneously.
There has been an enormous impact on human behavior derived from video games;
this comes in the form of cognitive, motivational, emotional, and social
behaviors as noted by the American Psychological Association. These behavioral impacts along with a
significant amount of research in gaming are key indicators that the use of
games in teaching and learning will have a major impact on education (Horizon
Report > 2015 Museum Edition, n.d.).
Gamification
integrates all of the factors found in a game i.e. gaming pieces, mechanics,
and structure into serious games. Serious games are usually associated with
training and education. Various
situations and scenarios are presented to the student, which he or she uses to
affect an outcome. The NMC Horizon Report: 2015 Museum Edition article "Games
and Gamification” provides an interesting view of how museum exhibitions and
programs enhanced with gamification will attract the next generation of museum
visitors (Horizon Report > 2015 Museum Edition, n.d.).
Museum
curators all over the world are well aware that games are one of the most
popular apps being used on smart phones; therefore they have prevailed in
creating interactive apps that appeal to these smart phone users with their
museum displays and programs in mind. There is an increase in the development of
custom interpretive gaming applications that correlate with museum programs
that have the mobile gaming community in mind.
As an example, one of the first mobile gaming apps that have gained widespread
notoriety is “Murder at the Met” which was developed with the collaboration
between the Metropolitan Museum of Arts, Green Door Labs and Toursphere. The theme of this creation is to inspire visitors
to visit various galleries to uncover clues as to the death of Madame X. Web based games such as scavenger written by
Edventure Builder is being released to allow patrons to actively learn about art
collections within the Smithsonian American Museum of Art (Horizon Report >
2015 Museum Edition, n.d.).
A
prime example of an element that could be included in a museum game scenario
would be famous art works such as the Mona Lisa painted by Léonard de Vinci in 1503
A.D (Figure
1.) which is displayed within the Louvre Palace in France. Through gaming, a player could become immersed
in the history and all associated information regarding various works of art
and become well versed in all aspects of the various works on display (de
Vinci, L., n.d.).
Figure 1. Mona Lisa, (de Vinci, L., n.d.)
Since
the handling of one-of-a-kind art pieces can be damaging, digital
representations can be experienced by all patrons without any repercussions. This digital representation and handling of irreplaceable
art is gaining popularity among all age groups of museum visitors. Prominent museums such as the Brooklyn Museum
of Art, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Getty Center are all utilizing
various forms of digital games to attract and educate their patrons on their
extensive collections. New venues called
“Game Jams” are challenging patrons to create their own digital games using the
museum’s collections as a framework (Horizon Report > 2015 Museum Edition,
n.d.).
This
NMC Horizon Report includes various links that provides some examples of games
and gamification products, they are as follows:
- An In-gallery Adventure Game of Resemblance: go.nmc.org/ingall
- Mike Horn Designs Frog Pond Exhibit for Computer History Museum: go.nmc.org/frogpond
- Project Syria: An Immersive Journalism Experience: go.nmc.org/projsyr
References
de
Vinci, L. Mona Lisa – Portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del
Giocondo. (n.d) Retrieved from http://www.louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/mona-lisa-portrait-lisa-gherardini-wife-francesco-del-giocondo
Horizon
Report > 2015 Museum Edition.
Retrieved from http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2015-nmc-horizon-report-museum-EN.pdf
No comments:
Post a Comment