Video Games in the Classroom?
A good, intelligent discussion of the (potential) use of games in education. The participants avoid stepping on cliches and approach the topic with sound fundamentals. Many useful nuggets. Like this: "Games can teach facts well and certainly could be used for this without much change in schools. But the real potential of games is to get people to think, value, and act in new ways. A game like Civilization can get the player to see that history could have happened in different ways..." Some of the questions show that people still don't get it, though. More...

Educators Turn to Games for Help
Wired News taps into the future of learning as it described and links to a number of initiatives using games in learning. Of note: according to the article, "The developers behind popular commercial game Neverwinter Nights made their design tools available to anyone." Also, worthy of mention is this contrast between game design and learning design, which I talked about last week. More...

Learning with Role-Playing Games
Good analysis of RPGs (Role Playing Games) and their role in learning. The article begins with some taxonomies of RPGs from John H. Kim and Levi Kornelsen, then offers summaries of more than a half dozen accounts of the use of RPGs in learning. More...

Inside the Epic Online Space Battle That Cost Gamers $300,000
Bo Moore, Wired, February 13, 2014
The gaming world is still abuzz about a massive battle that took place in Eve, an online multiplayer roleplaying game (MMORPG). To put this into perspective, the battle was between two coalitions of forces and involved thousands of individual players. Because in-game assets can be bought and sold, it is possible to attach a price to the battle as well: $300,000. More...

At E3, video gaming's bigots have lost
Dave Lee, BBC News, 2018/06/22
This is how an institution gets better. Four years ago, Gamergate ricked the gaming industry. It was a harassment campaign intended to drive women out of gaming. It failed. "What were once referred to as the 'thinly-veiled' elements of Gamergate are now fully visible. But it no longer matters. More...