London (UK), June 2010 - Caspian Learning challenged both novice and expert users alike to create the most innovative serious game in just thirty days. The entries were whittled down to two finalists whose games were selected based on how well the entrant used Thinking Worlds innovatively to create a game with a good storyline and good use of learning interactions.
Lee Rushworth, Marketing Executive for Caspian Learning, announced that "A Planet in Peril: Plagiarism" was voted as the winning entry by experienced instructional designers at the company. The game was developed by a small group of Communications Media and Instructional Technology doctoral students (who jokingly refer to themselves as Random Precision Studios) from the Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP).
Mr. Rushworth says, "A Planet in Peril: Plagiarism was the game that really stood out to us as well produced and built with a great sense of humour and some innovative uses of Thinking Worlds interactions that even we hadn't thought of."
The game, which is currently in a beta release, follows the story of a student who uncovers the secret of a group of aliens disguised as academics at his university campus. The aliens have prophesied the end of the world, which is set to occur due to a student's excessive plagiarism, and it's up to the hero to put the pieces of this puzzle together in order to prevent disaster. While working through the challenges, players learn about what is and what is not plagiarism, including ways to avoid it.
The game is targeted at the college and university level but has application for high school students. The final version of the game will be released in the fall.
The idea was pure serendipity... and a little luck. Ryan L. Sittler, Assistant Professor of Library Services at the California University of Pennsylvania (and one of the lead designers of "Random Precision Studios") says, "I am working on my PhD at IUP and am an avid game player. My State-System colleague, Dr. Kelly Heider, suggested that I create an information-literacy game. I knew I could never do it on my own, so I asked some other doctoral students to help get it off the ground. Fortunately, they were interested! It was in our initial conversations that we settled on one information-literacy concept - plagiarism - and developed the ridiculous end-of-the-world scenario."
This team included Chad Sherman and David P. Keppel as the other lead designers (handling the majority of game production) and Dana Covitz Hackley, Chrissy Schaeffer, and Laurie A. Grosik, who assisted with pre-production and documenting the process for a potential future publication.
Caspian Learning is committed to making the creation of 3D performance simulations and serious games more accessible to traditional learning and development providers.
