I met James Portnow (Divide by Zero) at GDC Austin in 2008, and since then we exchanged a few emails and met a couple of times in different conferences (Meaningful Play 2008, GDC Austin 2009). James is proponent of the concept of "Tangencial Learning" or "Collateral Learning" as applied to video games, an idea that aims to better leverage their educational potentials. I found this concept to have some similarities with the developmental proposal of the "Trojan Horse Approach" in regards to the use of indirect and skilfull means to promote more meaningful learning and experiences.

In an article at the website Gamasutra, James Portnow started a very interesting discussion about the "Universal Game, the game aimed at everyone". In my view, he most interesting aspect about this article is how it taps into fundamental aspects of player-customization explored in my academic research, and the challenges to create an "Universal Game" that could work on "multiple levels" - as he points - having great universal appeal to both children and adults as acclaimed popular movies such as Wall-e.

A friend of mine directed me to this very interesting (and unconventional) article written by Borut Pfeiffer, where we discusses about the subject of meaningful games and use of "subversive" startegies in video games. In my view, his ideas present a few points of resonance with some of the concepts proposed in my Trojan Horse Approach to video games, which is one of the core fundamentals of the INDENTRO framework.

Follow below Borut Pfeiffer's article, extracted from http://www.plushapocalypse.com/borut/?p=98

The Plush Apocalypse
Meaningful games must change the world

This question has bothered me for a long time. Since my first brush with real genre criticism (going to GA Tech before the take off of the LCC school my unfortunately minimal humanities requirements were nonetheless wonderfully met by classes like “Movie Genres” and “History of Science Fiction”), I’ve looked for subversive elements in games much like the elements in subversive genres like science fiction.

It is well known that many of the technological advances we have access today comes from leading edge experiments in Universities and the military industry. The internet and video games are great examples of that.

Based on these historical facts, many of the advances we are seeing today in these environments will shape our daily life in the future in terms of technological interaction and use.

I recently came in contact with Diane Piepol, chair of Siggraph and who works at USC labs. She has been leading one of UCS's several projects related to virtual reality, which includes research on virtual worlds, avatar emotions, artificial intelligence, computer generated storyteling and narrative, interactive 360 holographic images, mixed reality, stress disorder virtual therapies, VR psyhcology and neuroscience, etc...

I invite you to take a look at that and just use a bit of your imagination to envision how some of these technologies could be used in the future (maybe not far from now) for deeper psychological, therapeutic and developmental means. I think video games can be a great media to bring to the popular ground some of these amazing virtual reality experiences and potentials.

Here is the link to all their projects: http://ict.usc.edu/projects/all/ -- I highly recommend checking what they have been up to!

All best,
Moses

Moses Silbiger, M.A.
www.pressplaytogrow.com
www.integraleye.com

I recently had a great phone talk with Tracy Fullerton, Ph.D., who I am having the chance to meet soon at the Meaningful Play Conference 2008 in Michigan.

Tracy Fullerton is a game designer, educator and writer. She is also an Associate Professor at the USC School of Cinematics Arts and Director of the Electronic Arts Game Innovation Lab - having participated as faculty advisor for the games Cloud, and flOw; and as a game designer for The Night Journey, a unique game/art project closely related to personal and spiritual development - http://tracyfullerton.com/projects/the_night_journey.html -- Great (and groundbreaking) stuff!

Here is an excerpt taken from her website www.tracyfullerton.com:

The Night Journey project is a game project conceived by Bill Viola, an internationally acclaimed artist and MacArthur fellow, which uses video game technologies to explore the universal story of an individual mystic's journey towards enlightenment. The game is being developed in collaboration with a team from the USC Game Innovation lab, including myself, Kira Perov, Scott Fisher, Andreas Kratky, Todd Furmanski, and Kurosh Valanejad.

I just came back from the Game Developers Conference 2008 in Austin. Wow!... I am often surprized about the relevance and aliveness of these events, based on my previous experience at GDC 2008 in San Francisco.

As expected, the GDC Austin conference brought me a lot of updated information about the industry, including what is going on in terms of new and upcoming games, game design, career opportunities, new interfaces, academic research, etc.

As always, I made good contacts and expanded my "gaming network", making new friends and colleagues throughout the event.

One of the highlights of the event was a great informal conversation I had about my research and "integral ideas" with John Romero, renowned designer of the video games Doom and Quake. Although these are some of the most violent games ever created, it seems (because it is still confidential) that he has been involved in less violent, more mature projects nowadays, probably reflecting where he is right now personally. John Romero is considered one of the greatest designers of the video game industry, and is currently involved in a series of upcoming (high-level) projects, including a MMO video game.

I just came back a week ago from my lecture presentation at the Meaningful Play Conference 2008 in Lansing, Michigan.

Together with the Serious Games movement, Games for Health, Games+Learning+Society, Games for Change, Games for Health and other proactive, socially responsible and integrative initiatives, the Meaningful Play conference is an example of an emergent "wave" within the video game industry and academic studies that certainly came to stay (and grow).

These "alternative" movements have been gradualy stirring up the video game community and industry by bringing a series of timely and significant discussions about the emerging role of meaningful educational messages and useful practices through a new generation of alternative "trans-entertaining" video games in our culture and society.

Here is an introduction extracted from the Meaningful Play 2008 conference website:

Whether designed to entertain or for more “serious” purposes, games have the potential to impact players’ beliefs, knowledge, attitudes, emotions, cognitive abilities, and behavior.

This article summarizes some of my current views about the new video game Spore, created by Will Wright (Electronic Arts).

Note:
Since this review is based on an Integral Psychology perspective, I am using some integral 'jargon' from the AQAL Model.

About the Spore Creature Creator Module:

The module was fun to play, and it gives you a lot of creative freedom to play “God” in 3rd person, figuring out the “biological” (and maybe aesthetical) side of creating “life”.

About the video game Spore:

First of all, I would like to praise Will Wright for the novel idea of creating such an interesting (and timely) game concept based on evolution.

I think Spore may raise a lot of interesting issues, ideas and discussions coming from different audiences and worldviews...