數位遊戲特質與環境對學習歷程影響的整合研究-子計畫六---從遊戲歷程檔案分析玩家的成長過程及其透過介入遊戲設計而學習的模式

Abstract

數位遊戲演變至今，無論遊戲內容或遊戲形式都已經有了非常多元而複雜的發展。因此玩家進入遊戲世界之後，常會歷經多個階段，每一階段的挑戰和樂趣各有不同，需要學習的知識和技能也不一樣。此外，個別玩家所經驗到的階段順序、尋求學習資源的方式、解決問題的策略等，也都會有所差異。因此，本計畫第一年將挑選敘事性及互動性均強、任務挑戰性高、而玩家又有很高遊戲目標自主性的角色扮演遊戲(Role-Playing Game, RPG)，分別在個人遊戲的單機平台和群體遊戲的線上平台上，分析其遊戲特質，進而探究玩家在遊戲中所歷經的遊戲階段與學習過程。 玩家不僅在遊戲過程中學習，他們更可以透過改變遊戲規則和設計新遊戲來學習。尤其在今天遊戲公司已經開放許多遊戲設計工具給一般玩家，大大增進了這種透過設計來學習的潛能。本計畫第二年將採用遊戲規則層次的觀點，分析玩家有那些設計遊戲的切入點，進而探討何種類型的玩家（同時考慮個人特質及遊戲經驗）傾向於介入遊戲設計。在遊戲類型的選擇方面，除了RPG之外，亦將分析甚為風行且玩家設計參與度極高的即時策略遊戲(Real-Time Strategy game, RTS)及其廠商所開放的地圖編輯器等功能，藉以探討玩家設計遊戲的先備知識與設計過程，以及最重要的學習元素與學習機制。 當代的數位遊戲牽涉到龐大的產業體系與經濟利益，除了遊戲內容之外，不論遊戲平台、收費模式、或遊戲內商品交易，這些關鍵元素主要都操控在遊戲廠商手中，這對遊戲的核心特性（例如輸贏的共識和公平性的認知）帶來了極大的衝擊。本計畫第三年將探討遊戲營運模式對遊戲性所產生的引導作用，並觀察玩家（包含個人和社群）在其中的因應策略。本計畫將由這個面向深入探究玩家在遊戲中學到了什麼（包含隱藏的價值觀與意識型態），以及學到這些概念的途徑，作為遊戲式學習設計與研究的參考。

Digital games have rapidly developed versatile and complicated content and form in the past decade. As a result, players now usually experience several stages after they enter the game world, and each stage presents its specific challenges and pleasure, and most importantly, specific requirements of knowledge and skills. Furthermore, individual players have quite different gaming and learning experiences in terms of the order of stages, the approach to seek learning resources, and the strategy to solve problems. Therefore, this project will choose Role-Playing Games (RPGs) as the first-year target genre to study, because they present strong narration and interactivity, challenging tasks, and the players have high autonomy in setting their own gaming goals. We will investigate RPSs on both console and online platforms and analyze their dynamic game characteristics, thus to reveal the detailed gaming and learning stages in this playing situation. The players not only learn in the games and the gaming world, they can also learn through changing game rules and designing new games. This is a particularly important opportunity for today』s players/learners because game companies have released varied design tools for the players to modify existing games or to create new games. Therefore, in the second year of this project we will take the perspective from the levels of game rules and analyze what access points are available for a player to participate in design. We will investigate what types of players, considering their personal characteristics and gaming experiences, tend to participate in game design. For this purpose, in addition to RPGs, we will include Real-Time Strategy games (RTSs) in our second-year project because the players in this genre have demonstrated an active manner toward design, and the companies have prepared multi-leveled editing tools, such as map editors, for their players to use. We will then explore in detail about the players』 prior knowledge about game design and their design processes, and most importantly, the involved learning factors and mechanisms. Contemporary digital games have a close and complex relationship with entertainment industry, thus under remarkable influence from the game production and distribution companies. In addition to the obvious game content, all key elements of digital gaming, including platforms, payment models, and trade inside the game, are controlled by the business-minded parties. Inevitably, this trend brings a fundamental impact on gameness, such as the consensus of win/loss and the concept of fairness. Thus, we will focus on the gaming business models and their influences on gameness, and the players』 responding strategies, in both individual and social aspects. We will take this approach to investigate what the players learn from the games, including hidden values and ideologies, and how they acquire the concepts. We believe that our research results will provide important reference for both game-based learning and more sophisticated game design.