According to some, all games are tools for teaching. We learn things from pretty much any game we play.
Some games are very effective teaching tools (Pokemon game study she cites)
Kids are smarter than you (expect)! SimCity.. great tool for learning? -> Kids felt they weren’t learning anything from playing the game.
“Fun is learning” is the beginning, not the end. This is not easy to accomplish!
There are several core human emotions. There is a “game-learn” emotion… “fun is the cognitive mechanical process by which we convert fear into happiness through surprise” -> called “sophia” by the presenter.
It is a very interesting lens to view fun through games. It seems fairly accurate thinking about games that I view as “fun.”
Creating an ordered state from some chaotic system is satisfying, sometimes highly so, and some games are more sophia than others in this regard.
Meaningful games stick with you.
Games which you can “master” provide satisfaction, and sofia is the process of this.
Learning games have a specific goal/skill to teach, but often lack emotion.
Lack of core emotional clarity, not enough surprise preceding satisfaction, lack of tension, fear not illuminated are all problems that are visible when looking through the lens of sofia.
It can be very helpful to use this POV when developing games with some broader purpose, so that they are effective games as well as tools for learning.
