ESCAPE ROOM VIDEO GAME TO LEARN AND PRACTICE DIFFERENT WRITING SYSTEMS

Serious Games is a well-stablished research discipline which has a great impact in a varied range of research fields and application domains such as medicine, nursing, psychology, military training, and, especially, in education. Results presented in this latter domain, where serious games are used for education purposes, are generally positive, reporting on an increased implication, engagement, and adhesion to learning objectives, as well all an overall improving of students’ academic scores in performance tests. These positive outcomes can be in part explained by the combination of active pedagogy techniques and playfulness strategies to accomplish learning objectives that are based on knowledge or skills.

Within the realm of education, the tedious, time-consuming and effort-demanding process of learning a new language is a common target of serious games projects. Various authors have pointed out the enormous opportunities of serious games applications to linguistic interaction, paying special attention to a new breath of opportunities that emerge from the interplay of computer-assisted language learning and multiplayer online game environments. Despite all the above, existing references and works to the use and application of Serious Games to learning writing skills of languages other than mother tongue are relatively scarce.

The aim of this work is to present the development of a video game to teach students to write characters through a game mechanics based on the escape room game mechanics. In an escape room, players must escape from a closed room solving puzzles and riddles, to reinforce and strengthen social relationships and team building for countless purposes including education and literacy. This mechanic was originally designed to take place in real spaces; however there are recent examples of escape room video games that are being emplaced in virtual environments.

The escape room video game presented in this work has two modes: the characters creator and the escape room. The characters creator allows designers (e.g. teachers) to define their own characters, grouping them in packs, adapting or tailoring them to the learning needs of the targeted players (e.g. students). The escape room mode, on the other hand, allows a player to select a character pack with which to play. The game offers some predefined ones, but other characters previously created using the characters creator mode can also be selected.

The game starts by distributing the characters randomly around the room. The objective of the game is to leave the room by solving some puzzles, which consists of finding those characters and writing them in an electronic panel (with the finger in a mobile or tablet and with the mouse in the case of a PC). In this way, the game essentially keeps the same mechanics of traditional escape rooms but customised to recreate and practice written characters in order to escape from the room. Besides, the game includes customisable images algorithms for computing and comparing required time to draw characters, so that it can be adapted to the needs of the players. The escape room is wrapped in a post-apocalyptic narrative that is gradually being discovered while advancing in the puzzles and helps to engage the users. In summary, the scape room video game is a tool for educators so that they can include it in the classroom to encourage their students to practice writing while having fun playing a video game.