DIGITAL LIBRARY
DESIGNING A NARRATIVE FOR AN EDUCATIONAL MOBILE VIDEO GAME: WHERE TO START AND WHEN TO SHARE
Higher School of Education of Viseu, Ci&DEI, Polytechnic Institute of Viseu (PORTUGAL)
About this paper:
Appears in: ICERI2024 Proceedings
Publication year: 2024
Pages: 5934-5940
ISBN: 978-84-09-63010-3
ISSN: 2340-1095
doi: 10.21125/iceri.2024.1437
Conference name: 17th annual International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation
Dates: 11-13 November, 2024
Location: Seville, Spain
Abstract:
The merging of learning goals with mobile video games has created fresh opportunities for education making it more fun and easy to access. A key part of this blend is crafting a gripping story that not hooks players but also strengthens what they're meant to learn. This proposal aims to look into the first steps of creating these stories and talks about the right times to share the story with key people to make sure it's developed and put into action well.

Setting a clear educational goal is key. The story needs to match the learning targets acting as a tool to present educational material in a captivating way. Take, for instance, a game created to teach history. It might feature a main character who travels through time meeting important historical figures and taking part in major events. This approach gives context and helps students gain a deeper grasp of the subject (Kapp, 2019). When game creators define their educational aims from the start, they can craft stories that boost and improve the learning process.

Knowing who you are developing for plays a key function too. You need to match the story's style, depth, and thoughts to the age and training of the players you want to reach. Kids regularly like less complicated extra magical tales, whilst older college students would possibly get greater into intricate plots and authentic-to-life conditions (Gee 2020). Looking at your audience enables you create memories that click on with gamers, which makes the gaining knowledge of part paintings better.
Character development is a foundational detail in narrative layout (Salen & Zimmerman, 2021).

A properly-established narrative usually follows a traditional arc: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and backbone. This shape helps preserve engagement and gives a clean progression thru the sport’s educational content. Each phase of the narrative must comprise gaining knowledge of duties that strengthen each the plot and the instructional dreams. This integration guarantees that gamers are constantly engaged and studying as they development thru the game (Ryan & Deci, 2020).

Timing is important while sharing the narrative with stakeholders. Initial narrative ideas need to be shared early inside the development procedure to acquire feedback from educators, sport designers, and ability gamers. This early comments can provide treasured insights into the effectiveness of the narrative in reaching instructional goals. Iterative trying out with goal audiences at some stage in the development system is also essential, as it lets in for changes based on participant engagement and getting to know outcomes (Sawyer, 2019).

In conclusion, for an academic cellular video game, designing a story cautiously balances tutorial objectives, audience understanding, development of a person, and how that person is shaped. Strategically sharing the narrative in the process of development ensures it remains focused on the academic dreams and manages to resonate with the audience. As can be seen, applying these fine-sifted recommendations can go a long way to help designers come up with compelling high-impact educational video games which make learning an interest-filled and immersive experience.
Keywords:
Narrative Design, Educational Game Development, Storytelling Techniques, User Engagement.