Computer games, as we know, are immensely popular, especially with the young. Why is this? There are a number of reasons, one of which goes something like this: the human brain seeks data, information and knowledge that will provide both a sense of pleasure and meet the goal of learning things that may be useful in wider game of survival. The pleasure comes from the release of chemicals in the brain, endorphins, when some kind of satisfaction is obtained such as solving a puzzle or emerging victorious from combat. The desire to learn is deeply embedded in the brain from our primitive days on the African savannah and in caves when humans had to learn certain things just to survive. Many of the skills we needed thousands of years ago are now redundant (such as hunting and killing for food) but some are still present while others have been replaced by more modern variants. Many of the features of computer games stem from these innate desires to learn and be rewarded and also from emotions such as mastery/domination and territoriality (especially in males) and the tendency to model behaviour on others (more common in females). Add to this the fact that most games, especially computer games, are formal abstractions of reality, essentially mathematical in nature and we have a perfect subject for both intellectual inquiry and practical fun.
Mission Maker is software that lets you create video games in a range of styles. It provides various locations such as 'Stone Age' and 'Futuristic', a wide range of props that the player can pick up and control, characters, special effects, doors, triggers and media such as speech and video. Mission Maker can be used to create games purely for fun, it can be used as a way of teaching principles of design or as a way of creating games with an educational purpose such as literature or foreign languages.
Immersive Education's Mission Maker Page
| Computer Games | The Design Cycle | Levels of Knowledge |
| Game Features | Gameplay | Labyrinths and Mazes |