Course on Gamification via Coursera

Coursera, a website that teams up with professors from various universities to offer free online courses to the public, is offering an introductory course on gamification, a concept that is gaining speed quickly. The course begins this week.

This is reportedly one of the first courses designed specifically for the concept of gamification, and the course itself is partly designed to explore the meaning and purpose of the concept, as well as to generate ideas on how to apply it in relevant ways.

Read more about the course here.

CVGA Featured on SlashDot

Check out Dave Carter, our fearless leader, describing the archive in a more in-depth glance at what we have to offer via this feature on SlashDot.

See the video here.

Sexual Harassment in the Gaming Community

An article hit the New York Times earlier this month discussing the prevalence of sexual harassment in virtual game play.

In the article, they highlight several examples online, from a Kickstarter devoted to documenting how women are portrayed in video games to a blog devoted to the unpleasant comments that women often encounter while playing online games. Quoted in the article are also several people who recognize the need to do something about it.

Read the article here.

Sid Meier's Game Design Boot Camp

A piece appeared in UM's Michigan Today about Sid Meier's Game Design Boot Camp, which took place earlier this Summer. In it, we discover what gave him the idea for the boot camp, which companies were involved, and a bit about how it was structured. We also learn that not only was Sid Meier's son Ryan involved (a UM graduate), but also his mother, who attended the event as well.

Read more about it here: http://michigantoday.umich.edu/story.php?id=8413

Kinect Used for Terrain Imaging

A recent Wired article highlights the use of the Kinect as a terrain imaging tool, to capture data for anything from glaciers to asteroids.

According to Tedesco, one of the scientists mentioned in the article, the Kinect works as a much more affordable way to capture the kind of data they need. It also helps inspire students to do related research because the Kinect is a tool that they're likely already familiar with, and doesn't seem as imposing as more complicated imaging equipment.

Read more about their use of the Kinect here.

International Games Innovation Conference - Call for Papers

The Fourth International Games Innovation Conference is accepting submissions for their next conference taking place in September 2012. 

According to their website, the conference is "a platform for disseminating peer-reviewed papers that describe innovative research and development of game technologies. Participation from academia, industry and government are welcome."

They are seeking "short papers (4 pages), long papers (5-8 pages), posters and panels" from a variety of areas of gaming. 

Read more about the conference and the submission process here.

Library of Congress' Video Game Collection

American Libraries Magazine recently published an article featuring the Video Game Collection at the Library of Congress.

According to the article, the collection preserves every game turned in for copyright registration, which works out to be about 10% of the games published each year. They collect the games themselves, along with promotional materials and guides associated with each game.

According to the Moving Image Materials collection policy listed on the LOC's website:
"Video games have become an established, popular medium of moving image entertainment which demand inclusion in the collections of MBRS. The Division is developing new approaches for the more systematic acquisition of video games, including playback consoles and platforms, the multiplicity of formats and their equipment needs, and the technical challenges in preserving the digital source files. The collection will encompass a wide range of examples of video game culture, to allow historians decades hence to fully understand this as a popular phenomenon, and not have simply a few games which seemed significant at the moment of release."

Read the article here.

Smithsonian Seeks Gaming Images

The Smithsonian's Art of Video Games Exhibition is seeking images of creative projects and paraphernalia inspired by video games.

According to their site, they are looking for "photographs that show how video games can inspire creativity! These might include images of video-game-inspired drawings, paintings, sculptures, jewelry, clothing, events, graphics, food, wallpaper... anything, really! We're particularly interested in seeing creative and crazy costumes inspired by your favorite game characters."

Read more about it here.

National STEM Video Game Challenge

Submissions are being accepted for the National STEM Video Game Challenge, an opportunity for students and educators to flex their creative muscles and share their original video game concepts.

The competition is divided into four categories: Middle School, High School, Collegiate, and Educators. The general goal of the competition is to motivate interest is Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM).

Submissions will be accepted anytime between November 15th - March 12.

Read more about the competition here.

How To Do Things With Video Games

Ian Bogost, author of several books including How To Do Things With Video Games, spoke to Forbes recently in an interview about video games as a medium.

He discusses the strengths of video games as a medium, the power of games in politics, and how the industry is handling adult themes in games. He also mentions the varying answers that people give to the question "what is a video game?" and how that affects whether they consider themselves gamers.

Read the interview in more depth here.

Pondering the Issue of Games in Libraries

Phil Minchin of Port Phillip Library in Australia shares his views on why games are an overlooked but important addition to libraries via a blog post on the Library Journal blog.

In it, he points out a number of reasons why games should be in the collection, including that they are important elements of culture, that they foster community, and that they are art - the poetry of system.

Read more about his insights here.

Libraries in Minecraft

Old Dominion University has taken the time to painstakingly recreate their library in the popular indie game Minecraft, and is currently seeking out ideas for connecting with current and potential users who play the game.

According to their website, they're planning a zombie invasion on their virtual library to celebrate Halloween, and who knows what might invade them next.

Check out the project here.

Finding New Planets with the Help of Gamers

A new game called Planet Hunters, set up by  a list of organizations including the University of Oxford and Yale University, enlists the help of gamers to seek out new civilizations. Or at least discover potentially new planets, by searching through NASA Kepler public release data.

According to Gamasutra's article, "Every user who helps to discover a planet is then named in the acknowledgements as part of The Royal Astronomical Society monthly notices."

The official report explains more of the details.

Online Gamers Crack AIDS Enzyme Dilemma

Online gamers have used a game called FoldIt to help decipher "the structure of an enzyme of an AIDS-like virus," helping scientists to develop "new insights for the design of antiretroviral drugs."

While the enzyme had "thwarted scientists for a decade," the entire process took the online gamers only about 3 weeks to crack.

Commenting on the project's success, FoldIt's creator Seth Cooper has stated, "Games provide a framework for bringing together the strengths of computers and humans. The results in this week's paper show that gaming, science and computation can be combined to make advances that were not possible before."

The project is also discussed in a recent paper published by the journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology.

Video Game History Museum in the Works

The organizers of the annual Classic Gaming Expo - John Hardie, Sean Kelly, and Joe Santulli - have a mission. They want to start a physical museum that collects everything about classic games - every version of every game, design & developer notes, promotional materials, backups of unreleased games, etc. 

The exact location is yet to be determined, but San Jose, CA is their stated goal. The group has already done much to raise donations and is getting close to their goal, but is still accepting donations via their website.

More information can be found on their website and via their press release.

Hand Eye Society Encourages Women to Develop Games

The Hand Eye Society will be running two game incubators in Toronto over the next several months, both of which focus on making it easier for women to get involved in creating video games.

The group aims to get more underrepresented groups involved  in game creation, and is working to dispel certain myths about game development that prevent people from trying it out, such as the assumption that developers have to be experienced in programming and mathematics.

According to their article in the Torontoist, anyone who has "completed a project in a creative medium" is eligible to participate.

Responses to the Minors Buying Video Games Case

The Supreme Court decision is out, but the issue still lingers. Many people feel strongly either way regarding the issue of whether minors should be able to buy violent video games, and their voices have carried long after the decision came out.

Those who agree (at least to some extent) with the decision:
Theresa B. Slusher, Cincinnati
Editorial from the Idaho Press Tribune

Mixed reactions:
Craig Anderson, ISU
Several other opinions

Those who feel that minors should in some way be restricted from buying them:
Alan Brownstein, UC Davis School of Law
Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

How do you feel about the decision?

Politicians Commenting on Video Games

Video games have received a lot of attention lately from politicians like Obama and Gore, and their messages don't always agree.

Gore was quoted at the 2011 Games for Change Festival today, praising the video game industry as a "very large, extremely significant industry with a wildly diverse and rapidly growing audience of players on all kinds of platforms," and gave several examples of games that "integrate social good and efforts to make the world a better place into games."

Obama, on the other hand, though not expressly against video games, has warned people of the dangers they present in distracting kids from family time, as well as their education.

And with the decision from the Supreme Court forthcoming about whether minors should be able to buy violent video games, it would seem that video games have been on the minds of a lot of government officials recently. Whatever your take on them, it certainly seems that they continue to garner more and more attention.

Violent Video Games and Minors

The Supreme Court is reportedly finishing up their assessment of an issue presented through a California court case back in November, which questions whether it should be legal to sell violent video games to minors.

Video games are currently regulated via the ESRB rating system, and certain ratings may be deemed illegal to sell to people who are underage.

Hear about the latest updates here, and let us know what you think of the issue.

Video Games Giving Young Brains a Workout

University of Michigan psychology professor Susanne M. Jaeggi was quoted today in an L.A. Times article about research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that explored the possibility of certain video games improving the reasoning and working memory ability of children who play them.

According to the researchers, the children have to want to play the games and not be pushed into doing them, and there has to be what Jaeggi calls a "delicate balance between too much or too little" in order for the games to be effective.

Read more about the research here.