A Formal Approach to Distinguish Games, Toys, Serious Games & Toys, Serious Re-purposing & Modding and Simulators

While the concept of serious game has considerably evolved in the last two decades, it still needs to be clearly differentiated from other types of artifacts. Thus, for most outside the domain, there is a degree of confusion about the relationship between serious games and other related applications such as simulators or the re-purposing of entertainment games within educational practices. This article proposes a formal approach towards classifying Games, Toys, Serious Games, Serious Toys, Serious Re-purposing & Modding and Simulators. The aim of this theoretical work is twofold. Firstly, on a practical level, this approach aims at helping actors from different ecosystems, such as health, for instance, to differentiate between these various devices and use them to their best advantage. Secondly, from a research perspective, based on a formal approach, our work aims to contribute to the development of a taxonomy for gamified intervention with serious purposes. This formal approach allows us to demonstrate that unique combinations can be proposed to distinguish each kind of application. In this context, Serious Games can be seen as a specific purpose and not as a synonym for other existing applications

Mazetec: A Scenario-Based Learning Platform

This work presents Mazetec, a scenario-based learning platform for delivering non-linear scenarios format asynchronously. It enables subject matter experts to create interactive, state-dependent case studies or courses with branching logic for online learning and knowledge testing. Mazetec is a complex web application designed to deliver decision-based or case-based educational scenarios and simulations in a time-limited, non-linear format. There are many e-learning systems in the open source and commercial markets, but while these systems may have similar functions, we have found none that are both domain independent and able to deliver state-dependent content asynchronous and non-linearly. Mazetec can serve as a standalone training system or serve as a supplementary activity provider to an existing course in an organization\u27s existing learning management system (LMS)