04 . 28 . 10

Rusch Visits from MIT

Dr. Doris Rusch visited Dartmouth today, and offered a compelling discussion of the purposeful use of games. She looked at the ways in which the human condition is expressed through other media such as language, literature, and film, and went on to argue for the value of thinking about games in their use of metaphor. Discussion several important recent design trend, Rusch skillfully moved between the theoretical and the practical, making lofty goals ideas concrete in designed form. This was followed by a game night at Tiltfactor, hosted with the help of the Jewel of India.

in the Tiltfactor laboratory

in the Tiltfactor laboratory

Rusch’s  game, Akrasia, was featured, as was a performative achievement in DDR by our own E. McNeill. Finally, a seemingly neverending Settlers of Catan rounded out the evening, with an unsettling trend of rolling 9s and an overpopulation of sheep and monumental robot-building among teams.

Posted by tiltfactor in Games for Social Change/Activism, News, Uncategorized, What We're Playing, critical play, variable_d | No Comments »

04 . 25 . 10

Friends of Tiltfactor in the News!

News about game development, from USC’s great games program to the island of Malta! Tracy Fullerton’s game innovation lab is featured in the New York Times. Tiltfactor is happy to be honored with not only her work on various advisory boards, but also her insiprational pedagogy and loyal, generous students who also contribute to Tiltfactor and to Dartmouth’s games courses.

The University of Malta is part of an initiative to develop a games industry in the country.

Posted by tiltfactor in Education, Games in the News, News, critical play | No Comments »

04 . 20 . 10

Fantastic Visitors, Spring 2010!


Doris Rusch, MIT Gambit Game Lab

Wednesday April 28
3pm talk, “Purposeful Game Design”

Dr. Rusch discusses how she explores abstract concepts related to the human condition in her game design, primarily using metaphors to find links between sites of strong emotion and game play.

Tiltfactor Laboratory, 304 North Fairbanks, Dartmouth College

Thursday April 29th
Rusch visits 10am -12:  Game Design: Values at Play Course

Product Owner: Akrasia

http://gambit.mit.edu/loadgame/akrasia.php

Product Owner, Executive Producer, Lead Designer: The Bridge

http://gambit.mit.edu/loadgame/thebridge.php

Doris C. Rusch holds a postdoctoral position with the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab in the Programme at Comparative Media Studies at MIT. Before that she worked at the Institute for Design and Assessment of Technology at Vienna University of Technology. In her habilitation project titled “Once More with Meaning”, Rusch investigates the medium specific characteristics of digital games and their potential to produce a wide range of emotionally satisfying and deeply meaningful experiences. Although her work is theory-driven, she aims at applicability of her research to actual game design with the goal of pushing the boundaries of games as media. Rusch has an eclectic background having completed studies in German Literature, Philosophy, English and Comparative Literature at the University of Vienna, where she also received her Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics. Her work in computer game studies is part of a larger interest in “narrative worlds” that expands over books, comics, and films.

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Marcin Ramocki, Filmmaker

Tuesday May 11th 2010 at 5:30
Marcin Ramocki
, Dartmouth alum from 1995, shows his film on videogame art, 8-Bit. Screening and talk with the filmmaker at 530 pm, Loews Theater, Dartmouth College.
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Lucas Welch, Soliya

Thursday May 13th 2010 at 10am
Lucas Welch, Founder & Chief Innovation Officer of Soliya, a non-profit organization using new technologies to facilitate dialogue between students from diverse backgrounds across the globe. Welch visits 10am -12:  Game Design: Values at Play Course to launch the dialogue building game design assignment.

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Digital Humanities Symposium 2010
Friday May 14th, 2010 - All Day Event! Visitors include scholars in digital arts and humanities areas, project demonstrations. Free registration on the website includes breakfast, lunch, reception(s), demonstrations, talks.
A cosponsored Digital Humanities Symposium, Dartmouth College – Visitors Welcome!

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Dr. Helen Nissenbaum
Tuesday May 18th

Visit with Helen Nissenbaum, Professor, New York University, Media, Culture, and Communication & Computer Science; Senior Faculty Fellow, Information Law Institute

Dr. Helen Nissenbaum visits var_d and the co-sponsors of ISTS, Digital Humanities, Philosophy, and Tiltfactor.

Posted by tiltfactor in News, Uncategorized, values at play, variable_d | No Comments »

04 . 13 . 10

Educational Technology at Digitel 2010

Tiltfactor reps are in Taiwan listening to a panel at The 3rd IEEE International Conference on Digital Game and Intelligent Toy Enhanced Learning, Digitel 2010 conference, where a panel discussion ensues on Research Policies on Technology Enhanced Learning. This panel is moderated by Ovid Tseng (Taiwan), with panelists: John Cherniavsky (USA), Chee-Kit Looi (Singapore), Roy Pea (USA), Chih-Wei Hue (Taiwan), and Beverly Woolf (USA).

The definition of Education by Dr. Beverly Park Woolf, University of Massachusetts Amherst was offered as “any environment in where learning happens.” This, along with other issues, were debated by the audience. Presentations by Hue and Looi emphasized interesting questions about cultural identity and education. There was a buzz in this audience as education policies from Taiwan, Singapore, and the US were presented. Further discussed by US participants was the recent National Educational Technology Plan (NETP) has offered some troubling facts about U.S. Education: “Twenty-four percent of young people in the United States drop out of high school (OECD, 2007). That number jumps to almost 50% of Latino and African American students (Orfield, Losen, Wald, & Swanson, 2004).” and “Today, just 39% of young people earn a two-year or four-year college degree (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 2008). Enrollment rates are unequal: 69% of qualified White high school graduates enter four-year colleges compared with just 58% of comparable Latino graduates and 56% of African American graduates (National Center for Education Statistics, 2007).”

We were pleasantly surprised to hear a program officer from the National Science Foundation discuss new the NSF and other national support for research in home schooling efficacy.

Tiltfactor’s Director, Mary Flanagan, is speaking tomorrow on Insights in Games and Learning, incorporating results from a collaboration with the Games and Learning Institute.

Posted by tiltfactor in News, Uncategorized | No Comments »

04 . 12 . 10

Digital Humanities Symposium, Friday 14th May 2010

If you happen to be in New England May 14th and have a burning desire for things digital, RSVP (so we can feed you) and drop in for the open-to-all, day-long Digital Humanities Symposium at Dartmouth College, 14th of May 2010. We have an impressive lineup of speakers, including Hany Farid, a computer scientist looking at image forenics; Laura Mandell, the Director of Digital Humanities at Miami University and the Chair, Committee on Information Technology, MLA; Doug Sery, Acquisitions editor, MIT Press; William Noel, curator of Manuscripts and Rare Books and Director of the Archimedes project; Tom Streeter; and so many more. Check it out!

Please feel free to join us. We promise good discussion and generous hospitality to you. Those from nearby colleges in NH and VT especially welcome.

Posted by tiltfactor in Announcements, News | No Comments »

04 . 07 . 10

New Publications!

This spring, visiting scholar Jonathan Belman is at Tiltfactor up at Dartmouth to do some research. We’ve been productive in research lately, with two new journal publications emerging from the lab: Belman, J. & Flanagan, M. (in press). “Exploring the Creative Potential of Values Conscious Design: Students’ Experiences with the VAP Curriculum.” Eludamos: The Journal for Computer Game Culture.
Belman, J. & Flanagan, M. (in press). “Designing Games to Foster Empathy.” Cognitive Technology Journal 14(2).

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04 . 07 . 10

Metadata, Manga, and More

We’ve been busy at Tiltfactor! Our new Grow-a-Game card series is being sent to the printer as I type… We’re accumulating new Metadata games from our myriad developers, including Joe Pietruch and Charlie Whitney. We’ve begun working with Jonathan Jay Lee
on our educational, beautiful manga project. Out of the lab, we’re running the design course Values at Play: Game Design Workshop.
And, we have many more games in the works. Happy Spring!

Posted by tiltfactor in Announcements, News | No Comments »