Educational Games
My parents were big supporters of "constructive play" when I was a child, so nearly all video games we had were of the educational sort. And they were awesome! (and still are, as technology becomes more interactive and children can get more 'hands on' with their virtual play).
I played Mega MathBlaster and spent hours playing the JumpStart series and Read, Write, and Type! with my cousins. Recently, I rediscovered the computer with Read, Write, and Type installed. Wanting to see if it was a useful tool to adults, I tried it out. Even though I already know how to type, I improved my typing speed and used the correct fingers more after less than an hour of game play. It was still really fun. What I learned was that educational games are a great tool to teach all ages, not just developing children. The difficulty is to find a way to combine teaching and important concepts in a way that is engaging, fun, and interactive. Many game and entertainment companies pitch annual challenges to students and amateur game developers to find new ways to create stimulating and productive games.
On a related but slightly different note, puzzle games are still my favorite. As a kid, I solved cardboard ones and rubiks cubes. Now, I try to find challenging ones on the computer. Red Remover is a really cool puzzle game. There are few rules, which get introduced slowly, while the player tries to remove red squares while keeping the green ones. There is some sort of gravity and force algorithm built into the game, so you have to consider that when removing squares.
Check it out below:
http://www.addictinggames.com/redremover.html
I played Mega MathBlaster and spent hours playing the JumpStart series and Read, Write, and Type! with my cousins. Recently, I rediscovered the computer with Read, Write, and Type installed. Wanting to see if it was a useful tool to adults, I tried it out. Even though I already know how to type, I improved my typing speed and used the correct fingers more after less than an hour of game play. It was still really fun. What I learned was that educational games are a great tool to teach all ages, not just developing children. The difficulty is to find a way to combine teaching and important concepts in a way that is engaging, fun, and interactive. Many game and entertainment companies pitch annual challenges to students and amateur game developers to find new ways to create stimulating and productive games.
On a related but slightly different note, puzzle games are still my favorite. As a kid, I solved cardboard ones and rubiks cubes. Now, I try to find challenging ones on the computer. Red Remover is a really cool puzzle game. There are few rules, which get introduced slowly, while the player tries to remove red squares while keeping the green ones. There is some sort of gravity and force algorithm built into the game, so you have to consider that when removing squares.
Check it out below:
http://www.addictinggames.com/redremover.html
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