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This study examines mass-market applications for some of the many theories of eLearning and blended learning, focusing most closely on a period from 2000-2010. It establishes a state of the union for K-12 immersive eLearning environments by using in-depth cases studies of five major mass-market, educational, and community-education based products—Gaia Online, Poptropica, Quest Atlantis, Dimenxian/Dimension U, and Folkvine. Investigating these models calls into play not only the voices of traditional academic and usability research, but also the ad hoc voices of the players, commentators, developers, and bloggers. These are the people who speak to the community of these sites, and their lived experiences fall somewhere in the interstices between in-site play, beta development, and external commentary (both academic and informal.) The works of experimental academic theorists play an acknowledged and fundamental role in this study, including those of Ulmer, Barab, Gee, and McLuhan. These visionary voices of academia are balanced with a consideration of both the political and financial constraints surrounding immersive educational game development. This secondary level of analysis focuses on how issues around equity of access, delivery platforms, and target disciplines can and should inform strategic goals. While this dissertation alone is unlikely to solve issues of access, emergent groups including the OLPC hold exciting promises for worldwide connectivity. My conclusion forms a synthesis of all these competing forces and proposes a pragmatic and conceptual rule-set for the development of a forward-looking and immersive educational MMORPG

Democratic theorists argue that democratic institutions thrive when the citizens of the society robustly participate in governance (Galston, 2004; Barber, 2001). A traditional indicator of democratic participation is voting in elections or referendums. However, democratic apologetics posit that humans need to be trained in democratic processes in order to be democratic citizens (Dewey, 1916; Gutmann, 1990; Sehr, 1997; Goodlad, 2001). Citizens need to know not only the protocol of participation, they also need to be trained in the processes of mind (Dewey, 1916; 1927). Educational systems in this country have been the traditional place where democratic training has been vested (Spring, 2001). It seems, though, that the methods that educators are using to train young people fail to meet this challenge as voting rates among the youngest citizens (under 30) have never been higher than slightly more than half of eligible voters in the age group. To remedy this situation, Congress and several private civic-education organizations have called for changing curricular approaches to engage more youth. One such method that may hold promise is the use of video game technology. The current generation of youth has grown up in a digital world where they have been labeled "Digital Natives" (Prensky, 2001a). They are "tech savvy" and comfortable with their lives being integrated with various forms of digital technology. Significantly, industry research suggests that over 90% of "Digital Natives" have played a video game in the last 30 days, and business is booming to the level that video games pulled in more money than the movie industry did in 2008 (ESA, 2009). As early as the 1970s, educational researchers have looked at the use of video game technology to engage student learning; however, this research has been limited at best. More recently, educational scholars such as James Gee (2003; 2007) and Kurt Squire (2002; iii 2003; 2006) have sought to make the academic conversation more mature with regard to using video games as a classroom supplement. This study continues that conversation by using quantitative methods to investigate whether or not different groups of middle school students self-report a greater propensity to be civically engaged as a result of civic-themed video gameplay. The investigator collected data from middle school students who were given access to civic-themed video games to see if there were statistically significant differences in self-reported civic-engagement scores as a result of gameplay. This investigation was conducted at a large, urban middle school in the Southeast region of the United States.

This thesis investigates the poetical interplays of the contemporary magical realist computer game Kentucky Route Zero. Through the notion of literariness coined by the Russian formalists, the work centers on the ways the game operates with the established conventions of magical realism. The theory of intermediality, with its concepts of media modalities, media representation and transmediation, introduced by Lars Elleström, foregrounds the underlying connectedness of Kentucky Route Zero with older media – early instances of computer games – and with the discussed literary style. Text-world theory, outlined by Alison Gibbons and Sarah Whiteley, allows locating and analyzing the idiosyncratic presence of magical realism in the game. As the analysis demonstrates, the realization of magical realism in the game performs a subversive role by destabilizing the aspects of linearity and progression, important for games of the same genre. This, in turn, composes an overarching theme of Kentucky Route Zero – nostalgia; the theme that runs both through the stylistic features of the game and through its content.

This thesis researches the impact of audio in video games as a tool for enhancing memorization through an experiment. Existing research has found that videogames have the potential to be used as learning tools, however there's a lack of research exploring what aspects of video games make them useful in a learning setting. In this paper we have attempted to shed some light on the matter by exploring the effects of audio in educational video games, namely how the existence of audio feedback might affect the effectiveness of an educational game. This was done by conducting an experiment where participants of three groups attempted the same periodic table quiz twice, once before a study session and once after. One group was a control group, they would study by simply attempting to memorize the periodic table by looking at it. Another group would study by playing an educational game about the periodic table without any audio. The final group would study by playing the same educational game with audio feedback. All participants' quiz results were analyzed using an ANOVA. The results did not display any significant difference between the groups. This suggests that audio feedback may not play a very important role in the effectiveness of an educational game. To assess whether audio in fact does have a more subtle effect on learning, a larger sample size would be needed to detect the small differences. The results shed light, both on the effects of audio feedback in educational games, and also on the influence of sample size on interpreting data, emphasizing the need for larger sample sizes to detect subtle differences among study groups.

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Stockholm is experiencing the fast urban expansion with major development projects including housing, transportation and public spaces in and out of the city in which existing blocks are involved at different levels. The project Urbancraft’s proposal to transform Kvarteret Sländan in northern Vasastaden in Stockholm is an an explorative and experimental work that look at a range of different approaches which are inspired from the game world where more interactions happen and people are more engaged in its environment but are of different characters. The aim of the project is to explore and test the approaches from game world and answer the question of how to create a vibrant neighbourhood in a traditional European district, but at the same time an imaginary vision of it: mixed, historic and most importantly interactive and responsive to the local contexts for amenity such as seasonal difference of sunlight and the diversity of needs. The key point of the concept is translating game design methods into urban design and architecture language regarding to physical world and digital game world. The design phase focuses on three units of the traditional blocks: buildings, networks and courtyards which have a significant impact in Vasastaden’s appearance. The shapes of buildings are modified through strictly applied rules for both daylight and direct sunlight, while making these possible to change periodically. Networks as connections into the site break the barriers and create new public and semi-public spaces both at roof level and ground level. As a result, rooftops and courtyards will be redefined and more responsive for different users and needs with the thinking of game world.

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