Back to School Week: The Learning Game Vol. 1

Welcome back, suckaz!

If you're an American between the ages of five and 17 years old, I'm sorry. About 95 percent of you either went back to school last week or you'll be frantically buying a new wardrobe today or tomorrow and marching back into a classroom sometime in the next 72 hours. I feel your pain; I'm a certified English Language Arts teacher and if the economy hadn’t taken a headshot or 17 recently, I'd probably be captain of my first classroom right now instead of selling computers at Best Buy.

No more Thrill Kill!?

Your parents probably told you that you can’t play as many video games during the school year as you did during the scorcher days of the summer, which is a total bummer. And for you old people out there like me, just imagine how it would feel if someone told YOU that you can’t play Street Fighter every night! ...wait, that's called college. So to anyone lamenting the loss of their gaming hours, keep your chin up high and take note: There are people out there who think gaming holds an important place on the classroom.

One of them is me.

Last year I created a blog called “The Learning Game” as part of a grad school class. The blog focused on how video games could be intertwined with education to form something that the student AND the teacher could get excited about. In honor of students everywhere going back to school, I’ve imported and enhanced the The Learning Game to Wordsmith VG in its entirety. Think of it as the difference between the original Metroid on the NES and the Metroid: Zero Mission remake on the Gameboy Advance, only this time instead of stupid alien space pirates taking over some alien planet, it’s all gravy. Besides, you’re getting two posts a day, which is more than 1.99 times more words for you to read (or ignore)!

Pull up a chair and get ready to learn something from, class.

He's FROM SPACE, dude.

The Value of Gaming in Education

Examine the possibility of video games making the move from entertainment to educational. It's still far off, but the idea is much more feasable than it was 10 years ago.

Just a tad different from the book.

Les Misérables: The Fighting Game

You know, every classic novel should be converted into a fighting game.  This one is more entertaining than a garbage truck full of angry Frenchmen!


Extra Credit Bonus Link: It’s Itoi’s Word, Charlie Brown!

If you’ve got some time to spare after class, take a gander at this essay comparing the world of Shigasato Itoi’s Famicom (NES) classic MOTHER 1 to the endeavors of Charles Shultz’s Peanuts characters. There’s more than meets the eye going on here in this progressively poingent essay. It was the first post here on Wordsmith VG, so if you missed it, now's your chance to get a little more studying in!

I made the MOTHER series! LOVE ME.