How are Serious Games Transforming Learning Across Businesses?

Serious games are designed to promote learning and behavior change besides entertainment. The aim behind designing these games is to help a player hone a skill or learn a new behavior. They are used in a wide range of industries including marketing, healthcare, education, defense, and other businesses and industries. Such types of games combine learning strategies, knowledge and structures, and game elements to teach specific skills and attitude. In several areas, they are used to solve problems and challenges. By using the entertainment and engagement component, the games also offer rewards to users.  

Some examples of the serious games that have reshaped various industries

In recent years, these beneficial games have been applied to several areas with a very successful outcome. Following are some interesting cases that show the effectiveness of these games: 

Sea Hero Quest: This is a game designed to collect data from users to detect dementia at an early stage. Previously, it took 176 centuries to collect data to confirm the disease. However, this game can collect such data in a few months. 

Little Learning Machines: In October 2023, this game was released and marketed as a reinforcement learning game. Players use this game to train their machines by using different rewards. The games involve advanced AI-based robots with advanced neural networks, helping machines to develop different sets of skills and personalities. Through this game, users can progress their learning about artificial intelligence and machine learning topics.  

Go Nisha Go: This game has gained popularity in India. It is designed to provide knowledge about women’s bodies and menstruation. It has been downloaded more than 224,000 times. It uses a narrative-driven model that empowers players to make informed decisions in a safe environment. It involves an avatar called “Nisha” who receives advice from several inspirational females belong to various professions such as nurses, police officers, scientists, and influencers.  

Working with Water: This game teaches students along the Central Coast of Australia about developing and maintaining a sustainable water supply system. The game gives knowledge to players in building new infrastructures to satisfy the increasing demand for clean water among the community.  

Why are serious games advantageous for your business?

Nowadays, many businesses are using these games for a serious goal. Traditional old books or e-learning modules are not wrong methods, but these games provide a new aspect to transfer knowledge and information to individuals. The games act as an effective tool for individuals because of the following reasons: 

Greater engagement and immersion: The games are designed in such a way that they motivate players to keep playing by earning exciting rewards at every step, getting story progression, and other feedback systems. This offers a beautiful environment for the users to immerse themselves in the subject matter. 

Providing positive emotions to improve learning: According to a recent study, students who use these games experience more positive emotions. This is mainly because learning through fun provides an improved learning experience to users compared to traditional and video learning methods.  

Providing a safe environment to experiment with: Serious games offer a safe space for users to experiment with their innovative ideas and thoughts. For instance, in the medical research field, experiments in the real world can damage the material or cause some bad consequences. Through these games, users can experiment with their ideas in all possible ways without worrying about their consequences. 

A ray on some innovative developments shaping the serious game domain

The global serious games industry has witnessed a significant increase in demand for effective educational tools to enhance the knowledge and interest of students. Furthermore, the increase in the inclination of businesses toward cost-effective training modules is further expected to propel the growth of the industry in the coming years. The market is anticipated to manifest a CAGR of 18.47% from 2021-2030.  

To stay ahead in the competitive landscape, several players in this domain have made alliances and come up with innovative product launches. For instance, in February 2022, Brightcove Inc., the global leader in business video announced its acquisition of Wicket Labs, an audience insights platform designed to tell a story about your video business from the data. With this acquisition, Brightcove would have access to content subscriber insights to market-driven decisions to improve subscriber acquisition, engagement, conversion, and retention.  

On the contrary, in July 2021, Computing students at the University of Kent developed a beneficial serious game for Cyber Security education, called – “SherLOCKED”. It was created in the style of a 2D top-down puzzle adventure to consolidate student’s knowledge of foundational security concepts including security threats and attacks and risk management. This game involves an investigative style theme based on the fictional private detective, Sherlock Holmes. SherLOCKED offers a new way to engage students with content and complement more traditional approaches to learning.  
 
In a nutshell, the industry is expected to observe a significant growth due to the emerging technological infrastructure across various industries. Furthermore, the ongoing trend of game-based learning among organizations to achieve impressive performance from employees is expected to create immense opportunities for the market in the years to come.  

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Author’s Bio: Rosy Behera holds a bachelor’s degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering and now she has been working as a content writer for the last 5 years. Grabbing readers’ attention with a nice command of words and offering creative write-ups consistently are her biggest assets so far.