Serious games and immersive learning simulations have become a very hot topic in training and education.

Serious games have the potential to significantly improve training and education activities and initiatives. You only have to observe an ‘average gamer’ at play to see that the computer & videogame industry has more or less mastered the art of using computer technology to not only captivate it’s audience but to also persuade it to spend approximately £10bn a year to use it.

If we compare a typical entertainment games technology-based experience with a typical learning technology-based experience the contrast is glaringly obvious. When was the last time you had to drag a learner from their PC at 11 o’clock at night whilst they pleaded; “Please…just another hour…I really want to finish this level”?

Entertainment games are demonstrably ‘engaging’. In comparison when the training industry uses the word ‘engaging’, there is an all too obvious incongruity.

The motivational virtues of videogames are what initially entice training and development professionals to look to games-based approaches but there is a lot more to serious games than simply using fun as a means to engage learners.

Simulations and role playing are two key genres of entertainment-orientated games that many people deem to be particularly appropriate for adoption as training tools.

A simulated environment (e.g. the user support desk), a simulated system (e.g. a production line) or a realistically recreated role play scenario (e.g. a sales meeting) can allow learners to experience something that is too costly, too risky or even physically impossible to achieve in the real world. You would not let your new management trainees run your business but you would like them to fully understand every facet of your business as early as possible. Serious games and immersive learning simulations can help you achieve this.

Repeatability is also a key strength of a game or simualtion-based approach. Learners can play out a particular strategy or adopt a certain approach. If he/she fails or does not quite deliver the desired outcome, then they can try again with a modified approach. ‘Learning by doing’ and ‘experiential learning’ are possibly overused terms but in this case it is very pertinent to building a deep understanding of scenarios, concepts, processes, environments and systems.

'Experience’ is a key word when people discuss using games-based learning. Games engage people psychologically - they can be very emotional experiences - and they also engage people physiologically. What is going on beyond the peripheries of the TV screen or computer monitor ceases to register to the user. Their heart rate increases, the hair on the back of the neck stands up and they may well end up laughing out loud at (or furiously cursing at) a virtual character who is actually nothing more than a collection of pixels and programming code.

Games are very good at using drama, storyline, humour and characters to create a compelling experience which, from a training point of view, develops memory hooks and means that learners not only remember what happened but also why it happened. If undertaken appropriately, games and simulations are the vehicle for embedding new knowledge and/or skills that can then be immediately applied in the workplace.

If you strip away all the techno-wizardry games are essentially highly experiential software applications which foster deep levels of cognitive activity e.g. higher-level thinking skills such as conflict resolution or negotiation.

Games are nothing more than a vividly recreated environment and/or system in which the user has to solve a problem or series of problems. Solving that problem, be it ‘how to kill 100 aliens as fast as possible without dying yourself’ or ‘how to settle a contractual dispute with a fictional client’, is what derives satisfaction on the learner’s part. If a serious game application enables the learner to solve that same problem for real (e.g. make a client and their own employer happy) then doubtless the learner’s employer will also derive satisfaction!

The ability to assess, for example, what strategies a learner adopted, how well he/she analysed and made sense of information and how well he/she explained and justified their decisions and how well they understand how their decision affected a specific outcome are what tells the trainer much about that person’s knowledge, competency, problem-solving skills and even their personality. Seriopus game and immersive learning simulation applications track all of this data in often staggering levels of detail and, if they are designed properly, provide this data to those that need to see it in an appropriate manner.

Serious game-based learning isn’t, however, about using simplistic ‘Pong’ or ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?’ as a means to teach people raw facts. That was the approach that edutainment took and which by and large failed for all except, perhaps, primary school children.

Serious games and immersive learnign simulations can be made to realistically represent a complex environment, system or process that is intrinsically relevant to the learner because it is what they recognise as being relevant to their vocation or career aspirations. That might be achieved by allowing them to explore a virtual oil rig for health & safety training (modelling a physical environment) or allowing them to run a virtual business (modelling a set of interrelated business activities, objectives and processes).