Using Lore to Teach in Games
Video games, like any good story, can be great teaching tools. The two main reasons for this are that people like to be entertained, and that being emotionally invested in a tale helps its message sink deeper. This, coupled with interactivity, have passed the torch to video games for teaching through stories.
There’s plenty of ways to teach through games, but today I’ll be focusing on lore. I want to share three games with you today that use it effectively to encourage players to pause the game and learn more about the digital world they’re exploring.
Valiant Hearts — Ubisoft
Valiant Hearts: The Great War is a 2D puzzle/adventure game developed by Ubisoft Montpellier. It explores the different sides of World War I through four characters: an American, a Belgian, a Frenchman, and a German.
Usually, there’s no HUD during gameplay, but when the player finds, for instance, a collectible, it’s hard not to notice the menu that suddenly pops up. Having such a big notification intrigues the player into pausing the game, where they can read about the item, the location they’re in, and how this relates to the war.
The game presents the information effectively. The text, while detailed, is never too long and is always relevant to the story at that moment. The key thing about the “lore” here is that it’s not dry facts about battles or historically significant events — the primary focus is on people, how their lives were disrupted and affected.
“I’d love for people to play the game and for it to go some way towards helping them appreciate how stupid this kind of war is … I hope that our generation, which is able to communicate on a global scale, can maybe begin to make a change. Boundaries have changed so much, and communication has improved so much. Making games like this — sure, perhaps it can help. Maybe it can inspire someone to think differently.”
— Adrian Lacey, Ubisoft IP development director (1)
Never Alone — Upper One Games & E-Line Media
Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna) is an atmospheric puzzle-platform game developed by Upper One Games in collaboration with E-Line Media. The game is infused with Iñupiaq culture & values, produced in collaboration with Iñupiaq elders. I definitely recommend reading more about their development process here, but for now, let’s focus on how it teaches players.
In contrast to Valiant Hearts, which teaches through text, Never Alone centers a series of mini-documentaries throughout the game. As the player progresses, they gain access to new videos on topics appropriate to the narrative. The game has plenty of stopping points that make it feel comfortable to pause and watch the clips, but even if the player doesn’t watch them immediately, the loading screen prompts them to watch the documentaries before progressing. Since they’re so short and so relevant to the gameplay, it’s quite pleasant to take a break and watch them (but there’s no penalty if the player doesn’t).
“We want the game to be infused with the Native Alaska culture … This is not a documentary. We are not trying to literally teach you exactly how the elders live or what their ceremonies look like. We want to infuse it with the values that have stood the test of time within the culture.”
— Alan Gershenfeld, founder of E-Line Media (2)
Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey Discovery Tour — Ubisoft
Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey is an action role-playing game developed by Ubisoft Quebec and set in ancient Greece. It’s the second Assassin’s Creed game to include a Discovery Tour — the first one was Origins, set in Egypt, and their latest game Valhalla will add one later this year. The Discovery Tour allows the players to explore the world in character and visit different locales without worrying about dangerous missions.
Odyssey effectively combines text and videos to educate the player about the location they’re touring. When the player follows the tour’s stops, they encounter animated cutscenes full of cinematic camera work and smoothly narrated descriptions of culture, history, myth, architecture, and/or daily life. If the player steps off the golden path, though, they can find Discovery Points. There, the player can look at real-life photographs and read a short blurb and what they’ve just found. The result brings our theories on what ancient Greece might have been to life in a beautiful, exciting way.
“I wondered what it would be like if our society decided to dedicate a tiny proportion of its wealth to creating more and better products like Discovery Tour. What might our children become, if we encouraged them (and ourselves) to spend time deep inside the lessons of history, science, ethics and humanity, instead of skating above them aboard textbooks?”
— Colin Campbell, games journalist (3)
Video games are a great use of digital space to pass on history and culture through storytelling. Not only are these three games fun, but they’re also accurate enough to be used in conjunction with classroom materials.
If you’re interested in learning more about these kind of games, you can read more here:
- Q&A: Telling human stories of the Great War with Valiant Hearts
- Video games encourage Indigenous cultural expression
- Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey’s educational Discovery Tour mode is here at last, and better than before
