An Authoring Tool for Adaptive Digital Educational Games

Abstract

Digital educational games, especially those equipped with adaptive features for reacting to individual characteristics of players, require heterogeneous teams, which increases costs incurred by coordination and communication overhead. Simultaneously, typical educational games have smaller budgets than normal entertainment games. In order to address this challenge, we present an overview of game development processes and map these processes into a concept for an authoring tool that unifies the different workflows and allows close collaboration in development teams. Using the tool, authors can create the structure of a game and fill it with content without relying on game programmers. For adding adaptivity to the game, the authoring tool features specific user support measures that assist the authors in the relatively novel field of creating non-linear, adaptive educational experiences. Evaluations with users recruited from actual user groups involved in game development shows the applicability of this process.