Ask&Answer: An educational game where it pays to endear your capricious virtual companion

Abstract

This paper presents a competitive, educational, novel multi-user game that involves two groups of human users and a single virtual character. Within this game, it pays for the users to create social bounds with the virtual character, and to adapt the natural language, typed input to the limited natural language processing faculties of the agent. We expect that the socially complex scenario will enhance learning pleasure and efficiency. The game also aims at clarifying educational, technological and conceptual problems related to the creation of social bounds with virtual agents, and to the use of natural language in this context. Specifically, this game is an environment where the concept of a rationally profitable social relationship with a virtual agent can be examined. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2005.