Designing a DEER-Toolkit: Enabling Educational Escape Rooms in a 2D Dungeon Crawler Game

Abstract

Digital Educational Escape Rooms (DEERs) have gained increasing attention as an engaging form of game-based learning. However, existing solutions often rely on web-based point-and-click interfaces that offer limited immersion, or on virtual reality implementations that require substantial development effort and specialized hardware. This work introduces a DEER-Toolkit integrated into a self-developed 2D multiplayer dungeon crawler game environment, designed to balance accessibility, interactivity, and educational value. The toolkit provides configurable puzzle mechanics, collaborative gameplay elements, and lightweight learning analytics to support facilitation and post-play reflection. To illustrate its capabilities, a short cybersecurity-themed DEER scenario is presented, designed for one to three players and playable within ten minutes. The demonstrator highlights how narrative framing, interactive object-based puzzles, and adaptive scaffolding can support active learning in a compact format suitable for classroom or workshop use. Future work focuses on developing authoring tools to enable educators to create their own scenarios and on evaluating the toolkit’s effectiveness in authentic teaching contexts.