Abstract

Contemporary digital games do little to help novice and disadvantaged players wanting to learn to play. The novice-expert divide is a significant barrier for entry for disadvantaged groups who want to play digital games; this is especially true for women (Jenson, Fisher, & De Castell, 2011). In response to this problem, three new tutorial modalities and strategies for World of Warcraft (WoW) were designed in an attempt to improve the existing tutorials. These new tutorials offered different modalities of instruction, as well as instructional strategies in assisting players. Results suggest that players react favourably to a faded or “just-in-time” instructional strategy, showing significantly increased motivation for play, engagement, and play mastery. Implications for game design, and specifically game tutorial design, are discussed.

Citation

White, M. (2012). Designing Tutorial Modalities and Strategies for Digital Games: Lessons from Education. International Journal of Game-Based Learning, 2(2), 13-34. IGI Global. Retrieved March 26, 2023 from https://www.learntechlib.org/p/186690/.

Keywords

• digital games
• Formative Evaluation
• games
• learning and teaching
• tutorials