In Real Life

A Kotaku Reader Has Big Plans And Sees A Big Future, For The ‘Year Six MMO’ He Built

If you ever complained about homework increasing as the days got longer and the weather warmer, well, the tables have been turned. Ben Bertoli is up late doing a lot of it himself as the school year ends.


April 20, 2012
In Real Life

Iowa Journalism School Adds Video Games Writing To Curriculum

This fall, the University of Iowa’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication will offer a course in writing about video games and reporting on the industry.


April 10, 2012
In Real Life

North Korea Has A Tractor Simulator. It’ll Plough The Fields Of Your Mind.

The wizards in North Korea created this: a computerized simulator that teaches students how to drive a tractor.


March 19, 2012
News

Grade-School ‘MMO’ Launches Site, Plans Kickstarter Drive

ClassRealm, the role-playing game/teaching system developed by educator and long-time Kotaku reader Ben Bertoli, has launched a website to help share the game with other schools and teachers interested in it. Bertoli says a Kickstarter project is planned soon.


March 5, 2012
In Real Life

How One Teacher Turned Sixth Grade Into An MMO

Editor’s Note: Ben Bertoli is a long-time Kotaku reader and commenter, a lifetime, dedicated video gamer and a sixth-grade teacher in Indiana. He reached out to Kotaku this past week to share the story of how he turned his class into a role-playing game. The enthusiasm and motivation of the children in Bertoli’s class evoke the success stories seen in gamified experiences such as Fitocracy. Here, Bertoli explains his creation, ClassRealm, how it works and what motivated him to develop it.


February 18, 2012
In Real Life

SOE Competition To Award $10,000 Scholarship

Sony Online Entertainment has just announced their fifth annual “Gamers In Real Life” (G.I.R.L.) scholarship competition. Although the acronym has always mildly annoyed me, I think the program itself is great. Winners receive $US10,000 in scholarship funds and the opportunity for a paid internship at SOE’s San Diego headquarters.


February 4, 2012
PC

Noxious: A Free, Student-Made Dead Space Clone

Kotaku AU

It looks like an extremely early build of Visceral’s Dead Space, but it’s not. The clip above is a full play-through of Noxious, the final project for the Game Development/Art class at Full Sail University in Florida. If you want try it for yourself, it’s available as a free download.


December 4, 2011
Mobile

NSW Universities Rejigging Degrees To Include App And Games Development

Kotaku AU

At the two developers I’ve worked for, there’s always been a strong demand for talented programmers. You honestly can’t get enough of them. It looks like NSW’s educational facilities have recognised the growing need for developers and has realigned a number of courses to be more in tune with the current state of the interactive industry. Namely, iPhone and Android app development.


November 5, 2011
In Real Life

Video Games Promote Creativity In Kids

I was under the impression that it took a creative person to fully appreciate everything video games have to offer. According to recent research conducted at Michigan State University, I may have had that backwards. Does playing video games make you more creative?


PC

MinecraftEdu Distributes The Building Blocks Of Games-Based Education To Classrooms Everywhere

Joel Levin at the Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School in the US used popular indie block building game Minecraft as a learning tool for his second grade computer class. Now he’s a part of the newly-launched MinecraftEdu, a program dedicated to spreading Minecraft-based learning to classrooms around the world.