Over the last few days I have been attempting to create a fusion of my research and teaching agendas by getting students in my intermediate German conversation class involved in the DigiBahn Project. In class we have discussed - auf Deutsch, sogar! - language as a sociocultural tool that we use to structure reality and,…Read more DigiBahn Comes to the Intermediate German Conversation Course

A new screen capture of the DigiBahn game, including a new model of the church (St. Andreas Church in Weißenburg in Bayern):I also tweaked the camera to provide a more realistic human perspective; the point-of-view (POV) is much taller than in prior screen captures. In any case, we're making great progress on the game so…Read more New DigiBahn Screen Capture and New Training Resources

One of the features of Half-Life 2 that impresses me time and time again is the seamless sense of flow that the game narrative, virtual spaces, and ludic activity provides. Unlike many other games that front load a large amount of interface training thinly masked as plot development or avatar "education" (America's Army 3 comes…Read more Flow, Narrative, and Idealized Sociocultural Spaces

One of the primary difficulties facing the DigiBahn Project is the development of realistic 3D models to simulate an authentic German environment. One workaround we have been employing is to mine the Google 3D Warehouse for models and exporting them into Blender as a COLLADA file.The workflow is fairly straight-forward:Download the SketchUp model as a…Read more DigiBahn, Blender, and Google SketchUp

I have been busy since 3:30 AM this morning, working on getting a basic prototype of the DigiBahn game ready for the 2009 ACTFL Annual Conference. I know that it won't be until November 22, but I'm afraid that once the semester starts the first week in September, I'll get too busy with other things.…Read more Nothing But Blue Skies…

Thinking about how the DigiBahn game could eventually be used in a language classroom has led me back to thinking about language itself, specifically its "play-like" nature: We can "play" with meaning of words and even entire games focus on using language in playful contexts. Seen within a communicative framework in real-life settings, language and…Read more The Play of Language

I have been experimenting a bit more with Blender to get the animation for the street sign in the pedestrian zone just right. Although it still doesn't look exactly the way I'd expect it to look in real life, the use of specular and bump maps has given the model a more realistic appearance than…Read more Specular and Bump Maps; New Screen Capture Software Needed?

For the last few days, in addition to getting a handle on the Blender Game Engine and Python scripting language, I have also been working on developing a workflow for creating 3D game models. Thinking that starting off small would probably be the best way to go, I decided to create a mesh texture for…Read more Fun with Specular Maps and Stanley Fish

I just love free programming resources, don't you? Since the Blender game engine uses Python as its programming language of choice, I recently decided to dust off my coding skills (I went all the way up to C3, data structures and algorithms, while retooling as an unemployed, post-PhD graduate) and get more involved with Python.…Read more Delving Into Python: Free Stuff!

It occured to me a few days ago that a game level map would not only help us visualize the direction in which we want to go, but would also help us in marking progress and keeping track of what meshes we need to create in order to complete the level. So, after a few…Read more Game Level Map: A Good Start

Did a quick run-though today of the DigiBahn game with the Blender game engine (BGE). I was able to find a script for mouse/camera control on the Web, although it is using Python 2.5 and many of the functions – its seems – have been deprecated for Python 2.6. Future development in Blender 2.49 and,…Read more DigiBahn + Blender Game Engine

Well, it took me the better part of the evening to render ~ 13 seconds of video in Blender, but I finally got it knocked down. I didn't take too much time for cleaning up or smoothing the meshes, so some areas are a bit rough. I just wanted to test out Blender's animation capabilities…Read more First Animation Render in Blender!

While rendering the first test images of Stuttgart Central in Blender a few days ago, I couldn't help but notice that the handrails on the moving walkway were a bit "chunky," for lack of a better word. This part of the mesh was actually the most difficult part to create as it required me to…Read more Saved by a Python Script

There is so much literature out there about computer games, DGBL, and education, it is sometimes a bit overwhelming to find a good overview that can quickly provide an orientation point for future research. In the past I have suggested Richard Van Eck's Digital Game-Based Learning as a starting point, but a few days ago…Read more DGBL Primers, the New Sesame Street, and Elon University Students

For the last few weeks we have been working on getting meshes created in Maya and Blender. Just to see what they look like together, I threw some together this morning for a quick render: In the next few days I will focus on getting the handrails on the escalator ironed out; the mesh here…Read more Initial Blender Experiments

Three dimensional digital game-based learning (3D-DGBL) environments and instructional simulations provide several advantages for the teaching of the humanities and foreign languages, including the ability to foster constructivist learning environments and provide personally-tailored and highly motivational instruction; the promotion of student-directed learning, free inquiry, and exploration; and the power to emulate remote or inaccessible real-world…Read more 3D-DGBL and Instructional Simulations for the Humanities

In October 2008 the Elon University Digibahn Project began modifying The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) game with a freely available game editor (TES Construction Set) in order to build a proof-of-concept game prototype. By April 2009 we had imported a few basic 3D meshes, developed an instructional blueprint, and programmed some…Read more Modding a COTS Game

It was during a temporary job that one takes between academic positions when I was reintroduced to computer games. I say “reintroduced” because I grew up when the Atari gamestation, Pac-Man, and the mall video arcade were coming of age. Although my junior-high school friends spent numerous hours – and quarters – in dimly-lit rooms…Read more A Journey of Ten Thousand Vertices