The Rise of Corporate Games

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“We are calling it SafeTour,” Mackay says. “The objective of the SafeTour project is to develop a training tool using computer simulation technology to train Alcoa employees in the potential environmental, health, and safety hazards they may encounter in a manufacturing plant plus explain the countermeasures in place to protect employees from those hazards.”

Even tech companies are using serious games. For the last five years, Cisco Systems Inc., the computer software and hardware giant, has been developing a variety of games for training, promotion and social networking. In the training space, the company has developed games for its Cisco Certification program, one of the premiere networking certification programs in the world.

“Many people preparing for a Cisco Certification examination choose a variety of self-study methods such as e-learning or printed study guides,” said Jerry Bush, a program manager for Cisco Systems who works in the Learning @ Cisco group, that is responsible for the development of the Cisco Certification program. “We also find that most students who attend traditional instructor-led classes still spend a great deal of time in self-study. To support these individuals, we built several websites that provide offerings such as practice quizzes, access to mentors and of course, learning games.”

The Binary Game is one of the games used in the certification program, and it teaches strategies related to the binary number system, a foundation knowledge used by Cisco certified professionals to install, configure and operate local-area networks (LAN), wide-area networks (WAN) and access services for small networks. The game plays like a game of Tetris or Lumines where rows of 1s and 0s appear from the bottom of the screen and the player clicks the 1s and 0s to create binary numbers. The players earn points when they answer correctly but the game becomes more difficult when rows begin to appear faster and faster. As the players advance through the game, they begin to recognize patterns and develop conversion strategies.

“Learning games offer a fun and effective way to study,” Bush says. “We have found that some topics can actually be learned better by using the right learning game."

The demand for games-based training is huge, but it doesn’t stop there. Video-game technology is now being used in data collection, market research, promotion, polling, and a plethora of other areas. But people who develop and consult in the serious games space are hoping for bigger and better things—like an office between the accountant and the marketing coordinator at your average corporation.

“The question becomes, are investments in game technologies something that’s strategic to an organization across the board, much the way investments in websites, intranet technologies, communications, and video-media production are?” says Sawyer. “Why aren’t we applying that same mentality to games?” Given the recent hype surrounding Google's foray onto Second Life's turf, serious corporate thinking about serious games just might be a lot closer to reality.