Engaging professionals is not trivial as they are exposed to too many messages every day. The only way through is to make the most of each of their micro-moments of availability combined with the power of gaming.
Learning new research skills without even noticing it. This is the idea of DervalResearch’s new story-driven serious game City of Mystery. While exploring Amsterdam, and solving a mystery, participants will discover at their own pace the latest advances in neurosciences, user experience (UX), and luxury management. The interactive game targeted at researchers and curious minds lets participants decide how they want to react at each important step of the story. No prior knowledge is required to follow this educational adventure.
The eight episodes, with a total duration of approximately 66 minutes, are offered to 50k+ professionals and students from Paris to Shanghai, in partnership with corporations, universities, and business schools.
The game was designed following nine principles of sensory immersion that help boost engagement:
1. Use a targeted vocabulary and tone
Meaningful learning helps memorising. So using participants’ vocabulary is key: scanning their recent posts can help identify and use their top words. As season 1 of City of Mystery caters to 50k+ professionals and MBAs from Paris to Shanghai, the tone had to be current. No need to over-“bro” or to “emoji”-your-face to connect, but Shakespearean language might be too stiff. Also the conversation should feel comfortable whether you come from Tallinn or Dubai. Involving DervalResearch’s diverse teams of designers, scientists, and researchers helps keep the game cool and global.
2. Present information in its context
As each piece of knowledge is embedded in another one, learning with a context is recommended. What has been demonstrated is that some people are more likely to encode data in a sequential way (with data organised in categories) while others are more likely to encode data with their context, in an indexed way (all data connected to each other) (Derval, Bremer 2012). Games, even if serious, therefore need to adapt to each persona’s brain structure. For some, learning a list of tools will be helpful and for others, learning the different applications of the tools will be more effective.
3. Adapt the content to different types of personas
Adapting to variations in learning styles is also key. Some personas for instance need to know all the rules of the game beforehand: starting to learn with an overview of the tools, content, and business cases instead of just exploring will greatly help them.
“The learners are in control of their experience, which breaks the stereotypical and unilateral teaching approaches we know. City of Mystery is a great example of ‘Blended Learning’ that is particularly effective for next-generation learners,” highlights Jean-Baptiste Andreani, Director of IFA Paris luxury and fashion business school. “The serious game developed by DervalResearch is an ideal tool, that allows to explore a complex discipline such as neuromarketing or luxury anthropology, through a series of fun and interactive adventures.”
4. Develop a design maximising the flow and receptivity
Being in a deep physiological rest mode is very conducive for learning (Caine 1991). When creating City of Mystery, we were inspired by Japanese popular OTOME, story-based video games, and thought their flow was perfectly adapted to the new learning experience we wanted to propose.
Similar to animated print used in advertising as a replacement to movies, a serious game gains from using slower animation and not too flashy colors. This will prevent the “vampire effect”, where you remember an ad that was awesome but forget what the actual product or brand was (Derval 2018). In the game, we need to make sure the knowledge and the learners stay at the center.
5. Connect with existing and familiar knowledge
Linking to the familiar is key in the engagement and learning process. People are often taught complex topics like geometry in a very abstract way without any attempt to link this new topic to familiar items like doors and windows. Multimedia tools like stories, designs, and music are very powerful as they connect with the natural mental space (Caine 1991). And gaming is a perfect combination of all of the above.
In City of Mystery, we for instance draw a parallel between diamond lab growing techniques and a more familiar device like a microwave thus facilitating technical learning.
6. Talk about topics that engage and increase responsiveness
Time and place neurons encode memories, together with multisensory input. But to encode a memory, it has to be worth it! Relatability and receptivity are the key filters. An event we cannot relate to simply slips over our memory and ends up in the “to be sorted later pile”. If we are not receptive, the event will not even be perceived (Derval 2018).
Studying topics participants like will help connect. Including nice sceneries, historical anecdotes, and luxury insider information makes our game even more engaging, according to the learners.
7. Capture and retain attention throughout
The best way to start any topic and catch attention is to introduce an eye-opening anecdote or experiment, or exciting case studies on appealing brands.
Using surprising and controversial content helps trigger discussions, as it helps a group focus on a shared conversation (Medina 2008). In our example, we designed a game with a mystery to solve in the background, with friendly as well as unfriendly characters, just to spice things up. The interactive scenario by proposing to choose from three options helps keep the participant’s attention (you can check the interaction mode in the screen recording of a scene from City of Mystery).
While exploring Amsterdam, and interacting with engaging characters to solve the mystery, participants discover at their own pace the latest advances in neurosciences, sensory perception, ethnography, research, user experience (UX), and anthropology of luxury.
8. Validate the interaction and provide take-aways
For an added-value content provider it is important to make sure learners “are asking the right questions, they know where to find the answers, and what to do with them” (Caine 1991).
Validating the acquired knowledge with a test and a certificate came naturally. And as the objective is to learn, the quiz includes un-missable hints and leads to the take-aways. Participants who complete the quiz get a certificate validating this introduction to neurosciences and anthropology of luxury journey.
9. Deepen the content with additional information
Accessible via the Internet on mobile, tablet, and PC, this first season of City of Mystery is designed for professionals, students, and curious minds who want to learn more about human behavior without complicated reading.
That being said, additional readings are mentioned for those who want to sharpen their freshly acquired knowledge.
City of Mystery just entered Fast Company’s 2019 Innovation by Design Awards, in the Learning category, and you can start playing and learning this summer:
Link to the City of Mystery game: http://www.derval-research.com/CityofMystery/
City of Mystery on Instagram: @cityofmysterygame and on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CityofMysteryGame/
References
Caine, R.N., Caine, G. (1991). Making Connections: Teaching and the Human Brain, Dale Seymour Publications.
Derval, D., Bremer, J. (2012). Hormones, Talent, and Career: Unlock your Hormonal Quotient. Heidelberg: Springer.
Derval, D. (2018). Designing Luxury Brands: The Science of Pleasing Customers’ Senses. Heidelberg: Springer.
Medina, J. (2008). Brain Rules. Seattle, Pear Press.
About Diana Derval
Diana Derval, PhD, EMBA, is Chair and Research Director of DervalResearch, Harvard Business Review contributor, and neurosciences lecturer at Sorbonne Health MBA and adjunct Professor of Innovation at Donghua University.
