Strategies for Using MMORPGs as Educational Environments

MMORPGs, such as EQ2, are fully formed and fully functional worlds, albeit virtual ones. To utilize them as educational environments requires the instructional designer to create an online portal, an entryway controlled by the instructor.

Benefits and Limitations of MMORPGs

The benefits of utilizing MMORPGs as educational environments are numerous.

MMORPGs and Educational Assessment

Traditional educational assessment (e.g., multiple-choice tests and essays) is a by-product of the Industrial Age emphasis on mass-production. There were simply not enough teachers for the overwhelming number of students and so ways of quickly judging student work were developed. It should be noted that these assessment methods do not directly measure any real-life skills (except test-taking).

Assessment in MMORPGs

In EQ2, players explore a rich 3D environment set in the fictional, geographically vast world of Norrath. A player can create multiple characters by choosing from a variety of classes and races (e.g., humans, trolls, dwarves, elves, etc.). They interact with other real players and computer-generated NPCs (Non-Player Characters) and embark upon quests for treasure and experience points, which are a measure of a character's advancement and improvement in skills.

Advantages of MMORPG Performance Assessment

Traditional educators have yet to embrace the kind of automated performance assessment featured in MMORPGs. However, even casual observers of training trends will have noted the ascendance of simulation games in which performance assessment is automated.

MMORPGs and Curricular Evolution

Curriculum and the subjects that comprise it evolve over time and are always a reflection of the society in which they are embedded.

MMORPGs and Virtual Economies

MMORPGs are becoming incredibly popular worldwide, attracting millions of players and generating billions of dollars of revenue.4 In EQ2, players explore a rich 3D environment set in the fictional, geographically vast world of Norrath.

Traditional Economics Content and MMORPGs

There are no accreditation standards for economics education at the college level. However, in 1986 Hansen5 proposed five proficiencies that all undergraduate economics majors should achieve and these proficiencies have been endorsed by Becker6 in 1997, by Salemi and Siegfried7 in 1999, and by Carlson, Cohn, and Ramsey8 in 2002. Below are Hansen's proficiencies.

MMORPGs and Information Age Economics Content

MMORPGs represent a new instructional paradigm. And, as with all new paradigms, fundamental changes are inevitable. MMORPGs make possible not only new ways to deliver traditional economic content, but also new kinds of economic proficiencies as well as new ways to assess these proficiencies.

MMORPG Predecessors: Computer Games

The first computerized role-playing games didn't have many of the bells and whistles of today's 3-D games. Text-based role-playing games, like multi-user dungeons (MUDs), took the idea of multi-player role playing to the online world. Particular types of MUDs include MUD object-oriented (MOO) and MUSH games. In games like these, lines of text describe the game world for multiple players.