Awesomenauts

The game

This week I played Awesomenauts. Awesomenauts is a 2D multiplayer online battle arena (moba) computer game. The game is both a competitive and cooperative game. Players compete as a team of three against three other players (team red vs. team blue). Using waves of minions, players fight the opposing team to destroy their turrets and eventually their home base. Throughout the match, players gain experience and currency to power up their character.

Currently, there are over 20 unique characters for players to choose from and they each have a specific role and special abilities. Throughout the match, characters can unlock badges by completing challenges, leveling up and gaining prestige. More examples of the badges can be found below.

My experience playing the game

I had a blast playing this game. I have tried to get into other moba style games in the past, such as Defence of the Ancients (DotA) and League of Legends, but Awesomenauts is a faster paced version of those games and take less time on average to complete. Traditionally mobas are five players vs five players but Awesomenauts is three players vs three players, which, in my opinion, makes the combat and gameplay more manageable. The goal, as I described above is to destroy enemy turrets and eventually their home base (known as the core).

Badges are incorporated into the game for two reasons. First, they give players additional challenges to complete when playing the game, and second, they allow players to showcase their mastery of the game. For example, the badge called Snorkel pipe boost, which requires players to slay the solar boss before the 2:10 minute mark, has only been completed by 0.6% of players. Having that badge on your Awesomenauts account gives the player a level of prestige that most other players (99.4%) do not have.

The story of the game is not required but makes the art and feel of the game more relatable. The game was designed to resemble a Saturday morning cartoon show from the 80s or 90s, as can be seen in this Awesomenauts trailer released a few years ago (complete with theme song).

Knowing the story of the game is important as it helps the player identify the goal and primary objective of the game. Taken from the Awesomenauts official wiki, “The year is 3587, conflict spans the stars. Huge robot armies are locked in an enduring stalemate. At the center is a team of elite mercenaries fighting for the spoils of war: The Awesomenauts” (Awesomenauts Wiki, n.d.).

While knowing the storyline helps give the player valuable background knowledge for the setting and goal of the game, knowing the background and history of each character provides further understanding of the characters’ play styles and special abilities. The character backstories are often humorous, which adds to the game's charm. A full list of character backgrounds can be found here (further down the page).

Visual assessment tool

Please find my visual assessment tool for Awesomenauts below.

• Blank assessment tool here.
• Completed assessment tool here.

I decided to create a rubric that incorporated badges as well. The better the game did in the different categories, the more elaborate the badge looks. For example, an “outstanding” game has a very elaborate badge associated with it (it has wings, a crown, and a nice ribbon), while a game that is “well done” has only a crown and ribbon. A game that scores below satisfactory receives no badge at all! I have included a feedback column for all criteria to further elaborate on how the game met the various criteria.

The criteria I focused on this week was: short-term motivation through badges, long-term motivation through badges, did the inclusion of bages increase overall motivation to complete the tasks, challenge of obtaining various badges, the gameplay, the storyline, definition of the goal, and replay ability.

Explaination of assessment criteria

1- Short-term and long-term motivation through using badges

I thought this would be an interesting criteria for assessment and one that I decided to include based on the Harmon and Copeland (2016) article. In table 2, they ask students a series of questions using a likert scale (1-7) about the effectiveness of badges for motivating them in their learning. Harmon and Copeland asked students whether, in a few years time, badges they received while doing their course work would be more meaningful than their course grade. No surprise that the overwhelming majority of students said that no, the course grade would be more meaningful in the long term (p. 95). It was that question in Harmon and Copeland’s research that influenced my decision to include both short-term and long-term evaluation in my criteria for assessment.

Awesomenauts, as part of a larger online community called Steam, rewards players for getting badges across a number of games. This makes the collection of badges in Awesomenauts reflect on their Steam profile. For that reason, I thought Awesomenauts provided excellent short-term motivation (while the player is working on their in-game progress) and long-term motivation (since the badges reflect on their overarching Steam profile).

2- Overall motivation through the inclusion of badges

When I read Harmon and Copeland (2016), I knew that I wanted to include an overall evaluation of the effectiveness of badges in this game. As we can see in the reading, a number of student responses in the Harmon and Copeland study felt that the course grade was more important to them than the collection of badges. However, a number of students felt that including badges was more effective in informal learning environments as opposed to formal learning environments (p. 96).

When I played Awesomenauts, I felt the combination of short-term and long-term motivation from the badge rewards made me continuously try to unlock the next badge.

3- The challenge of obtaining various badges

Overall, I thought the badges available to unlock in Awesomenauts included varying degrees of difficulty. According to Jane McGonigal (2011), creating a perfect balance between a hard challenge and achievability is the key to effectively providing the user with the feedback to know their skills within a game are progressing and that they are getting better (p. 24).

I thought this applied to the challenge of unlocking different badges in Awesomenauts. Although some of the badges were extremely easy to unlock, these gave the player a positive emotion and motivated them to continue. However, the more challenging badges gave players something to aspire towards. They were not easy and they took time to unlock. However, once the player unlocks them, there is a great sense of accomplishment.

4- The gameplay

I wanted to include a more general criteria for the game, in this case, gameplay. In my opinion, a game can include all the necessary components to make a good game, but if it isn’t fun, why play it? According to David Michael and Sandra Chen (2005), “fun is not an ingredient or something you put in. Fun is a result” (p. 20). I see gameplay as an all-encompassing category in my assessment tool that includes game mechanics and an evaluation of whether a game was fun or not.

Awesomenauts provided great gameplay and I found myself wanting to try new things, get better and progress as far as I could on the leaderboard. The depth the game provides to the player is a defining factor for whether a game can continue to be fun and challenging, both in the short and long-term.

5- The storyline

The inclusion of storyline evaluation in my assessment was very important. According to Kapp (2012), the story element of a game can provide the player with relevance and meaning to the game experience (p. 41). The assessment tool that I developed for the scavenger hunt game had no need to evaluate storytelling. As Kapp argues, “[s]imple games like Tic-Tac-Toe are not guided by a story” (p. 41), however, “a surprising number of simple games have more story behind them than you think” (p. 41).

When applying storytelling to instructional games, it allows players to apply the encountered situation to their own experience through such elements as characters, plot, tension and resolution (Kapp, 2012, p. 42).

Awesomenauts makes great use of story to set the stage for the arena that players compete in, as seen in this short trailer for the game. I discuss the trailer more in the evaluation of the aesthetics of the game below.

6- Defining the goal of the game

According to McGonigal (2011), goals are what players are working to achieve while playing the game (p. 21). Without a clearly defined goal, the player doesn’t know what they are trying to accomplish.

Awesomenauts has an incredibly simple and well-designed tutorial map that every player needs to complete before they can jump into competitive matches. The tutorial is even built into the storyline allowing players to map the goal of the game to the overall story.

7- Aesthetics of the game

I have included aesthetics as one of my assessment criteria for this week’s badge game. According to Kapp (2012), visual elements are present in all games and are an important element. Without effective visual cues, the game runs a serious risk of reducing the overall experience of the player (p. 46).

Awesomenauts makes great use of visual cues to set the tone of the game. The cartoon-like graphics make the game feel fun, inviting and familiar. It makes you feel like you have taken a step into the past and it allows you to make an immediate connection with the characters and the world.

Elements of the game that could be adapted to an IS game

A number of games incorporate badges that display current player level, and Awesomenauts is no different. One of the most motivational aspects of Awesomenauts is increasing your account level. A badge is included next to your character’s name in battle as you level up your account. Although it does not directly associate with skill level, it does correlate to time investment in the game. Someone with a higher rank has typically invested more time into the game. This tends to be seen as a prestigious mark. I think this could be applied to an IS game to show how much of an expert a player is in mastering library skills. For example, a student who levels up in a certain library skill can put points toward their overall player rank, while adding badges such as catalogue searching and book location, or library knowledge could showcase individual skill levels. For example, I might be an overall level 7 library user, but I have a gold rank in catalogue searching.

References

Awesomenauts Wiki. (n.d.). The official Awesomenauts wiki. Retrieved from http://awesomenauts.gamepedia.com/Awesomenauts_Wiki

Harmon, J., & Copeland, A. (2016). Students' perceptions of digital badges in a public library management course. Education For Information, 32(1), 87-100. doi:10.3233/EFI-150964

Kapp, K.M. (2012). The Gamification of learning and instruction: game-based method and strategies for training and education. Retrieved from http://discover.sjlibrary.org/iii/encore_sjsu/record/C__Rb5018864

Michael, D. R., and Chen, S.L. (2005). Serious Games: Games that Educate, Train, and Inform. Boston: Course Technology. Retrieved from http://discover.sjlibrary.org/iii/encore_sjsu/record/C__Rb2863826

McGonigal, J. (2011). Reality is broken: Why games make us better and how they can change the world. New York: Penguin Press.

Ronimo Games. (n.d.). The Awesomenauts. Retrieved from https://www.awesomenauts.com/