www.edge-online.com Episode Three in my series of video “lectures,” made in association with Edge. I’m pleased to introduce game designer James Portnow, cofounder of Divide By Zero Games. He and I will be partnering up to bring you these lectures from here on. Loosely modeled after Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw’s Zero Punctuation reviews. For the first time, NOT made to be presented on screen in the classroom. I can be reached at floydo_animation at yahoo dot com. James can be reached at jportnow at gmail dot com. Like the intro/outro music? Download the full tracks here! Penguin Cap www.carbohydrom.net Walk on Water ocremix.org
About admin
Wooo tangential learning.
Personally, two of the games that have truly motivated me to crave more knowledge have been the Touhou Project (obviously after a quick glimpse at my account) and Okami, both which deal with a great deal of Japanese folklore.
But after skimming through my games’ library, I realized that only those two and a handful of others actually have little facts and tidbits that are, at least, easily recognized. Guess we are still a long way to go. Or I need better games.
After watching this, I would like to point out one of my favourite games. Age of Mythology (from the Age of Empires series, you know ‘em) This was put in the setting of the mythological ages of the Greek, the Egyptians and the Norse. Not only did it include a long and well written story driven campaign which took you too places like Troy and Erebus. But also added the option for you to click on your unit’s picture and showed his background story. I learned mythology of 3 cultures with this game!
This is so true
I’m a fan of a series called Fate/Stay Night. It has many mythological characters in it and it got me interested in them.
Gilgamesh, Medea, King Arthur, Sasaki Kojirō, Hassan-i Sabbah, Angra Mainyu, Gilles de Rais, Lancelot of the Lake (a Knight of the Round Table), Heracles, Medusa, Alexander the Great, Diarmuid Ua Duibhne, Cúchulainn, Endiku, and more.
This also led me to learning their individual stories and terminology. It was a good two days…my head hurt at the end
I gained somewhat of a Spanish vocabulary from playing metal gear solid peace walker.
After playing God of War I started looking up information about greek mythology and history.
I learned a great deal about military technology and history playing the Metal Gear series.
I raised my hand when you asked about Sephiroth.
Great job with this and all of your lectures.
dude, spot on. agree 100% hell, your example on 3:38-3:42 is ME right there! your videos are great. keep doing what your doing!
The problem I see with this concept: The effect of additional referencial material in games is probably minimal, because those who care are already interested to look up a lot of topics on wikipedia anyway. But how can you engage those, who normally wouldn’t care about additional knowledge? I think this is something really hard to achieve. Brainwashing may be the simplest method.
Ha. I totally looked up Sephroth half-way through the video.
I have just found this series of videos and all I can say is: This guy is my hero
I’ve learned everything about foreign races and ethnicities by playing Street Fighter. Thank you, Hakan
Awesome vid, and totally true
i <3 Mass Effect 1&2
I actually contribute my great grades in school to video games. They helped me become much more open minded.
i learnt more from portal then a whole week from school
Why don’t you just play games and take the time too read a book?
I can personally attest that interest in a topic makes learning it quicker. I took an environmental science class and the thing I learned the fastest was how nuclear power works. Why? Because I’ve seen two people argue that it should replace most of our fossil fuel consumption and that it isn’t as dangerous as it used to be. This intrigued me but yet I never bothered to look up how nuclear power works (and since it’s been 2 years I’ve forgotten it too).
I had a conversation with my old English teacher, and for some reason I brought up God of War and after explaining what it was we got into this big conversation of the teaching potential of video games. It was interesting and I wish I remembered more of it.
I like the remix of hydrocity. And severely enjoyed this video. It’s a really good point, considering that I’m one of those guys who use Tangential learning, almost perpetually.
ive learned about the greek gods from playing god of war
Love the info you put out and the way you deliver it. Also some of the music in the beginning of these videos of yours sounds kinda familiar to me. In fact at the end of this one the music you used sounds like Hydro city from Sonic 3.
wow you are married. Congrats
Cmon we cant talk about sex
O my word… if only i had this video at my grasp when arguing with people that video games doesn’t teach people anything.
My argument that Street Fighter 2 taught me geography and that Ninja’s come from Japan got worn out, but at last, I have some thing to back me up. LoL.
Loved the video, research/knowledge and humor!!! Keep ‘em coming!!!
Dude, your videos are the best!