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GETTING WAR (GAMING) BACK INTO THE WAR COLLEGE

"SHALL WE PLAY A GAME?" These are the iconic words from the 1983 movie WarGames, in which a high school student unknowingly hacks a government computer system to play a game called "Global Thermonuclear War." The protagonist sets off a chain of events that blurred the lines between gameplay and reality until the wayward artificially intelligent computer ultimately concluded that no one could win a nuclear war, a thoughtful revelation inspired after playing Tic-Tac-Toe with itself.

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How Games Make You Better at Strategy

Play is the best way to consolidate any form of information. It is the language children speak, adults utilize it to encourage team building, and it's a great way to instigate competition. When we look at the importance of games, either in a professional environment or as a way to learn, we need to see the benefits of what play can do. Games are a fantastic resource, even when they are used in a passive sense, such as video games or in a testing environment such as a learning game. But how do games make you better at strategy and becoming a better strategist?

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The game-based learning phenomena

One of the ways of digitizing the school curriculum was found to be the concept of 'game based learning'. For instance scrabble was introduced to teach students spellings, chess to improve their critical thinking skills, Kreigsspiel game was used to teach strategy and many more games had been there. The idea behind game based learning is to teach something by repetition, letdown and triumph of success.

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Massive study of video games for learning offers good news about the future of safety education

Video games are often advocated as educational tools that can increase students' knowledge through entertainment. Published studies about the effectiveness of video games in education and training are limited in both the number and diversity of participants, lacking the robust evidence that needs a very large, varied, worldwide sample.

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How Riot Games' board game Tellstones weaponizes memory

No more than six minutes into the game we were accusing one another of blatant cheating and resorting to pot shots about memory loss. As I paced back and forth in the bedroom, my pride wounded and my dear wife cackling triumphantly in the living room, I asked myself: how can one simple game like this provoke such a reaction? Sure, I don't like losing, and plenty of board games are rage-inducing, but this hit different.

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Why neural networks struggle with the Game of Life 

Despite its simplicity the Game of Life remains a challenge to artificial neural networks, AI researchers at Swarthmore College and the Los Alamos National Laboratory have shown in a recent paper. Titled, "It's Hard for Neural Networks To Learn the Game of Life," their research investigates how neural networks explore the Game of Life and why they often miss finding the right solution.

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How Can Videogames Help You in Real Life

Although most teenagers’ parents assume that videogames are just bad distractions from the important things in life, there is evidence out there that suggests otherwise. Of course, gaming for long hours every day isn’t good for your mind or body, but in moderation, gaming has been said to have some amazing benefits for learning and cognitive ability. In this blog you will learn three main ways that video game skills can help you in real life, transferring your hangout hobby into an actual life skill which can be used practically too.

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"What Makes A Good Board/Card Game Rulebook?" Live Presentation

This panel will review game rulebooks in depth. It will cover the purpose of your rulebook; striking a balance; and the process of writing and revising the rulebook. The structure of the rulebook will be covered from different sections including statistical information, components, theme, overview, setup, core loop, and game end. The way that you organize the contents of this rulebook is important for informing the player experience. Your voice in how you write your rulebook is as important as testing it out with your playtesters. Finally, edge cases; applications of rule books for games based learning; and action steps for writing your rulebook will be covered in detail.

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