UXP_FB_Logo copy.jpg

News

AI smashes video game high scores by remembering its past success

An artificial intelligence that can remember its previous successes and use them to create new strategies has achieved record high scores on some of the hardest video games on classic Atari consoles. Many AI systems use reinforcement learning, in which an algorithm is given positive or negative feedback on its progress towards a particular goal after each step it takes, encouraging it towards a particular solution.

Read More
Teacher to fund Playing is Learning initiative with AZEdNews Classroom Grant sponsored by

Schreen Marvin, a teacher at Centennial Elementary School in Flowing Wells Unified School District in Tucson, will use the AZEdNews Classroom Grant sponsored by Davidson/Belluso for her Playing Is Learning initiative. "The Playing is Learning initiative brings game play and building back to the classroom to teach multiple subject area concepts in a fun and engaging way," said Marvin, who teaches second grade in a Title I school that serves children with diverse backgrounds.

Read More
Video Games Aren’t Just for Teenagers

According to an AARP survey, 44% of adults over 50 years old played video games in 2019 at least once a month-the average is five hours a week-compared with only 38% in 2016. The AARP survey includes players of all sorts of computer or video games, and the majority say they play puzzle and logic games, such as Sudoku or Words With Friends.

Read More
What motivates us when we turn something into games?

Self-Gamification is turning our projects, activities, and our whole lives into fun games, of which we are both the designers and the players. I think the biggest reason for so many people to go to games as inspiration is the experience of FUN. When talking about fun, I love quoting Heidi Klum, a German-American supermodel and television personality, who had been one of the four judges on America's Got Talent for many years.

Read More
Volunteers in video game study self-report positive well-being

A team of researchers at the University of Oxford working with two video game makers has found that volunteers who play video games self-report a positive feeling of wellbeing. In their paper published in the journal Royal Society Open Science, the group describes experiments they conducted with volunteer game players and what they learned from them.

Read More
Mobile Game Design: 4 Factors That Enhance User Experience

No matter how entertaining or original the concept of a mobile game, if the user experience is not up to scratch, it will neither gather momentum nor earn an audience. So what is the difference between a well-oiled mobile game from a UX perspective, and one which is just average or even worse? Here is a look at the factors which determine this, so you can keep them in mind if you decide to develop your own interactive creation.

Read More
Why travel guessing game GeoGuessr is gaining popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic

A computer game could hardly succeed in replicating the luxury experience of a fortnight in the Maldives, but one game in particular has been bestowing its players with a little escapism, sightseeing and global knowledge. Geo Guessr, a game which places you in a 360º photograph taken somewhere in the world and challenges you to pinpoint where you are on a map, has had a surge in interest in recent months, as talented players build large followings on Twitch and YouTube.

Read More
Gamification And Microlearning: The Ideal Combination To Deliver Excellent Online Training

Traditional training methodologies like classroom-based learning have gradually given way to more modern learning strategies. Most organizations use the combination of gamification and microlearning because it adds a bit of interaction and fun to your eLearning content thus, providing more rich and structured learning experiences to your learners.

Read More
Study Reveals Pigs Can Become Excellent Video Game Players

A new study reveals that pigs are not only very intelligent animals, but are great at gaming too. The paper appeared in the Frontiers in Psychology journal, and showed how two Yorkshire pigs, Hamlet and Omelet, and two Panepinto micro pigs, Ebony and Ivory, became adept at playing video games. The pigs were trained using a "Rudimentary joystick-operated video game task" that was first developed to test chimpanzees and rhesus monkeys.

Read More