The GATE Education pilot attempts to showcase the future of education through demonstrating the possibilities of game based learning in the classroom. HKU's R&D program Applied Game Design, developed a race game that helps players to understand Newtonian physics. The game, called Carkit, proves that serious games can be fun...

The main goal of the pilot is to showcase the possibilities of game based learning to the educational sector and creative industries in a demo based on state of the art game design & development insights and techniques. CarKit demonstrates the potential of the application of games in the classroom in the form of a race game that enables children to play with the laws of physics. Furthermore the pilot aims at a better understanding of the (im)possibilities of the adaptation of educational content to a game context and to share this understanding with the educational sector and creative industries.

Towards a design methodology for educational games
The results of the GATE Education pilot consist of a fully playable demo of a state of the art race game validated in Dutch classrooms. HKU designed and developed a game as an addition to and embedded it in existing educational methods. The design posed several challenges: the game had to be fun to play and a rewarding experience in itself, but also had to succeed in motivating players to understand Newtonian physics and succeed in transferring the appropriate knowledge. Successfully translating educational content into game mechanics and gameplay is difficult. By using a highly iterative design method, allowing us to constantly validate concepts and design decisions both in relation to player experience and the educational context, we succeeded. At the moment we are close to delivering a demo that successfully faces the posed challenges. Apart from CarKit and its abilities to showcase the future of game based learning, the value of this pilot also lies in the knowledge we gained in regard to design methods for educational games. We were able to share our insights in regard to the design methods and design processes of educational games in several papers, presentations, demonstrations, workshops and symposia.