Playing with the Past: Into the Future

Description

Since the turn of this century (and even earlier), a plethora of projects have arisen to promise us bold new interactive adventures and immersive travel into the past with digital environments (using mixed, virtual or augmented reality, as well as computer games). In Playing with the Past: Into the Future Erik Champion surveys past attempts to communicate history and heritage through virtual environments and suggests new technology and creative ideas for more engaging and educational games and virtual learning environments. This second edition builds on and updates the first edition with new game discussions, surveys, design frameworks, and theories on how cultural heritage could be experienced in digital worlds, via museums, mobile phones, or the Metaverse. Recent games and learning environments are reviewed, with provocative discussion of new and emerging promises and challenges. Preface Acknowledgements Images Funding for the Palenque Project Academic Advice Advice Scripting and Materials From General Archeological Advice Contents About the Author List of Figures List of Tables 1 Virtual Travel: Being Not Quite “There” 1.1 Virtual Travel 1.2 Being Not-There May Safeguard the Place 1.3 Share by Being Not-There 1.4 The Implications for Virtual Travel 1.5 Videogame Tourism 1.6 Learning via Virtual Travel 1.7 The Thorny Issue of Engagement 1.8 Four Major Problems 1.9 Virtual Reality and Cultural Significance References 2 Virtual Environments: Constraints and Possibilities 2.1 Virtual Environments 2.2 Moving Past the Picture Frame 2.3 Technological Constraints 2.4 The Convergence Phobia: Where is Widely-Distributed Technology? 2.5 Size, Speed and Rendering Issues 2.6 We Still Lack Meaningful Content 2.7 We Experience More Than Tangible Objects 2.8 The World is More Than Visual Stimuli 2.9 Different People See Different Things 2.10 Personalization is Missing 2.11 Where is Contextual Evaluation? 2.12 Summary of Implications for Virtual Environments References 3 Space and Place in Cyberspace 3.1 Place in a Virtual Space 3.2 Experiential Types of Place 3.3 Place as Unique Experience 3.4 Sublime Places of Terror and Awe 3.5 Evocative and Atmospheric Place 3.6 Place as Stage and Playground 3.7 Place as Trace and Palimpsest 3.8 Place Requires Embodiment 3.9 Place Requires Paths and Centers 3.10 Response to Place Requires Ongoing Feedback 3.11 Place Requires Social ‘Embeddedness’ 3.12 Place is Mark-Able 3.13 Evoking Place via Arts and Sciences 3.14 Architecture 3.15 Art and Artifacts 3.16 Literature 3.17 Film 3.18 Cultural Geography in Place and Culture 3.19 Cyberspace Critics and Criteria 3.20 Cyberspaces Lack Limits 3.21 Cyberspaces Lack ‘Play’ Through Objects 3.22 Cyberspaces Lack Life History 3.23 Cyberspace Concepts and Terminology 3.24 Suggestions for Creating Cyberplace 3.25 Three Types of Virtual Environments 3.26 Inert ‘Explorative’ Environments 3.27 Activity-Based Environments 3.28 Cultural or ‘Hermeneutic’ Environments 3.29 Matching Virtual Environments and Technologies 3.30 Terms 3.31 Summary of Place Theory References 4 Culturally Significant Presence 4.1 Why Photorealism Does Not Convey Cultural Significance 4.2 Virtual Heritage is Not Realism 4.3 Phobic Triggers and Experiential Realism 4.4 Archaeology and History is Not Set in Concrete 4.5 Confusion over Cultural Presence 4.6 What is Culture? 4.7 What is a Culturally Significant Place? 4.8 How Culture is Learnt 4.9 Social and Cultural Presence 4.10 Hermeneutic Richness, Cultural Agency 4.11 Culture in Virtual Worlds 4.12 Useful Cultural Presence 4.13 Culturally Significant Presence 4.14 Summary of Cultural Presence Theory References 5 What Have We Learnt from Game–Style Interaction? 5.1 Defining Games 5.2 Defining Game–Style Interaction 5.3 Useful Features of Games 5.4 Engaging Features of Games 5.5 Case Study: Heretic II 5.6 Dynamic Places 5.6.1 Dynamic Place Design: Unreal Palenque and Xibalba 5.7 Constrained Tasks and Goals 5.8 Interaction Modes in Palenque Using Adobe Atmosphere 5.9 Constrained Tasks in Journey to the West 5.10 Social Agency: Avatars Agents and Actors 5.11 Agency in a Marco Polo Game 5.12 Artifacts 5.13 Mapping to Aid Navigation for Egyptian Mythology 5.13.1 Mapping Through Drawing 5.14 Game-Based Learning 5.15 Game Genres and Cultural Learning 5.16 Issues of Time: Interaction Versus Historical Authenticity 5.16.1 Ancillary Non-celebrity Characters 5.16.2 Autonomous Action, Immutable Results 5.16.3 Groundhog Day 5.16.4 Possible Worlds 5.16.5 Diary of Emotional Development 5.16.6 Surfing Memetic Drift 5.16.7 Augment History with Real World 5.16.8 Augmented Cultural Exchange 5.17 Dynamic Places 5.18 Game-Based Evaluation 5.19 Summary of Games–Style Interaction References 6 Playing with the Past: Case Studies 6.1 What is Virtual Heritage? 6.2 The Problem of Culture 6.3 Virtual Heritage Case Studies 6.3.1 Online Bespoke Environment: Virtual Forbidden City, China, 2005–2008 6.3.2 Bespoke Museum Game: Discover Babylon, 2006 6.3.3 Commercial Learning Games: Global Conflicts, Playing History 6.3.4 A Protest Game Mod: Escape from Woomera, 2004 6.3.5 Virtual Egyptian Temple (2005 Onwards) 6.3.6 From a Game Mod to a Commercial Game, 2021 6.3.7 Fictional Archaeological Game: Heaven’s Vault, 2019 6.3.8 Commercial Game Series: Assassin’s Creed (2007 Onwards) 6.3.9 An Academic Research Game: Saxon Game 6.3.10 Never Alone (2014 Onwards) 6.4 Summary References 7 Mixed Histories, Augmented Pasts 7.1 What is Augmented Reality? 7.2 Blends of Augmented Reality and Augmented Virtuality 7.2.1 Inserted Walk-About Reality, University of South Australia 7.2.2 Overlaid Walk-About Reality, Columbia University 7.2.3 Bubbled Reality Example 3: Mawson’s Huts, Antarctica 7.3 Other Types of Augmented and Mixed Reality 7.3.1 Phone-Based Augmented Reality 7.3.2 Augmented Virtuality 7.3.3 Audio Augmented Reality 7.3.4 Participant and Audience-Augmented Virtuality 7.4 Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, and Virtual Heritage 7.4.1 Smart AR Case Study 7.4.2 Mixed Reality Heritage Case Study 7.5 XR and the Metaverse 7.6 Summary References 8 Evaluating Virtual Heritage in the Future 8.1 Testing That Which is Not Yet Fully Tested 8.2 Evaluating Cultural Learning 8.3 Virtual Heritage Evaluation 8.4 Expert Testing 8.5 Content and Media Comparison Studies 8.6 Physiological Testing 8.7 Task Performance 8.8 Surveys/Questionnaires 8.9 Ethnographic Evaluation 8.10 Evaluating Virtual Heritage Environments 8.11 Task Performance and Game Evaluation 8.12 Statistical Methods Suitable for Virtual Heritage Projects 8.13 Evaluation Case Study: Palenque 8.14 Pilot Study 8.15 Evaluation Questions 8.16 Observations 8.17 Fitting Evaluation into Infrastructure 8.18 Summary of Evaluation for Virtual Heritage References 9 An Open Conclusion 9.1 Cultural Understanding Through Digital Interactivity 9.2 Future Research References Index