Why games work and the science of learning

This paper will examine learning games, which is the use of games to introduce material, improve understanding, or increase retention. A lot of research has been done on learning games in recent years, and the results are sometimes nothing short of amazing. As an example, consider the Navy’s Damage Control Trainer (DCT). In our studies of DCT, we showed a 50-80% improvement in individual recruit performance after just one hour of game time.1,2