Using games to develop ideas and awareness for business isn’t new, but it appears to be growing in popularity at the moment, perhaps driven by the buzz around game mechanics and gamification.
For instance, EDF Energy is just launching a game for young engineers, which lasts for 3 weeks in January 2011, and involves you in an interactive adventure game to devise and produce energy and consume it efficiently. If you happen to be a young engineer, you can sign up here. Oh, and there’s a handy video:
All the world’s a game, and all the men and women merely players, with apologies to Shakespeare. More importantly, I think we’ll see a greater pace of gaming adoption by companies once more, and a larger number of gaming-based promotions proving to be successful by offering better interaction, engagement and rewards than in the past, due to the fact so many more people have a far greater understanding of how games actually work.