“Goin’ Social” Mobile Development and Game Creation in Museum Exhibits
The following was mega-comment I left on Nina Simon’s excellent blog post “Where’s the Mobile Museum Project for Intact Social Groups?” My comment addresses other comments on the post as much as it does Nina’s article. After writing my comment I figured it might make a good post to my own blog.
There seems to be a contradiction in some of the arguments here. First there is a discussion that museums should go beyond the audio tour and be creative and do more with mobile devices, specifically use it to expand the social experience. but then there seems to be the argument inferring that smartphones – specifically the iPhone, is a minor part of a larger mobile market and we need to design for even-access to technology and make sure dumbphones, which make up the largest part of the mobile market, are included.
A museum can attempt a “one size fits all approach but I suspect it will severely tie it’s hands when it comes to solutions for the user and social experience. Taking a scavenger hunt and moving it from paper to mobile without adapting it to use the power of the technology is not much better than using mobile for audio tours. You might as well just keep the scavenger hunt on paper and the audio tours on tape recorders.
One interesting thing is that iPhones account for 50% of all mobile browser traffic for U.S. based smartphones, and 33% of global smartphone site visits. That number is being challenged by Android but still both Android and the iPhone ofter a rich user experience with an intuitive interface not to mention the legions of developers working on apps, something not available for most mobile devices.
Not only can a museum can have iTouch/iPad (or Android equivalent) devices to loan or rent out with the app preinstalled, but users with their own devices can download the app or maybe even a lite version of the app and they can play out the game by themselves or join others.
By interacting with objects and people in the exhibit through 2-D barcodes or through RFID tags you can not only find and harvest objects you could trade them with others, cash them in for points or use them to build a spaceship/train/boat at a common interactive terminal and move on to a higher goal.
The important point here is game development, particularly if you want your mobile to “go social”. I suspect that exhibit developers are great at telling stories but telling stories is a much different skill set than writing/creating games. To create a game you have to understand about game parameters such as scalability, complexity and setting as well as game archetypes such as treasure hunts, survival games and economy games. I suspect the lack of the social mobile experience at museums could reflect a lack of game development experience itself.
