Turn your content into a training game.
Learn to gamify your training, step-by-step.
No programming, special tools or magic required.
- Your employees see compliance training as a chore.
- Your training only partially translates into action.
- Your learners don’t look forward to training.
- You struggle to increase your course completion rate.
- Training is seen as a “necessary evil” in your organization.
- You have to chase down managers to ensure mandatory training gets done.
You know that attention is key to learning, and that when learners are disengaged, training is not effective. Yet, your training’s objectives are important – life and death in some cases. But when learners aren’t engaged, learning objectives are only partially met, and content is incompletely understood or quickly forgotten.
You may have been intrigued by some gamified training programs… but the last thing you want is to distract learners from your content. How to draw the line between engagement and distraction? Or perhaps you wonder if you have the time, budget, or the know-how. Who has time to learn new tools?
The truth is that effective gamification is highly accessible, no matter what tools you use or what your skill level is. The most useful gamified training programs start with solid instructional design. It’s not about adding frills, gimmicks or distractions. It’s not about squeezing your content into a pre-existing game format, either. It’s not about programming skills, technical wizardry, or fancy graphics. It’s about understanding how to present your content in the form of stimulating challenges to awaken the learner’s drive to go through that journey from piqued interest to confident mastery.
Fundamentals of Gamification
The course for trainers, educators and instructional designers. Finally available online.
Sign up below to be notified when the next cohort opens!
What it’s all about
A 4-week course including weekly training, exercises,
live feedback sessions and PLAYABLE demos.
Step by step process
Rewards systems, skill building, interface design, psychology of motivation, replayability… where do we start? At step one, that’s where.
The course will take you through the entire process from content mapping to the finishing, polishing touches on presentation.
Beyond badges
This course will fill your design toolbox with tried-and-true motivational mechanics that are proven to be effective. And you’ll learn exactly when to use each one for optimal results in any training situation.
That means no more guesswork – you’ll design with confidence.
Results-oriented
Game mechanics must serve your course’s learning objectives, not the other way around. Results are the name of the game.
Focus on methods and techniques that smooth the learner’s journey toward acquiring knowledge and building skill, not gimmicky mechanics.
Any course, any tool
No special tools needed! Whether you’re making e-learning or instructor-led training in a classroom, you can apply these design techniques to drive learners and make your training unforgettable.
Playable examples
Play your way through examples in order to gain that gut-level understanding. Then, adapt them to your particular audience, content and setting.
Straight to the point
Your time is valuable, so this course aims to get you to creating gamified training programs, fast. It focuses on actionable techniques and step-by-step processes to quickly get you designing.
You will be able to:
- Turn your content into fun challenges
- Pique learner curiosity about your content
- Leverage game mechanics to maximize retention of information
- Design an effective reward system that optimizes skillbuilding
- Confidently pick the best game mechanics for your audience and content
- Apply the right tool to fix spikes in difficulty or dips in learner motivation
- Avoid mechanics that feel gimmicky
- Reduce the learner’s cognitive load
You too can gamify your training. Here’s why.
Gamification is really about organizing the information and challenges to engage the learner, make them pay more attention and persevere so that they remember more information and master skills faster.
Game mechanics don’t depend on any specific tools: You can apply them to your courses, whether you are making ILT or e-learning, whether you’re using Storyline, Captivate, PowerPoint, pen and paper, or rocks and bits of string. Your courses can leverage the power of game mechanics no matter what tools you’re using.
A little goes a long way: Game mechanics certainly don’t require fancy graphics, massive budgets or endless development cycles. Once you know how to think in game mechanics, you’ll be able to apply them instantly to your training designs.
The nitty gritty
Format
This is a hybrid course. That means every week, you get lessons, as well as an accompanying workbook, exercises and playable demos to work through at your own pace. Later in the week, join us for live discussion, review, feedback and Q&A.
Audience
This course is designed for instructional designers, teachers and trainers. It is specifically aimed at teaching how to use gamification in training programs to facilitate the attainment of learning objectives.
Tools
The techniques shown in this course work with any tool you use to build your course, from pen and paper or Powerpoint for classroom games to gamified e-learning programs made with Storyline, Captivate or any other authoring tool.
Duration
Fundamentals of Gamification lasts four weeks. Each week, you will receive the weekly course content (45-60 minutes of instruction, weekly exercises/workbook/playable demos) plus an optional 45-minute live session with the instructor for feedback and Q&A.
Community
Got questions? Need inspiration, feedback, or just need to share your achievements? Your fellow students are there for you. By enrolling, you’ll get access to an exclusive community. Share your great ideas!
Applications
The principles taught in this course apply to any form of training. Whether you are a classroom educator or an e-learning developer, you’ll be able to leverage the power of gamification in your own courses.
Learn at your own pace,
AND get live coaching.
Up your training game. Design with confidence.
Your Instructor
Hi, I’m Marie-Jo.
I’m known for my curiosity, no-nonsense attitude and passion for trivia (and dogs!).
After 10 years as a corporate trainer, I jumped into the wild world of games. As a producer working with Marvel, Disney, Sega and Ubisoft, I saw first hand how effortlessly games help players build skills, and give them memorable moments they talk about for years.
The trainer in me thought: Be memorable? Build skill? This is what training should do!
So after 10 years as a trainer and 10 more as a game maker, it was time to merge the two, and so 42 Comets was born. We have made gamified training programs in the fields of medical education, manufacturing, HR, transportation, and so on.
Throughout this journey, I have taught college-level game design and for the past 7 years I’ve been showing instructional designers how to gamify their courses. And I’ve learned something from every person I’ve taught.
Now, for the first time, Fundamentals of Gamification is available online. I can’t wait to see what you build!
Thanks for joining. Let’s do this!
Jo
Fundamentals of Gamification: Course content
We start by learning the fundamental ingredients of games, from tic-tac-toe to tennis to Super Mario.
- Anatomy of a game
Then, we jump into the step-by-step process:
- Analyzing your content to reveal the underlying game
- Designing the basic gameplay loop
- Criteria for a successful challenge
- Building a level template
- Range of outcomes
Once the core game loop is built, we continue the step-by-step process:
- Varying challenges
- Prototyping for design
- Setting the win condition
- Handling player failure
- Fostering player autonomy and building mastery
- Intro to difficulty balancing
- First playable!
This week we fill your design toolbox with motivational mechanics, and you will learn when to use them for optimal effect.
- Intrinsic motivation vs Extrinsic rewards
- Content gating
- Points
- Powerup types
- Collections
- Effective badge systems
- Bonus missions
- Shaping behavior through a motivational system
- Setting up a rewards system
This week is all about making sure the player understands their goals and progress, and feel clever going through your training game.
- Communicating with the player
- Signs and feedback
- Effective tutorials
- Theme and player fantasy
- Playtesting
- Fixing issues with difficulty
- Notes on polish and art style
Once you’ve been through the process, you will unlock new tools to best match your content:
- Complex game types
- Multiplayer mechanics
FAQ
Yes! Each week, you’ll have access to a live, instructor-led coaching and Q&A session (in case you have questions after doing the week’s work).
It’s best if you can attend the coaching sessions to ask your questions on the spot, but hey, life can get in the way.
If you can’t make a Q&A session, submit your questions ahead of time and they’ll be answered anyway. Then watch the recording when it’s convenient.
Yes! If the course doesn’t work for you, you have 14 days to request your money back. Although our students have loved the course so far we want to make sure you get value for your money and find the class helpful.
“Live” sessions means we meet on Zoom for the Q&A. If you prefer to meet in real life, check out our in-person workshops.
Workbooks and bonus cheat sheets are downloadable, so you can keep them forever! Enrollment includes access to all other materials (class recordings, community access, etc) for three months.
Yes. You will have immediate access to all content released up to your day of enrollment. The rest of the material will become available to you when it is released to all students.
Oui! Certaines cohortes sont offertes en français. Abonnez-vous pour être avisé des dates.
(Is the course also offered in French? Yes, in some cohorts).
Next session starts in summer 2022!
Fundamentals of Gamification
Special introductory offer
Regular price 797.00$
Now 447.00$
Want to go beyond basics?
Check out our other courses.
Coming soon
Advanced Gamification of Training
Fundamentals of Gamification – The Sequel! Now that you know how to structure your content into a training game and motivate learners to breeze through it, it’s time to go deeper! This course teaches you how to use cognitive mechanics to turn your content itself into interesting puzzles and immersive simulations.
Running now
Custom workshops
Launching in 2022
Live workshops range from the half-day Fundamentals to a 2-day Masterclass in gamification of training for your team.
Contact us and let’s schedule a course for your team.
Launching in 2022
Build an Escape Room with Storyline
Using your own content (or the included sample content) you will build an escape-room training game in Articulate Storyline.
This is a step-by-step guide to designing and building your escape room training game, for designers working with Storyline.