Creative Games sans Violence?

jolyon_jnr asks: "I'm looking for games to use in an unusual educational setting: a school within a Juvenile Detention Centre. I don't set policy, so the 'no violence' is a fixed criteria. I want to engage students' creativity and problem solving skills, without using 'boring educational software'. I've thought of Lemmings and The Incredible Machine. What other suggestions can you offer? Please bear in mind that most students have very low literacy levels, but will learn if motivated sufficiently."

Comments

Mindrover

[Evangelion]

Cognitoy makes an excellent (and engrossing) game called Mindrover, in which you have to design and program a vehicular robot to do certain things (follow waypoints, chase another robot, or destroy the opposing robot).

I don't know if a vehicle-on-vehicle rocket launcher qualifies as 'violence' or not (since these are very clearly toy robots going at it), but it's certainly an awesome game, even apart from it's educational value.

Loki has also ported it to Linux, and thier port is flawless.

I know it sucks, but...

[Spagornasm]

Did you consider any of the Myst series? Those can engage the eye candy requirement, and also help them develop complex problem solving skills...that is, if they understand different bases and number theory :-)...

Low literacy levels?

[liquidweb]

To suggest a solution as well as a direct statement of their literacy, I'd suggest anything in the "You Don't Know Jack" series. Seriously though good stuff.

Re:Low literacy levels?

[JabberWokky]

The biggest problem with any trivia game is that it requires that you learn the trivia in your own time, and it does not really teach any information.

Having taught in a "school within a school", I can tell you that what seems to work for your mental frame does not translate. That is *not* to say that the students are dumb... in fact, some of the single mothers and drug addicts (yes, Florida throws them in together; genius) are well read and/or were good students before they entered the alternative systems. Also, they get all the nice new computer systems.

There is hope for these kids, but even more than "mainstream" students, you have to focus on their individual issues. And (and I hate this as much as you do), you have to pick which ones to give up on to focus on the ones you *can* help.

Bah - there's a reason I *used* to teach. Maybe I will again... but not until I feel I can do it without becoming irrevocably cynical.

--
Evan

Oregon trail.

[Bad_CRC]

Worked great for us oldtimers. :D

Old board games:

[pallex]

Chess, backgammon, go.
Scrabble, trivial pursuit.
Kensington (if thats available in computer form)

carmen sandiego

[bigpat]

I liked Where in the world is carmen sandiego... put them on the other side of the law.

http://www.learningcompany.com/SubCategory.asp?C ID =244

Retro games

[MSBob]

Retro games should fit the criteria you specify. I don't know about their educational value but most will certainly meet the "non-violence" criteria. The ones that come to my mind include: Tetris, Manic Miner, Pirates, Boulder Dash etc. Often times they are more exciting that todays offerings and are pretty cost effective to purchase.

For a modern collection of PG rated titles try most things published by Nintendo. Actually Mario 64 was an excellent game in itself and a pretty challenging one too.

Hope this helps.

Droidworks

[Chelloveck]

Lemmings qualifies as non-violent? The game where those cute little guys can fall off cliffs, be fried by flamethrowers, blown up, drowned, decapitated, and squished? That Lemmings? :-)

Anyway, I recommend Droidworks. You build droids to solve various puzzles, then pilot them in an over-the-shoulder view. My kids love it.

Re:hmmm

[garcia]

I wonder if The Sims would have a good or bad impact on them. Would they want to have the families fail and fight or would they learn from the positive growth of the people within the game?

It would be interesting to see how each child would react.

mudding

[Cederic]

Get them into mudding. Find a mud that focusses on exploration and quest solving, rather than fighting. Then it meets the non-violence criteria.

Several advantages to muds (MUD, MUSH, etc:
- boosts literacy (text only feedback means you HAVE to read)
- teaches you to type fast
- social interaction
- intelligent inquisitive types will want to learn how to extend the mud == learning to code == gaining rather useful skills
- people will try to figure out how to cheat. This is healthy - it means they are applying creative thought.
- making the kids admin the mud puts them in a position of responsibility

~Cederic

Any adventure game

[dagashi]

Monkey Island 2, 3 and 4 are all great games where you have to think quite a bit... and best of all, you get to laugh too.
Don't miss out on Grim Fandango either.
All above from LucasArts.

I also enjoyed playing the Qing's/Space/Heroe's Quest games (Sierra) alot.
The Dig(LucasArts) is also a great adventure game not to be forgotten!

They're all non-violence.

Lego Alpha Team

[trichard]

Lego Alpha Team is a game that makes the player solve spatial puzzles to continue to the next level. The puzzles require the player to place special blocks that change the direction of movement of the on-screen characters.

In effect, you "program" the movement to accomplish a specific goal. In fact, the playing process reminds me a great deal of programming. Kind of an edit-run-debug sort of process. You have unlimited time and lives to complete the puzzles (unlike actual programming, I guess).

All of this is wrapped up in a action/adventure story-line which keep it engaging. My eight-year-old son loves this game and I enjoy playing it too.

Check out the game's home page and a review at Kid's Domain.

trichard

The Bridge Building Game!

[ObligatoryUserName]

I've recently been consumed by the non-violent fun found in Bridge Builder (fulfill all your secret engineering fantasies), as well as the cartoon physics motorcycle puzzle game. Bridge Builder is Free (as in Beer), and the motorcycle game has an 18 level shareware version.

NO!

[alta]

great, just we need a bunch of kids stuck in fantasy land when they get out of the joint. I can see it now, they get released, what do they do?

Go north
go north
go east
pick up stick
beat old man
You've gained experience!
You've looted 3 silver pieces!
Go east
go east...