Educational aspects of the Circuit Warz 

Circuit Warz is a pedagogically and theoretically sound serious game designed to teach advanced electronic/electrical circuit theory where students must use and apply their knowledge and understanding of circuit theory to bias a series of electronic circuits successfully to complete the game. The game is designed to ensure a high level of user engagement and replayability with a competitive leaderboard element and analytics to measure student retention.  To complete the game successfully the student needs to have a clear understanding of both the underlying circuit theory and its application.  The figure below shows the level type, player objective on each level, the related theory and the learning outcomes for each level. 

The game has main modes, training levels (7 x individual training levels available to play on line on this website) and the main game. The training levels allow the students to practise and learn the theory. The main game is effectively a form of assessment. 

Circuit Warz uses a summative and formative approach to assessment. Formative assessment is stealth based/implicit and carried out throughout the game, continuously monitoring student progress and providing feedback through the HUD and Generator status boards. This approach has a number of advantages as it can be carried out in real time without interrupting the user’s flow.  Elements of formative assessment include the time taken to complete level(s) and score achieved per level.

Summative assessment is carried out at the end of the game with an overall total accumulated score and awarding of in-game achievements and badges to the player e.g. achieving a score of 100% on a level within a constrained time period. A global leader board adds a competitive element to the game allowing the student to benchmark their performance against others.