My blog text is inspired by Hassan’s lecture about gamification. Gamification means making activities more interactive, similar to video games. Hassan showed three examples of what gamification can be like: a zombie-themed exercise program, a Hogwarts-themed classroom and Google News, a service that awarded badges for reading different types of articles.
Since Hassan only briefly mentioned these examples, I wanted to think more about them. Why would people try these activities instead of the normal versions, and would using them be effective? I decided to focus on the exercise program, since it sounded like the most interesting one to me.
I do not use exercise programs myself, but I can understand, if others like to use them. These programs make it easier to know how much a person has being exercising. This is good for people who are serious about getting enough exercise done. A normal exercise program could be boring for some people, since it only shows numbers, and nothing else.
Adding zombies into an exercise program can make it more interesting, and basically turn it into a game. If this game is fun to play, it could get exercising people to do more exercise. They could then recommend the program to other people, who exercise less than they do. This could help more people get into shape, even if they do not normally exercise much.
This program seems to be somewhat similar to egg hatching in Pokemon Go. To hatch eggs, players of Pokemon Go also have to do enough exercise. However, players can cheat in the game by travelling slowly in a car. This way, players would not have to do any exercise themselves. I do not know if this cheat also exists in the exercise program, but it is possible.
Cheating would ruin the purpose of the exercise program, since it is made primarily for exercising, it just has some game-like elements added into it. Since Pokemon Go was primarily made to be a game, it is not as bad, if people cheat in it. It is likely that cheaters are only a small minority, and that most exercisers and players would exercise without cheating.
Adding zombies in an exercise program seems to be an improvement for it. An otherwise boring program can turn into a game-like experience. More people can also get interested about exercising, which can cause them to improve their health and spend more time outdoors. Similar positive results have happened with Pokemon Go, so it is possible they would also happen while using a zombie-themed exercise program.