New GEElab recruit, Sean Elliot has hit the ground running with a paper being accepted into the 6th Annual Global Conference on Video Games Culture Project.

Co-authored by Sean Elliot and Cobi Smith, the paper describes a project to create a modification (mod) of the game Minecraft. The mod is a simulation of the surface of Mars, designed for teenage students in Australia. Players explore a Martian landscape in the creative sandbox game, collecting rock samples and sheltering from a potentially harmful sandstorm. The rationale for this project is education outreach for the Victorian Space Science Education Centre (VSSEC). One of the education programs provided by VSSEC is called “Mission to Mars”, in which students wear astronaut suits, explore and survey a geological reconstruction of the surface of Mars. The mod complements this physical world program in the virtual world of Minecraft. The project is a serious game with explicit education aims, specifically links to science in the Australian National Curriculum. Related curriculum covers the solar system, geology, environment, understanding science as a human endeavour and science in society. This project is novel in linking a physical simulated experience that specifically caters for school students from a particular geographical zone and education level, with a multiplayer game mod that will be available for all gamers, teachers and students, no matter their location. The relevance of these links for the broader science education landscape and concept of outreach in Australia and internationally is discussed.

Sean has been invited to present the paper as part of a panel from the 17 - 19 July 2014 at Mansfield College, Oxford (UK).