What can we learn from the last 20 years of Role Based E-learning? Analysis and critique

The paper presents an analysis and critique of the literature on online role play simulation games for education presented over the last 20 years at the various AACE conferences and journals as found in the EdItLib Digital Library. The analysis describes and critiques the way practitioners and researchers demarcated and understood the fields of online role play simulation games, it considers the design principles which they describe, and the theoretical conceptual schemes that are said to underlie such principles. The analysis, it is argued, shows that the field of online role play simulation games, which has significantly expanded during the last 20 years, is fractured to such an extent that it has become very difficult to evaluate the results of different projects. Some of the issues that disparately need to be addressed include theoretical conceptualization of what constitutes a role play simulation game, design principles that need to be more clearly articulated, and evaluation strategies need to be structured for comparisons to be useful