Game mechanics, Role play, and Narrative - Critically learning values through games

In 2018, the Swedish Parliament decided to make the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child a civil law, which will be implemented in the year 2020. The consequences of the decision are not unproblematic. The public debate, as well as research, shows that parents have a problem seeing how their style of parenting could correlate with the Convention’s legal text. The parents express hopelessness towards the notion of child upbringing. This thesis is an exploratory pilot study aiming to prepare and generate new knowledge for a project commissioned by Save the Children with the goal to develop a game to decrease the knowledge gap between parents and children regarding what the Convention means for their relationship. The thesis also asks the question: how can a game, played by parents and children meant to teach them about soft values in accordance with the Convention look like. Beyond traditional qualitative research methods, this thesis used Research through Design and developed a presumptive prototype for the project in order to explore the research subject. Findings showed that the games narrative and the power to change the narrative through player choices play an essential part in the participant’s ability to immerse in the game, and that this interactive narrative is closely connected with the ability to learn. The thesis also shows designer directions to consider when developing a game meant to teach the players about soft values