Here’s a question for those of you who are developing museum interactives, particularly museum educational games.

How much are these games developed for only one setting. E.g. an in-gallery kiosk OR the web. How often are they developed for both platforms (web and gallery)?

I’ve been looking at the games that museums share via their websites, but I expect there are many more that have been developed only for in-gallery usage & are inaccessible to everyone except on-site visitors. There are some good reasons this is the case, e.g. the in-gallery games are designed to be used with a touchscreen or other custom input interface. What are the hurdles to getting these out to a broader audience?

Just thinking:

1. it might be interesting to be able to aggregate a selection of museum games to make some comparisons, e.g. conducting some focused testing (this 24hr Museum has kindly done this for online UK museum games)
2. would people be willing to turn over executables for comparison (or maybe that question should be – who would you be willing to turn executables over to?)
3. There are a number of efforts underway to preserve console and PC games. Where will the groundbreaking museum interactives end up?

I’d also point museum game developers to the Values at Play and Social Impact Game Contest 2007 that just opened up this week. Surely there are some museum-based games that qualify.

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
•