First Person Cultural Trainer Wins Serious Games Showcase Award

January 30, 2012

The First Person Cultural Trainer (FPCT) has been awarded the Best Game award in the Government Category of the 2011 Serious Games Showcase and Challenge. FPCT is sponsored by U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command G-2 Intelligence Support (TRADOC). The Serious Games Showcase was part of the Interservice/Interindustry Training and Simulation Education Conference (I/ITSEC), and was held in Orlando, Fla., from November 28 through December 1.

FPCT is a research project from the University of Texas Dallas Arts and Technology (ATEC) program, has won a national award for serious gaming. FPCT is a four-level simulation game that allows Army leaders and other personnel to practice interacting with civilians in "culturally correct" ways. The game features a branching conversation system, methods for displaying non-verbal communication, and environmental perception. Its creators also claim that it can be ported to different game engines with "minimal redevelopment."

"This honor and the overall visibility that FPCT, UT Dallas and ATEC received at I/ITSEC this year is a real tribute to our sponsors at TRADOC, students, faculty, project staff and administrators who have nurtured this project for going on four years," said Dr. Marjorie Zielke, ATEC assistant professor.

As part of the award, the development team received a floor space at the conference where live gameplay was demonstrated. Developers from other ATEC serious games projects gave demonstrations throughout the entire conference.

In addition to winning the award, Zielke, Dufour and ATEC Research Manager Gary Hardee presented a paper titled "Creating Micro-expressions and Nuanced Nonverbal Communication in Synthetic Cultural Characters and Environments," which highlighted some of the new FPCT development recently completed in October.

Earlier in 2011, FPCT earned first place in the Innovations in DoD Gaming Competition at the GameTech Users’ Conference in Orlando. In 2010, FPCT won the cross-function award from the National Training and Simulation Association (NTSA).

Source, Image Credit: UTDallas.edu.
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Andrew Eisen: Needless to say, a chunck of those might not be inclined to plunk down their dough for Nintendo's new console when they just bought a competitor's, compounded with the fact that Nintendo has shown little interest in catering to their needs.02/22/2012 - 5:43pm
Andrew Eisen: If Nintendo is serious about courting the core gamer, it can't just ignore them until it releases the Wii U. They'll just get their fix somewhere else.02/22/2012 - 5:40pm
Andrew Eisen: A game which didn't light the sales charts on fire but didn't bomb either. In fact, from what I've read, NA sales make up a good half of that game's worldwide sales. Not to mention the good will Atlus garners by continuing to cater to gamers.02/22/2012 - 5:34pm
RedMage: Especially when the likes of Atlus seem to have no problem doing a great job localizing something niche like Catherine.02/22/2012 - 2:20pm
Uncharted NES: Entertainment Industry Embraces New Business Model: Suing Google For Third-Party Android Apps That 'Promote Piracy'- http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120221/08245617830/entertainment-industry-embraces-new-business-model-suing-google-third-party-android-02/22/2012 - 2:07pm
Andrew Eisen: Hard to imagine the games would sell so poorly that they wouldn't cover the reletively minimal cost of bringing them over (shipping, ESRB rating, new packaging, printing, etc.).02/22/2012 - 2:02pm
Andrew Eisen: A point I made in that YouTube video I did last summer. The games tend to sell more copies here so if the damn thing is already developed and localized, why not release it here?02/22/2012 - 2:00pm
RedMage: That's what I figured. It's especially ironic since the black and white data shows NA buys more of these games than Europe or even Japan.02/22/2012 - 1:57pm
Andrew Eisen: And honestly, at this point, most probably won't because they saw their were no more games and moved on.02/22/2012 - 1:55pm
Andrew Eisen: Localizing for Europe is actually harder. Or at least, more work because typically, you do more languages. I don't think its a matter of difficulty but that Nintendo, for whatever reason, has no faith in NA gamers to actually buy these games.02/22/2012 - 1:54pm
Andrew Eisen: Fatal Frame's localization was also announced! For Europe...02/22/2012 - 1:52pm
RedMage: Definitely the latter. I'd still like to know why Europe is apparently easier to localize RPGs for.02/22/2012 - 1:51pm
Andrew Eisen: Do you mean the quality of the localization itself or Nintendo's tone deafness when it comes to catering to the NA market.02/22/2012 - 1:45pm
RedMage: That being said, Nintendo still sucks when it comes to localization.02/22/2012 - 1:42pm
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Andrew Eisen: Sounds like an interesting story. Nothing to do with video games I wouldn't think but we're big on free speech rights here. Darn shame Slashdot's link doesn't work.02/22/2012 - 1:32pm
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