Serious Game Design and Evaluation Through Prototyping: A Case Study of Developing a Virtual Reality Serious Game for Vocational Education and Training

In recent years, virtual reality (VR) serious games (SG) have been increasing in the higher education scene but there is a lack of the design framework for development referencing. Due to the complexity of a VR SG, its development cost was considerably high due to multiple changes. Especially for the process of innovating a VR SG, this paper found that there are no studies discussing how to provide early evaluation of VR SG's learning evaluation. As such, this paper aimed to provide a suitable designing and evaluating framework to assist educators in innovating VR SG. This research conducted a case study to explore the possibilities of early VR SG design evaluation using Scrum methodology. A low-fidelity (low-fi) VR SG prototype was designed and developed based on this study's VR SG Design and Prototyping Framework. A sample of eight participants from polytechnic students in Singapore participated in the low-fi VR SG playtesting. Their perceived learning effectiveness were captured with a survey while their in-game actions were recorded for observed learning effectiveness. The results indicated that Scrum is a cost-effective way to develop a low-fi prototype that allows early validation of a VR SG design. Through measuring its learning-gaming effectiveness using perceived and observed learning data, non-performing designs can be easily identified. Thus, the VR SG design can be iteratively improved to meet the learner's need. This study concluded that VR SG can adopt Scrum methodologies to encourage innovative design for immersive learning experiences.