IIT’s gameplan for kids: Learn while you play

Eleven final year students of IIT Bombay’s Industrial Design Centre (IDC) are a happy lot these days. Five games designed by them for schoolchildren will now be produced and marketed by a leading toy manufacturer.

“Designing games for children that keep them engaged is difficult. We had to redefine the rules so that children can relate to them. We are excited because for the first time, all games designed by us have been selected. Children’s response during game testing was tremendous,” said Girija Aathalye, a final year IDC student.

The emphasis while designing games was on traditional board games and students had to keep in mind game play and its repeat value. UA Athavankar, IDC professor and in-charge of the project said the agreement with Funskool was signed last month. While  students have applied for registration, the games are expected to be in the market by the end of this year.

Had it not been for Athavankar, IDC students perhaps would never have got a platform to create such games. Believing that “learning while playing” is better, he started game designing in 1972. “Though the first game I developed then won an international award, no one was ready to produce it,” said Athavankar.

Two years back, the focus was back on games when a random survey of the Indian game industry was undertaken after Athavankar got in touch with several toy manufacturing companies.

“We conducted a game design workshop with schoolchildren last year. This inspired us to offer an elective in game design to IDC students,” he said.

While the elective was introduced last year, the games were designed during its 15-day duration. After the prototypes were created, schoolchildren were again made to play the games to get “live and instant feedback”. ChakarView and Teen Songataya are based on strategy, and meant for children of eight years and above.