Mystery of Sandy Pylos: Crafting an educational escape room adventure in a web-based game around Voidokoilia

Abstract

Even though the aspect of gamification has relatively recently been introduced as a means of engagement, motivation, and better learning, it finds use in a plethora of different fields. Cultural education is one of the fields that use gamification to achieve better engagement, accessibility, and thus improved connection with a wide range of target groups. In this specific research, the goal was to create a simple web-based escape room-like game that could offer multipurpose use for schools and museums. The game takes place on the beach of Voidokoilia, located in the Pylia area of Messenia (southwest Greece), and focuses on the constructivist approach in learning, by combining the first year of Greek junior high school’s courses, the Odyssey and the Ancient Greek History, while highlighting the important connection between cultural institutions and schools. The game’s target group consists of first-year junior high school students in Greece. The specific area was selected due to its great cultural and historical importance, its large number of visitors, including educational visits, as well as an increasing interest in research in various scientific fields. Additionally, an extended theoretical background was considered important for creating a game that covers the educational and cultural needs of the target group, while also maintaining a fun character, achieving the goals of engagement, motivation, and better learning outcomes. The research was conducted within the general framework of the Pylos Geoarchaeological Program (GEAPP) and aims to complement its integrated approach to the study of the area.