Motivation in Game-Based Learning: It's More than 'Flow'

Educational computer games are sometimes considered to be motivating per se – because of the playing activity and do not require further motivational strategies. Therefore the concept of ‘flow experience’ is commonly used to describe how smooth gaming naturally results in deep engagement and, consequently, enhanced learning. Learning with an instructional game without discovering the instructional parts, seems to be a crucial goal considering the presumed needs of today’s digital natives. However, teaching factual knowledge and the need for educational guidance, assessment and other intrusive components impede the creation of a free flowing educational game in contrast to non-educational games. The present paper claims, that an exclusively activity-focused view on game-based learning lacks important aspects of motivation on the basis of a broad motivational theory and a game model of motivation. Those aspects include personal and game characteristics, usability issues as well as anticipated outcomes. An integrative model of game-based learning is introduced and the theoretical considerations are transferred to the realization of a demonstrator game in the context of the European research project 80Days.