Using Video Games for Design Education: An Example of Developing Earthquake Scenarios for Home Environments

Abstract

The heart of interior design/architecture education is design studios. As a design-based graduate program, the main objective of the International Masters of Interior Architecture and Design Program-(IMIAD) in Istanbul Technical University Graduate School is to produce new disciplinary information and knowledge for design (Cordan, 2017). Additionally, the main objective of the Interior Architecture Project III, which is the third design studio blended with the thesis studies in the IMIAD Programme, is to guide students in their study based on research-based design approach. In this study, one example was presented to explain how the research-based design process conducted. This study was based on developing a game scenario for experiencing earthquakes in an experiential box. The earthquake scenario was developed for a bedroom situation at home environment by using virtual reality and gamification methods. The educational use of video games through serious games helps designers and design students understand real situations and raise public awareness by experiencing them in virtual environments. Besides, the study will fill the gap in the literature by using video games as an educational tool in design to develop scenarios for natural disasters such as earthquakes, the study will help educators for developing new ways of teaching and students for solving design issues using video games. Different scenarios can be developed for different natural disasters and cases in the future for further studies.