Events

12 July 2023

Breakthrough NATO Scenario Design Challenge

by :

 

Welcome to the 3rd AOD Transformative Strategic Game Challenge!

Challenge Question

What might a Breakthrough Scenario Resonating with NATO Members & Partners look like?

In other words, what might be the most evocative scenario we might develop for a whole NATO audience to seamlessly experience and learn about sense-making, problem framing/reframing and collaboration in a complex adaptive system?

How to Participate?

Register as an individual participant or as a team here by Friday July 21st!

Individual participants must be AOD members (any tier) and will be grouped with participating AOD members based on a diversity of mindsets and backgrounds.

Participants registering as a team must have at least one AOD member participant (any tier).

You may join us as a member here.

Deliverable 

Up to a 7 minutes pitch synthesizing your scenario idea to a panel of senior leaders across NATO members and partners including Col. (ret.) Jean-Michel Millet, Experimentation & Wargaming Branch, NATO Allied Command Transformation (ACT); Dr. Col. (ret.) Jim Greer, US Army School of Advanced Military Studies, Col. (ret.) Jeremiah Monk, US Air Forces and Thomas Danger, Strands Simulation.

 

Constraints 

  • Genre: Mystery/Investigative 
  • Murderer: A Complex Adaptive System 
  • Time: 2040
  • AOD NATO CCASCOE Report: One Hook
  • Level: Strategic
  • Location: One city
  • Music: One mood song
  • Optional: 5 phases

 

Support

AOD Discord Server’s Breakthrough NATO Scenario Challenge

Expected Outcomes

The AOD team including a game designer, a narrative designer and an illustrator will build on the most inspiring scenario features to develop an audacious scenario expressed throughout 140 clue cards, a 101 x 152 cm playmat and in a new version of the Game master manual for NATO members and partners.

Breakthrough NATO Scenario Challenge

 


Resources

AOD Member Adam Karaoguz, Assistant Professor of Naval Science at the University of Rochester shares his lessons learned on story-telling during a AOD monthly campfire.

 

AOD Co-President Michele Mastroeni is inspired by the work of Leah Zaidi mobilizing world building for gaining an holistic understanding of complex situation such as refugee crises. Zaidi uses a Worldbuilding model that can be useful for generating the world of your scenario. This model includes artistic and philosophical categories prompting scenario designers to explore beyond the beaten path.

AOD senior researcher and narrative designer Oliver Jones suggests exploring the principles of story-telling to inform scenario building. He recommends Fabio Strassle’s accessible craft of a storyteller blog for a start.

AOD Co-President Philippe Beaulieu-B. suggests mobilizing two tools shared with Breakthrough participants to consolidate learning: these tools are Causal layered Analysis and the Rich Picture. These tools can also be mobilized to develop a scenario grounded on the story of a complex adaptive system. While Causal Layered Analysis provides clarity over the depth of the scenario, Rich Picture provides clarity over the breadth of the scenario by foregrounding all stakeholders and their relationships including with story-telling elements.

Prior to embarking in an online workshop session, the team leader and team members might find inspiration in Tracy Fullerton’s “The Game Design Workshop” fourth edition. This textbook remains the ultimate reference to prepare and facilitate game design sessions and proved successful in our first and second transformative strategic game design challenges. Previous versions are available online. The open access “The Art of Serious Game Design” from the Toronto Metropolitan University will also provide a bigger picture model of game development considering storytelling as one of four main components including Gameplay, Learning and User Experience.

While participants are not pitching a full-fledged game, they may find inspiration in this pitch deck template provided by game designer Rami Ismail. The template is remarkably detailed with targeted advices for each component of the pitch.


Project Albatross Resources on Narrative Design

Gameplay would be meaningless without an explicit or implicit narrative to engage and immerse the player-learner.

For more background on narrative game design, please consult these resources:

1. In the Art of Video-Games Storytelling, Creative Director Neil Druckman explains how he relied on narrative design to engage the player and to create situations conducive to learning.

2. In this article, Emily Naul and Min Liu shares how narrative is critical to serious games

Story Matters

3. Lessons from the Screenplay shows how the Wachowskis are using exposition to engage the viewer in learning about the complex world of the Matrix

 

4. Dylan Holmes, 2012, “A Mind Forever Voyaging: A History of Storytelling in Video Games”

5. Narrative Design in Fallout