Feeling the Past

How an Interactive Text-Based Educational Game Could Influence the Source Selection of Historians

This webpage reflects on the game project Feeling the Past, which I created for the module History in a Digitized World as part of the master's degree History in a Digitized World / Zeitgeschichte. After a brief introduction, discussing the motivation behind the project, I elaborate on selected challenges and essential insights encountered during the production process. This includes collaborative work, Marugoto, the main tool used for writing the game, digital databases in relation to objects, and more. The main goal of the project was to illustrate the benefits of using objects as historical sources and thereby making a comment on the source selection of historians. The discussed literature supports the pedagogical approaches chosen for Feeling the Past and implies, that it can illustrate the possible benefits of using objects as historical sources. Further development of the game would entail more playtime, a richer collection and presentation of sources, fleshed out characters, and perhaps developing the game for a museum, educational, or collection environment.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Selected Challenges and Essential Insights
  • Collaboration using Git
  • Working with Lives in Transit
  • Marugoto as a Writing Tool
  • Digital Databases and Reaching the Fundamental Goal of Feeling the Past
  • Avoiding Normativity
  • Further Development and Practical Decisions
  • Marugoto as a Teaching Tool in University, School, and the Museum
• Conclusion
• Bibliography