Games for Training

In a continuing project that looks at training using game dynamics, I was reminded of the MS effort called Ribbon Hero, which aims to provide incentive to learn the complexity of Microsoft Office tasks. See also their FAQ here.   A very simple and clever means of attending to all complexity of a package like a modern word processing package.  In had in a previous with the much maligned Clippy, that suggested methods and training as it watched your work.  Despite all the ridiculing of that effort, it did work.  What it did not take enough advantage of was gaming dynamics.  Very simple ideas, that well implemented can and do work.  Studies have shown that even simple point accumulation and display can increase interaction multifold.