Joshua the friendly ghost

When we sat down to play this game, we thought it was just going to be an ordinary game. We chose the game “Henry Mall History” under the “Location Specific” category. We were confused whether or not we had to actually go to the locations listed, so we just zoomed out on the map and clicked on the descriptions. We then gained “Inventory,” which was basically just knowledge points.

            We all agreed that our favorite part was being led by “Ghost Joshua”. His name was Joshua Lederburg and he used to teach and research here at UW-Madison. They convince you to walk with Joshua and help “lead him home”. We learned many different things about the different buildings and Joshua’s research at UW leading to him receiving the Nobel Prize in Physiology in 1957.

            In relation to our last discussion, we realized we liked this app due to its game-like features. After following the trail we found out that there was no prize, but simply a “Congratulations!”. It also states “You’ve gained some knowledge! Now, how will you use your knowledge to make the world a better place?”. At first we were a little offended for just a “Congrats!”, but after the part about making the world a better place, we realized how our upbringing of games and technology made us expect a prize that is not always earned. We wonder if games were played without the competitive factor, would people still play them?

-Brooke Francis, Georgia May, Jennie Russnow

“Ghost Joshua”