Design and Evaluation of a Serious Game for Immersive Cultural Training

3D Virtual Worlds have the potential to expand the<br> knowledge of a foreign culture by presenting the information in a<br> visual context. In this paper we describe the design and evaluation<br> of ICURA, a Serious Game that provides an opportunity to learn<br> more about Japanese culture and etiquette. ICURA incorporates<br> different game design and learning principles to effectively<br> communicate knowledge. The main goal is to combine aspects<br> of learning and fun in an immersive 3D Environment to make<br> the communication of knowledge an entertaining experience. We<br> evaluated the game through a user study with 20 participants.<br> The comparison of pre- and post-test results highlights the<br> positive learning effect of ICURA.