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Info about creatures in niche so that students can learn!


Mulan the Cat

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I came up with this after making a post in the education forum. 

I want information panels saying whether a nicheling is warm blooded, a mammal, a vertabrate etc.

I'd also like information panels for the other creatures in niche. 

 

... that's it.

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This is a really cool idea! My only hesitation is that since I'm not using the game for education, I wouldn't want these panels to show up by default, since I personally wouldn't be using them and they don't actually affect gameplay. Maybe there could be an option for a separate game mode in settings, like "Education Mode" or something? With two separate modes, it would allow for layout changes and real-world info to be added without disturbing the immersion for non-educational players. 

That being said, I'd love to see additional educational aspects added to the game, since there are already so many opportunities for learning with it! I think it would be awesome if you could click on specific genes and read about them. It would be cool to click on the blood clotting gene and learn about X-linked genes, or click on fur color to learn about incomplete dominance. There could even be panels that come up when you achieve a specific game condition, like a panel about inbreeding depression when you breed a creature with double immunity genes, or information about deleterious alleles when you have a nicheling with a deformed paw. There's practically endless possibilities with this idea and I think it would be such a great tool for students and teachers to have! :)

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On 11/14/2020 at 4:21 PM, Mulan the Cat said:

I want information panels saying whether a nicheling is warm blooded, a mammal, a vertabrate etc.

What? Nichelings are all of these, and obviously so. The only issue you'd have with these is if you're doubting whether a nichling with a gills or a bird beak count as mammals or not because we know that the real-world animals they derive from aren't mammals. Other then that, I don't see how this is relevant to the game. There are no endothermic vs ectothermic genes or vertebrae vs non-vertabrae genes. We assume that nichelings are mammals because by default a majority of the genes available to them reflect that of mammals. Truth of the matter is, nichelings don't fit into that mold anyways because they're video game creatures. They don't nurse, they can have feathers, they can have gills, their ability to move is affected by outside temperature (not necessarily in a reptilian way, but it feels like that sometimes), etc.

I know that you want an educational feature to this game, but if it's going to include those things it should include more advanced information as well. Niche is very much a game more suitable for teaching middle schoolers and up, and the information you suggested is elementary school. If you want to teach elementary school kids these things, I'd actually recommend not using this game for that. I'm just imagining fourth graders going "yeah, it has a shark head, but sharks aren't mammals, so it's a fish." "No, it's not a fish! It has fur, and mammals have fur!" "No, it's a fish! It's a fish with fur!" And so on. They'll settle it after a fight and decide whether it's a mammal with a fish head or a fish with a mammal body. It just doesn't seem like the right game for teaching kids about these sort of things.

 

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