Quick Start Guide
Quick start guide to
Energy-wise
Serious Game
Version v1.0
Game version 1.0
Developed under the
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Quick Start Guide
Introduction
This document has been written to support end users of the Energy-wise serious game.
Users can be ‘walked through’ the Introduction stages of the game in order to better understand the
product’s navigation and interface elements and the general user experience.
This document uses the following annotation conventions to aid usage:





Web page and game screen names are shown in italics
External documents are shown in bold
HTML link titles are shown in bold blue
In-game elements (e.g. devices such as the PDA) are referred to in GREEN CAPITALS
In-game buttons are shown as, for example, [Continue]
Energy-wise Serious Game overview
The objective of the game is to correctly and effectively recommend sufficient energy saving devices
and techniques for the virtual companies through conversations and tasks. This serious game is to
work alongside the course to help reinforce key areas of energy efficiency for Small Medium
Enterprises (SME’s).
This serious game is designed to last approximately 1 hour, however you can decide to divide the
game into segments 4segments. These segments are:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Tutorial
Go Green
2up Construction
Energy Audit
Ecoville is a town wanting to be at the forefront of green technology. It has been awarded funding
to begin a regeneration programme aimed at creating businesses that have a key mission to reduce
their energy consumption.
As Premise Manger you need to visit each company to conduct an inspection, recommending
possible techniques, processes, and devices that can be installed or replaced to help save energy.
When visiting certain areas (i.e. the kitchen) a menu with choices will appear for you the learner to
choose from.
You will meet with the manager of 2up Construction to discuss staff awareness campaigns as well as
what can be done to reduce the company’s external energy consumption. At Go Green you will
meet with the Facilities and Process Manager to address internal energy consumption.
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Quick Start Guide
Your mentor, Marco offered you this position which he was recently promoted from. With the
knowledge of best practices he will have great insight into areas to focus on
Accessing the simulation
You will be able to access Energywise online at www.energy-wise.eu
Using the simulation
[1] To start
The game will load for a short period during which a shaded grey screen displays the text
“Loading data”. Depending upon the speed of your internet connection this will take
between 5 and 30 seconds to complete.
Tip! PIXELearning recommend a broadband internet connection of at least
1Mb/second. ISDN or dial-up use is possible however the loading period will be
significantly elongated and some screen sin the game may take a short while to
appear.
Game introduction stage 1
Once pre-loading has completed, the screen will change to show the main user graphical user
interface (GUI) - the ‘WORKBOOK’ screen see Fig.1.
Fig.1, Opening Screen
The initial view provides:
[1] Instructions (‘Your Job’ and ‘How To
Play’).
Read these to get an understanding of
the fictional scenario (e.g. that you
will perform various tasks for the
fictional organisation).
Game introduction stage 2
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Quick Start Guide
After clicking on the previous [Continue] button the contents of the WORKBOOK
change to provide in-depth descriptions of the various navigation tools (or ‘devices’) that
you now have at your disposal. See Fig.2.
Figure 2: Navigation tools
These are:
Each of these ‘devices’
are accessed from the
navigation bar. Read the
descriptions to get a full
understanding of the
function of each device.
[2] Main navigation
controls.
These are a series of
graphical
icons
contained
in
a
navigation bar at the
bottom of the screen.
This navigation bar functions very much like the ‘task bar’ in Microsoft Windows or Apple
Mac operating systems.
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
PDA: To access your emails, click on the PDA icon. To view a message click on
the title. Attachments may be downloaded to your laptop.

VIDEOPHONE: You will be alerted to a video message when the “Vmail” box
blinks in the upper left state bar. To access your video mail, click the icon in the
Navigation bar and then click the title of the message and the caller’s picture will
appear along with audio. To see a transcript of the audio message, click View
Narration. To close the transcript, click the icon again in the navigation bar.

Conversations: When you travel to a character’s office, you can start a ‘face to
face’ conversation by clicking on the character’s portrait icon. A dialogue box
will open with the character’s dialogue at the top and your dialogue at the
bottom. You need to click on the dialogue to “say” your words and carry on the
conversation. In some cases you will have multiple reply choices from which to
select. NOTE: once a conversation has been activated it cannot be re-started. If
© Copyright 2011. All rights reserved. | PIXELearning Limited.
Quick Start Guide
you close the dialogue box, simply click on the character icon again to continue
the conversation.

LAPTOP: Your laptop includes the following items, My Documents, Energy
Audit, Website and Task specific activities. To use any of these click on the
menu at the top if the laptop screen.

GPS: Click the GPS to launch a map of the various offices you can visit. To
travel to a particular office, click on the location name. As you visit different
offices, characters will appear on the screen and will speak to you. If no character
icon appears the character is not available at that point in the game.

WORKBOOK The Workbook is the central repository for all the tasks you will
need to complete during the game. To open and close the workbook, click the
icon on the Navigation bar.
Message status icons
These are usually green and contain a ‘0’. When you receive either an email or a Video
Message then these will flash in a red colour and the number will change to ‘1’ to indicate
that you have an unread/unseen message.
Once you have read the instructions click on the blue [Continue] button at the lower
right hand side of the WORKBOOK.
Tip! You may, if you wish, click on the icons in the Navigation Bar at this point (to
see what the various devices do). Don’t worry, you cannot do anything ‘wrong’ but
do remember to click back on the WORKBOOK icon (in the navigation bar) to
return to the game introduction screens as you must click through all of these before
you may start the game.
When you have completed this, click on the [Start Game] button to commence the
game.
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Quick Start Guide
Walkthrough of key navigational points
After clicking on the previous [Start Game] button the contents of the WORKBOOK
change to display the tasks that this games consists of. See Fig.4.
Tip! A pop up message displays informing you that you need to listen to a video
message before you can activate the task.
Fig.4, Workbook tasks
Example based on The Tutorial
To activate the first task you need to work through the tutorial. This begins with selecting
the VIDEO PHONE then the message to listen
Once you have viewed the video message click the VIDEO PHONE which will initiate an
email. Select PDA on the navigation bar and click on the message to view. Download the
attachment which is stored in the My Documents tab of the laptop. Select LAPTOP to view
the document
Before you can start your specific tasks you need to meet with your boss Marco at Eco
Advisor. Select the GPS icon and then the Eco Advisor building where you will see an open
plan map. Find Marco’s office and select the room to meet with Marco.
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Quick Start Guide
Once in Marco’s office you will be presented with a portrait image of Marco. Click the
portrait to begin a conversation with him.
Conversations
Conversations throughout this
simulation are structured the same.
As with any tutorial the aim is to
provide learners with an
understanding of how they work
Therefore they aren’t complex or
require any additional skills.
The characters dialogue is the top
text box.
The learners is the bottom text box
To play through a conversation the
learner must select the dialogue that
is present. Sometimes there may be more than one piece of dialogue to choose from; read
each option carefully as they may differ in points gained.
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Quick Start Guide
Once the conversation is finished the learner can return to the WORKBOOK to begin
activate the first task.
Task specific activities
Selection of items within Task 1 and 2
Within each of the tasks the learner is required to discover and recommend specific items
that represent the most energy efficient savings. Meeting with two members of Go Green
and one from 2up Construction you will need to discuss funding options, staff awareness
and basic energy saving advice.
After meeting with one of your clients at Go Green you will have the option to play a mini
game that is about hitting selecting energy efficient devices to untimely SAVE energy.
The second mini game will appear in 2up Construction task. This game will see you
identifying the energy saving potential of various devices and schemes.
Audit:
This audit consists of documents that have been shared by your mentor. These audits
demonstrate a basic example of how what you should be looking out for when you do an
audit.
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Quick Start Guide
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