When I was a kid at home, I played RPG games. Some of my favorite games included Final Fantasy, Lufia, Chrono Trigger, and Breath of Fire I. I loved playing these games. I can honestly say that they helped me learn how to read. They were supplementary to my homework. If I kid said that these days, it would be acceptable. When I was a kid, most of my teachers would not believe it. RPG games went just games. They were adventures. They were engaging. They were a way to escape reality and plunge into a world of wonder.
RPG's link to school more than we sometimes realize. I listed the classes and the explanations below:
We learned geography.
Geography: We learn how to read maps. In every RPG I have ever played, there was a map. You needed to know north, south, east, and west in order to travel to and from each location.
Here is a map of in Final Fantasy I.
English: Every game has characters and supporting characters but RPG's get into character development more than most games back in the day. In other games at the time, like Mario and Zelda, you got a basic story of save the princess. In RPG's like Final Fantasy, you have to save a princess, defeat a vampire, collect four crystals, and defeat the dark knight Garland. That is epic stuff. Now other gaming genres, tap into more engaging character development but right now remember I am talking about RPG games. I do recognize that you do the same thing in Zelda but Zelda has limited dialogue in the early games. That is another important aspect of learning, which I will get to in another blog.
Math: Characters have statistics and hit points. Players will learn addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
here is the main character in chrono trigger, Chrono and his stats in the character menu. As you can see, there are a lot of numbes here. I will translate for you if you are not aware of what each number stands for.
HP- Hit points. How much the character can take damage. If this ummner drops to zero, your character gets knocked out.
MP- Magic points. How much magic a character has. If this number drops to zero, the character cannot use magic.
The (sword icon) - Attack. How much damage the character can.
The (shield icon) - Defense. Lessens the amount of damage.
Time- how much time spent playing the game.
G- Gold pieces/money.
PWR- How much power the character has. this is different than attack points by adding to the power of an attack rather than the damage.
SPD- Speed. This is how fast it takes your character to take his or her turn.
HIT- Hit. How successful a character hits the target.
EV- Evasion. Characters percentage of dodging attacks.
MAG-How much magic attack power the character has.
STAM- Stamina. how much stamina the character has.
M DEF- Magical Defense
EX- Experience points. How much experience a character has in battle. Once they reach that number, they will level up.
NEXT- Next time the character levels up.
As a younger kid playing Chrono trigger, I learned a lot about these stats and later understood statistics a bit more. Though I was never good at statistics, it was still a good way to introduce these concepts to kids. Most RPG's in general had these or similar stisticts. Sometimes I would caculate how quickly I could slay a boss monster by estimating the numbers and figuring how many hits it had left. I did this all the time when I faught the Atmaweapon in Final Fantasy 6.
This boss was crazy hard. I remember the first time I played got to him. I had to fight him twice before I created a combination of skills and timing before I beat him.
Anyways, I think I made some points about RPG's and learning. I would like to move on to another topic for now. I will come back to this again at some point and make a Part II in the near future. I hope I at least brought some nostalgic memories back at the very least.
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