Setting.
Environmental Detectives is designed for use in any outdoor environment. Teachers or coordinators can set the initial location of the contiminant, the size of its plume, and it's trajectory through the environment.

Several Environmental Detectives scenarios are also designed for more constrained, indoor environments. Drawing off of actual cases, players in schools can investigate the consequences of a mercury spill in their school, including predicting and determining how the mercury will spread through air flows. Another scenarios includes the flow of synthetic toxins through a school water supply.

The goal behind Environmental Detectives it to provide a handful of compelling game scenarios across a variety of contexts which teachers can then adapt using the editing tools to match their own setting.

Robust editing tools allow teachers and students to take advantage of features in their environment that might make compelling gameplay. Teachers and students in the Boston area might use the Charles River, while students in the Midwest might track toxic flows through the Great Lakes. The airborne toxin and drinking water scenarios have been included specifically for students or teachers without obvious aqua scenarios or without off campus access.

Between the diverse set of stock scenarios and editing tools for teachers, Environmental Detectives allows people to turn any ordinary location into a gaming compelling gaming environment.

Copyright 2002, MIT.