Patriot Academy sophomores level up with video and board game designs

Sophomores in the Patriot Academy at Broadalbin-Perth Jr./Sr. High School recently brought their creativity to play with a pair of projects: designing board games and developing video games. These projects encouraged students to blend technology, teamwork, and imagination.

Board game design: Creativity meets collaboration

The students have been working in groups to create original board games that are each crafted for multiple players with a focus on collaborative play. In addition to designing the gameplay, students were tasked with writing detailed instructions for their games and used artificial intelligence to help them bring their ideas to life.

The students are now putting their board games through beta testing to refine and troubleshoot the mechanics of the games, allowing them to perfect their projects before they are finalized.

Video game development: Exploring coding and creative problem-solving

Alongside their board game projects, the students are diving into the world of video game design. Using Godot, an open-source development platform, they are creating 2D platform games, such as those their parents might have played on classic gaming consoles or in arcades. Through the project, students explored game mechanics, level design, and programming through GDscript, Godot’s built-in coding language, which is similar to the popular coding language Python.

Both the video and board game projects required the Academy students to work together and apply their knowledge in technology and design, all while gaining hands-on experience in game development.

Broadalbin-Perth’s Patriot Academy is an innovative school-within-a-school for students starting in grade 9 that is structured around interdisciplinary, project-based learning.