Research has shown that students are significantly more engaged and concentrate much harder when challenged in classrooms. Literature in the game-based context reflects similar understanding of the phenomenon that the challenge in games may drive a player's sense of engagement. As Fotini Paraskeva in "Multiplayer online games as educational tools: Facing new challenges in learning" writes, "Games seem to put the learner in the role of decision-maker, pushing players through ever harder challenges, and learning is accomplished through trial and error" (Paraskeva 499). Prior research by James Paul Gee in "What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy", and John Kirriemuir in "The relevance of video games and gaming consoles to the higher and further education learning experience" — which Paraskeva cites to corroborate her findings — also shows that challenge in game-based learning increased learning outcomes as well as satisfaction.

As new technologies allow for increasingly sophisticated game experiences, the potential for the integration of games and learning becomes ever more crucial. Learning environments have been largely limited to the traditional classroom: the teacher stands in front of the class and relays knowledge to a listening group of students. But gaming environments are quite unlike that. As Katie Salen Tekinbas in Guide to Digital Games + Learning writes, "Games . . . demand the active participation of players all along the way" (Shapiro 4). Through their use of immersive experiences, games like Mafia, Dragonbox, and Crayon Physics Deluxe — all social games referenced by Tekinbas — provide an opportunity for play which can result in a myriad of rich experiences.

It is clear that as a result of the ubiquitous digital environment and the sheer volume of their interaction with it, today's students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors. Brendan Alexander points out that "with the proliferation of the internet . . . people [can] play, share, and learn together from thousands of miles away". To give readers an idea of the growth of the Educational Gaming Industry, Alexander provides a link to "The Educational Gaming Industry Timeline". The timeline explores the evolution of overall game-based learning from the year 1967, to the present. In the final section of his blog, Alexander asks readers their thoughts, and invites them to share further examples that would benefit other readers.

According to Susannah Holz, "gamification" is an emergent approach to learning instruction. It facilitates learning and encourages motivation using game elements and game-based thinking. In this case, the goal may be to increase student effort or simply to convey to students that "games [can] make learning . . . fun and interactive". In addition, Holz references other blogs that deal with gamification and digital game-based learning (DGBL), such as Alex Calhoun's "'Vanished' Teaches Children to Save the Future with Science" and Vicki Davis' "Gamification in Education". In short, this blog seems to explore the relationship between game-based learning experience and learning and related outcomes.