Personalised Learning for Casual Games: The 'Language Trap' Online Language Learning Game Neil Peirce and Vincent Wade Trinity College Dublin, Ireland peircen@cs.tcd.ie Vincent.Wade@cs.tcd.ie Abstract: The features of video games that contribute to effective learning are drawing increasing attention in the world of technology enhanced learning. To date, game based learning has focussed on the learning benefits provided by the inherent motivation, rich visualizations, and low risk of failure, provided by contemporary educational games. Although these advantages create highly engaging and immersive learning environments, there remain additional techniques that can further aid the learning process. The integration of personalisation into educational games presents unique challenges, the most important being the preservation of the gaming experience. In consideration that a well designed educational game can seamlessly blend learning and gaming content, any adaptation of the learning content will ultimately affect the gaming experience. In effect all educational adaptations must be achieved in a manner that is non-invasive to the game play. In this paper we introduce the „Language Trap‟ German language learning game that provides learners with an online casual gaming environment that also benefits from a personalised learning experience. We demonstrate how a game playable online in a browser, using simple controls, and with low production costs, can effectively deliver this personalised learning experience. Through using the ALIGN (Adaptive Learning In Games through Non-invasion) system the game delivers adaptive dialogue difficulty, performance feedback, motivational support, and meta-cognitive hints, all within a highly interactive adventure role-playing game. The results of an authentic evaluation of the Language Trap game are presented, additionally we demonstrate how the ALIGN system can effectively adapt the learning experience within the game in manner that is non-invasive to the game play. A discussion on the benefits of adaptive educational games is presented, with particular reference to the benefits provided by the ALIGN system. Keywords: Adaptive learning, personalisation, casual game, user modelling 1. Introduction The intensely engaging and immersive experiences provided by video games have long been pursued by instructional designers as a means to motivate students. Through a combination of ludic activities, interesting narratives, and rich visual worlds, video games present an environment that is inherently motivating and an experience that is rewarding to pursue. The effective integration of instructional design and video games has been an active research topic since the 1980s, however efforts were stifled by early attempts that created uninteresting games and ineffective learning outcomes. Such games often termed “Shavian reversals” (Papert 1998) and branded as „edutainment‟ were often the result of „applying‟ gaming to existing educational content and resulted in experiences that lacked any synergies between the gameplay and the learning content (Kirriemuir & McFarlane n.d.; Papert 1998). Despite such a hindered start, educational games gained recognition and acceptance through the emergence of serious games. The work of James Paul Gee, Clark Aldrich, and Marc Prensky amongst others has helped to identify the affordances of educational games and the approaches to maximise their benefit. The most significant considerations are the tight integration of learning and gaming content, the suitability of the game genre to the content, and the preservation of a flow experience (Csikszentmihalyi 1990). As play itself is one of the most fundamental forms of learning (Huizinga 1949), it is not surprising that games present an inherent learning experience. However, the learning within entertainment video games often surrounds understanding the mechanics of the game, and its rules. These forms of learning, comprehension, practice, experimentation, and discovery are all keenly focussed on learning about the game itself. In order for educational games to be effective they must seamlessly integrate learning content to present a game that blurs the boundary between where the game stops and the learning content begins. As well as the requirement for tight integration, the need to match learning content with an appropriate game genre has been identified by several authors(Amory et al. 1999; Prensky 2001; Frazer et al.