UPM Develops Mobile Game for Young Forestry Guides and Scouts

 

This past week, UPM, Finland, announced that in October 2015, the company started cooperation with the Guides and Scouts of Finland to create a forest mobile game for scouts. The game will be created by the Finnish application development company NordicEdu.

"The challenge we posed in Slush in November attracted interest from a large number of developers, some of them experienced game industry veterans", said Paula Savonen, UPM Manager of Marketing & CRM, Wood Sourcing & Forestry. "However, it was the small company from Turku, NordicEdu, that stood out from the crowd. Despite the fact that NordicEdu is a relatively new company, it has extensive experience in developing educational games for young people. The developers are also scouts, so they can grasp the purpose of the game more easily."

"The mobile game will be used in preparation for the international Roihu Finnjamboree next summer. Roihu will have several themed 'activity valleys,' and the game aims to activate the participants into the forest valley challenges," explained the Forest Coordinator at Guides and Scouts of Finland, Jaakko Nippala. "We hope to have the game ready during the spring. It will become a great tool for us to teach scouts about the forest."

"We started the game development in December by outlining the basic elements in close co-operation with the Guides and Scouts of Finland and UPM," said Tomi Kokkonen, CEO of NordicEdu. "Over the years, we have created interactive education materials for various organizations. We always try to develop inspiring, innovative, and visually memorable products, and this is what we want to offer the scouts as well."

The purpose of the game is to encourage children and young people to learn about forests and the different species that live there, as well as the variety of ways that wood can be used such as in pulp and paper related bio products. Mobile applications are a familiar tool for children and young people, and they can be used efficiently to facilitate learning. In addition, mobile applications work anywhere--on the street, at home, and in the forest.

"Outlining the game framework was an eye-opening process for the whole project team," said Paula Savonen. "NordicEdu's young professionals challenged us UPMers to simplify our industry jargon, the scouts learned that forest-based products come in more shapes and forms than they could imagine, and NordicEdu learned to see the forest from a new perspective. We hope that the game will have the same effect on its players."

The skills learned within the game and the possibilities offered by forests can be seen in reality next summer, in the international Roihu Finnjamboree organized by the Guides and Scouts of Finland, and in the Evo campsite on July 20-28. Up to 15,000 participants from Finland and abroad are expected to attend the jamboree. Registration for Roihu is open until April 24, 2016.