“BUILDING CHARACTER”

This paper describes a 16 week-long, live-action experimental game in which English language learners at Universidad de los Hemisferios, a university in Quito, Ecuador, design an avatar and place him/her in an ethical dilemma. The aim of this game is to persuade students to have tolerance and empathy for those in different circumstances. Ian Bogost (2007) says that “procedural rhetoric” involves persuading by having people interact with a rule-based system. The challenge is to see whether the students are able to keep all aspects of the avatar’s identity in mind while role-playing the final game, for only in so doing can they make the leap from their own perspective to that of the “other”.