TY - GEN N1 - Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author. Copyright is held by the owner/author(s). Y1 - 2014/// AV - public SP - 2215 EP - 2220 TI - Learning the game: Breakdowns, breakthroughs and player strategies A1 - Iacovides, I A1 - Cox, AL A1 - Knoll, T CY - New York, NY, USA PB - ACM UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2559206.2581304 N2 - Digital games are rich learning environments that require players to engage with challenging situations in order to progress. Recent research indicates that gameplay involves overcoming breakdowns and achieving breakthroughs in relation to player action, understanding and involvement. In particular, breakthroughs involve moments of insight where learning occurs which, in turn, can help increase involvement. However, little is known about how players actually achieve breakthroughs. We applied the breakdown/breakthrough "lens" to explore how players attempt to achieve breakthroughs in relation to two single player games. We identified a finite number of strategies that illustrate how players learn in games. These strategies are considered in relation to producing playable and engaging games. ID - discovery1428460 ER -