Laxton's Castle: A Virtual Fieldtrip

Laxton Castle in Nottinghamshire is a fine medieval motte and bailey, once supporting a substantial masonry castle which served as the centre of the administration of Sherwood Forest.  We have surveyed the earthworks over a number of years, and our initial GIS-based visualisations provided much of the impetus for testing out the alternative route of game-based visualisation.

As we've worked on the Laxton model we have begun to think about and explore ways in which the game paradigm can be exploited to encourage exploration as well as simple for visualisation.  A first step is to embed within the terrain model vestiges of the masonry curtain walls and towers, based on the surveyed remains and, realistically hidden in the vegetation.  The first question for a new gamer is "what are you looking at and what evidence can you find for the original form of the castle?"   I feel that we are creating the first draft of a kind of virtual fieldtrip, encouraging users to explore the game landscape and learn from it just as one would confronted with the real thing.