The BBC has released a new Doctor Who game that has a hidden agenda: teaching kids (and adult users) how to code. In order to progress in the game, players must solve programming puzzles that become progressively more difficult. Players are rewarded for writing cleaner, shorter code.
“We’ve been exploring various ideas since Tony Hall’s speech in October 2012 when he announced the BBC would have a 2015 initiative focusing on inspiring a new generation to get creative with coding and digital technology,” Jo Pearce, Executive Producer for BBC Doctor Who Interactive, said. “As our Doctor Who team has a digital team embedded within it and a key role of this team is to look for innovation opportunities in which we can entertain and inspire, we saw a great chance to be a part of this.”
The team hopes that teachers will use the game to teach development skills in schools.