Simulations require more content than linear content. Much more.
This changes a lot.
-
There is an exploration of failure. Most corporate people
don't like talking about, let alone mapping out, things that went
wrong. Obviously finding people to talk about failure in detail is
difficult.
- You can't be politically correct at the expense of
accuracy when creating a simulation. Can you imagine making a
simulation of a car that works the way the designers hoped a car
would drive, instead of the way a car really drove? Of course not.
Likewise, simulations that present idealized world views are
quickly found out.
-
The more content, the harder it is to translate to other
languages. Many people act as if ease of translation of a
course is a good thing, not a bad. Of course it takes less time and
resources, but less content is less content. Some say, "simulations
get into cultural issues and behavior, which makes them harder to
localize." I say, "simulations get into cultural issues, so they
actually work."
I think the best quote about simulations comes from outside the
field:
Nineteenth-century mathematicians discovered to their discomfort
that as the conceptual machinery of mathematics became more
precise, it became more difficult. - David Berlinski, The
Advent of the Algorithm