Papakura Marae immortalised in a 3D game that helps teach te reo Māori

Papakura Marae has been turned into a 3D learning tool. Photo / Supplied

Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air

A collaboration between an urban marae community, a gaming company and rangatahi Māori has produced an innovative world-first in gaming technology.

Papakura Marae has been re-imagined in a game called Te Whare o te Reo (The House of the Language) that helps teach te reo Māori. The marae has been re-modelled in 3D imaging, and the player unlocks different parts of the marae by completing levels in language competency.

Papakura Marae CEO Tony Kake said that he was really proud to offer the marae as the platform to advance tikanga and te reo Māori.

"We are proud to be celebrating the 50th anniversary of the [1972 Māori language] petition signing and supporting this te reo Māori learning platform by offering our carvings and marae to be part of this digital learning experience," Kake said.

The team taking Papakura Marae to the 3D world. Photo / Supplied

Cam Swainson-Whaanga of Afed Limited created Te Whare o te Reo to help people learn te reo Māori in a new and engaging way.

"There's a huge push to have a lot more fluent speakers over the next few years and we hope to bring that to reality," Swainson-Whaanga said.

"As such, we wanted to remove any barriers of access, so the game can work on a tablet, a smartphone, any Chromebook or laptop.

"This gives access to students at kura, whānau at home, workers in a corporate environment - anyone can log on and learn our language in a fun and exciting way."

The game's development is a collaborative effort with Papakura marae and Afed Limited. It only happened due to the long-standing relationship of Swainson-Whaanga with the marae community. Kake said that he trusted Swainson-Whaanga and that was important.

"He has done a lot of work to support Papakura Marae and therefore our relationship, our trust and our ability with Cam was already established," Kake said.

"This allowed us to work together to advance te reo Māori in Aotearoa."

Te Whare o Te Reo uses a digital pōwhiri process to enter the game, even though the experience is virtual.

Learning te reo Māori can be fun. Photo / Supplied

"What was important to us is that we kept with tikanga and kawa that surrounds visiting a marae, so we worked closely with kaumātua at the marae to ensure that was followed," Kake said.

Swainson-Whaanga hired rangatahi who were kura kaupapa-raised to help create Te Whare o Te Reo.

"Māori 3D modellers and virtual reality designers are scarce in this industry, so we hired two fluent te reo Māori-speaking interns to train for this project," he said.

"We want rangatahi Māori to work on many more digital marae projects in the future."

Kake said that innovative collaborations like Te Whare o te Reo will make a difference in Aotearoa.

"We want to promote the language and Afed is what we want to travel with in terms of advancing te reo Māori in Aotearoa."

Te Whare o Te Reo already has 13,000 users/learners across 700 schools, homes and organisations.

Six hundred lessons and assessments have been released already, with another 1000 lessons coming in the next few months.

This learning resource and virtual marae will also be released as a high-end interactive game on Windows PC and PlayStation over the next few months.