Educational video games often engage students intuitively with visuals with quick, responsive actions to immerse students in authentic disciplinary practice. In contrast, typical formal learning environments engage students in conscious reflection with visual representations to understand underlying disciplinary concepts. Research has examined how to support students' learning with visuals in formal learning environments, namely by supporting representational competencies needed to learn with visuals. However, despite the ubiquity of visuals, prior research has not examined representational competencies in the context of educational video games. This dissertation presents four studies with 250 students in classroom and lab settings to create a starting point for empirically examining how students learn with visuals in games and the effects of implementing supplemental support for learning with visuals along with a game. Findings show that students encounter similar challenges learning with visuals in educational video games and formal learning environments. However, the studies showed that current supports that are effective in formal learning environments do not work the same way in educational video games. Specifically, games designed to intuitively engage students with visuals stand in the way of implementing support that encourages students to consciously reflect and engage in conceptual learning during gameplay. This work has theoretical implications for educational psychology and educational video game research and informs practice for game design and instruction with educational video games in the classroom. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]