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On Monday 19th March, Dialogic organised the 'Serious Gaming' workshop. The workshop is part of a study commissioned by the Ministry of Economic Affairs (DGET) on the use of serious games and game technology in the societal sectors of healthcare, safety, and mobility.
A serious game is a computer game with a different purpose than (solely) entertainment. The game element of serious games makes them engaging. This can contribute to achieving the goals of the game, for example, increasing user engagement. Serious games go beyond educational games. They form a wider genre. Games with a serious purpose other than education, such as pain management and phobia treatment, also fall under serious games.
The workshop was attended by both game developers, (potential) clients, and experts (UU, HKU, TNO) in the field of serious gaming for societal sectors. Divided into subgroups, they discussed the following statements:
- Serious games and entertainment games are unrelated.
- For serious games, graphic design and gameplay are of minor importance.
- In the transferability of elements of a serious game, the purpose (what is the game used for, what tasks do players need to perform) and the context (in which type of organization is the game implemented, how is collaboration between employees structured) are more important than external characteristics (graphic design).
- Knowledge of a specific sector is more important in the development of a serious game than knowledge of game development.
- Serious games often do not replace existing practices but bring new possibilities/practices. There is therefore no cost savings through substitution, but (potentially) quality improvement through complementarity.
Currently, the cost-benefit ratio for the use of serious games is not entirely positive: costs are often relatively high, and benefits are unclear.