serious game(s) -- issues

[eliens]

In the most recent of STT Expert Meetings the audience, all experts, presumably, was given the opportunity to ask questions, to be answered by the (expert) speakers. The theme of the meeting was play or be played, which has a similar ring as the, for creative technology students now familiar, phrase: program or be programmed. 

One way or another, it is (I repeat) all about literacy!

To cut a long discussion short, the questions were:

• how do games affect social networks?
• do players need to know the purpose of the game?
• where is the boundary between gameplay and serious issues?
• where are we 5 years from now?
• do games help to live independently?
• what are the demographic(s) of gamification?

Since the speakers were rather academic, no definite answers were given to these questions, even though some members of the audience were obviously impatient to know what to invest in, preferably tomorrow.
Clearly, serious games require a more long term effort, and, in my opinion, will benefit from an interdisciplinary
endeavor in academic research.

For Creative Technology that might mean joining forces with T-XChange to bring serious games as a (serious) topic in the curriculum, and initiate (associated) research on the theme of serious games as social technology.
On a short term, for our students, this may provide an excellent opportunity to further explore the application of T-REX (Twente Reward EXperiment) in a real-life situation, in casu -- het nieuwe werken.