From September 18 to 20, GameON – European Conference on Simulation and AI in Computer Games took place at the University of Abertay. Topics such as artificial intelligence, online gaming and its applications in a variety of contexts, such as health and education were highlighted at this conference.

GAMEON annualy brings together researchers, experts and videogame entusiasts from different countries such as Russia, Spain, Holland, Italy, United States, Czech Republic, United Arab Emirates, Portugal, Finland, Japan and Australia. Their goal is to bring the industry and the academy together as well as attract young people to this industry through tutorials and the opportunity to view game demos.

Liliana Costa of the SEDUCE 2.0 project presented the paper ‘Citizen’s interactions in’ Smart game-playing ennvironments’ co-authored by teacher Ana Isabel Veloso (IR of the project) and Óscar Mealha (co-IR). This paper discusses the design of interaction between the citizen – player and a SMART ecosystem, where the contributions of Kinesia, semiotic universe and respective affordances were discussed (see article).

The conference was also attended by guests Mike Cook who reported his experience in the development of games Angelina; Alan Hinchcliffe who shared his view on artificial intelligence and the development of game characters and Joseph DeLappe who showed the role of games and simulations for social activism.