1st Apps, Games and the Pandemic Conference

This online conference brings together academics, researchers, engineers, businesspeople, designers, producers, gamers, artists, audio professionals and others from a wide variety of fields, for a collaborative, multidisciplinary exploration of the ways in which the pandemic has impacted global ways of working and governance. Themes and issues for the conference include, but are not limited to:

Stream A: Design and the pandemic

How will the pandemic impact the design of agents, opponents, levels and worlds, and other elements of games? How has it, and will it impact consoles and mobile gaming? standalones and networked games? Esports? Are there regional or cultural differences in responses? How has remote working impacted game developers and designers, design business models and management? We welcome papers on any aspect of gaming and design, including but not limited to: hardware, accessories, design approaches, monetization, tools and platforms, simulations and models, procedural generation, social or spatial aspects, single or multi-user, IP policy and rights, AI, intelligent agents and gamebots,

Stream B: Apps and games in healthcare

We welcome papers on any aspect of apps and games in healthcare, including but not limited to: the use of apps and games in clinical education training and assessment, leadership and team games for clinical settings, the use of mixed reality and simulation in medical and nursing education, simulations and patient safety. Papers might also address the gamification of wellbeing and health motivation, in areas such as exergames and digital coaching for self-care and rehabilitation, communication with virtual patients in tele-medicine, and teaching and supporting patients with managing chronic illnesses or healthcare self-regulation skills , as well as in public health education. They might address emotion in healthcare apps and games, and affective serious games for managing psycho-social skills and emotions in teens.

Stream C: Computing education and the pandemic

How has online teaching during the pandemic impacted design education? What problems do teachers and students face? How do they handle them? How may games be used to teach humanities, social science or science content? How has, and how will the pandemic impact user engagement and experience? the use of game-based learning and learning communities? How will it shape educators’ use of serious play and serious games, the gamification of courses, AI and simulations? How have quarantine and lockdown measures impacted creativity, collaboration, and learning outcomes? How will they shape deep learning, the edtech industry, interdisciplinary exchanges, augmented and virtual reality, human-computer interaction, learning science, and brain-computer interfaces and environments?