News from the Department
Event: "Designing Intensity: A Case Study of an Extraordinary 24h Scenario Session” by Lauri Lukka
2022-01-18
Join us for the first lecture in our Spring 2021 season of the Transformative Play Initiative Event Series: "Designing Intensity: A Case Study of an Extraordinary 24h Scenario Session” by Lauri Lukka!
When: January 18, 7 – 8:30 PM, Central European Time (CET)
Where: Online on Zoom
Description:
Short live action role-playing scenarios have considerable potential in creating personal insight and understanding. Yet, what happens when the already intensive scenario format is pushed to the limit in an intense 24h gaming session that combines numerous scenarios? The lecture reflects on the psychological, emotional, and social dynamics of an experimental, exceptional gaming session. The post-mortem begins with concept design, continues to participant selection, designing the game content, and game-mastering in the session. The evaluation concludes with participants' self-reported impacts two years later. The case description illuminates the tension between intensity and safety, aspects that are both required for personal growth.
Presenter bio:
Lauri Lukka is a licensed psychologist and a designer. As a psychologist, he has focused on clinical psychology and therapeutic interventions. As a designer, he has written several freeform scenarios and papers on the intersection of psychology and games. Currently, he works as a senior service designer in an IT and strategy consultancy and writes his PhD in Aalto University on game-based digital therapeutics.
This series is hosted by the Games & Society Lab at the Department of Game Design, Uppsala University Campus Gotland. The series explores the use of analog role-playing games as vehicles for lasting personal and social change.
Learn more about Transformative Play at Uppsala and join the TPI mailing list.
Learn more about the Games & Society Lab at the Department of Game Design.
Like Transformative Play Initiative and the Games and Society Lab on FB.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and find our previous recorded events.
Graphic design by Liliia Chorna.
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Three Teams Nominated at Swedish Game Awards
Swedish Game Awards will be held 8-9 September 2023 in Stockholm. Among the nominated games are three teams from the Department of Game Design!
www.gameawards.se/nominees-2023
Fail Fail Succeed
Ball Bash
Haunted Heist -
Nordic DiGRA (Digital Game Research Association)
The Nordic DiGRA Conference returns this spring 2023, this time in Uppsala. This will be a fully in-person two-day event on 27–28 April 2023. Almost half of our staff from the Department of Game Design will be attending and presenting.
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Presentation at GDC in San Francisco
Game Developers Conference, GDC, was held in San Francisco, California in May 2023 connecting the Global Game Development Community in one place. One of the speakers was Associate Professor Patrick Prax from the Department of Game Design, together with other colleagues.
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SkillMill is presented in international conferences
SkillMill is an app that helps students identify, understand, and verbalize their soft skills development. The app was developed in collaboration with representatives from several different Nordic universities together with game design students and project managers from the Department of Game Design with EU funding from Erasmus+ Programme.
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Game Design at Almedalen Week
Come listen to one or all of the seminars that the Department of Game Design is participating in during Almedalen Week 2022.
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Co-creation of a Serious Game About Radiotherapy
The Department of Game Design and the Department of Women's and Children's Health at Uppsala University co-created a serious game for children undergoing radiotherapy for cancer treatment. The project has received quite a bit of attention in Swedish and local media (available in Swedish only).
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Alumni Days December 9-10
Meet former game design students and hear how their careers have developed after they left us. They have a lot of good advice for you and are always interested in hearing about your own projects and goals and expectations.
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Congratulations, Professor Doris Rusch!
The installation of new professors at Uppsala University is taking place in Uppsala this week. And among them is our very own first professor in Game Design, Professor Doris Rusch--Congratulations!
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Game Devs of Color Expo: Kayode Shonibare-Lewis speaks on September 25, 2021
One of the speakers at the Game Devs of Color Expo, teaches at the Department of Game Design, Kayode Shonibare-Lewis.
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Upptalk with Professor Doris Rusch
Listen to Uppsala University's first professor in Game Design, Professor Doris Rusch, in Upptalk Weekly, 16 november, kl 12-12.30: "Game Design, Witches and Transformation".
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Games that create meaning - interview with researcher and Senior Lecturer, Doris Rusch
Doris Rusch, researcher and senior university lecturer at the Department of Game Design on Campus Gotland, describes how we can create games that evoke thoughts and deep, meaningful experiences.
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Co-creative game design at TEDx Uppsala University
Patrick Prax from the Department of Game Design was one of the seven speakers selected for the latest TEDx Uppsala University. His talk 'The Players make the Game – Co-creative Game Design' discusses how games are co-created by players and the possibilities and potential risks involved.
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Game Educators Summit 2017
HEVGA teams up with Uppsala University and Gotland Game Conference to expand international goals.
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Summer school 2016 to focus on improving health through game design
A two week course will be arranged this summer in Visby within the framework of EIT Health, an EU health research consortium where Uppsala University plays a leading role. The course allows students from a variety of fields to develop game concepts with the specific aim of encouraging a healthy lifestyle.
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New publications: Therapeutic and educational theory and role-playing games
The Transformative Play Initiative has three new publications to share:
- Elektra Diakolambrianou and Sarah Lynne Bowman, "Dual Consciousness: What Psychology and Counseling Theories Can Teach and Learn Regarding Identity and the Role-Playing Game Experience."
- Josefin Westborg and Sarah Lynne Bowman, "GM Screen: The Didactic Potential of RPGs" and "Cheat Sheet: What We Can Learn from Edu-Larp and Other (Non-TT) RPGs."
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Announcing Erasmus+ EDGE: Empowering Game Design Education with Transformative RPGs
Announcing the launch of Empowering Game Design Education with Transformative Role-playing Games (EDGE) — An Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnership in Higher Education! The EDGE consortium consists of Uppsala University (Sweden), Turku University of Applied Sciences (Finland), Dragons Nest (Greece), Chaos League (Italy), and Avalon Larp Studio (Norway).
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Ritual: The Importance of Framing Transformational Experiences
Join us for our next lecture in the Transformative Play Initiative Event Series: "Ritual: The Importance of Framing Transformational Experiences” by Caro Murphy!
When: Tuesday, October 3, 7-8:30PM Central European Summer Time (CEST)
Where: Online on ZoomRegister here: https://tinyurl.com/eh3462e5
Link will be provided to registrants on the day of the event.
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Introducing the Master's in Transformative Game Design (60 cr.)
The Department of Game Design is starting a Master's in Transformative Game Design (60 cr.) with an emphasis on the use of analog role-playing games as a vehicle for personal and social change!
At the Department of Game Design, we are building upon our Certificate Track by offering a Master's programme of 60 credits. The courses are taught entirely online at half-speed (50% or 20 hrs per week), mostly asynchronously with video calls for playtesting.
The Master's is intended for professionals who want to integrate RPGs into their leisure, educational, or therapeutic games, e.g. teachers, counselors, youth workers, spiritual directors, coaches, business trainers, etc.
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Three Teams Nominated at Swedish Game Awards
Swedish Game Awards will be held 8-9 September 2023 in Stockholm. Among the nominated games are three teams from the Department of Game Design!
www.gameawards.se/nominees-2023
Fail Fail Succeed
Ball Bash
Haunted Heist -
Nordic DiGRA (Digital Game Research Association)
The Nordic DiGRA Conference returns this spring 2023, this time in Uppsala. This will be a fully in-person two-day event on 27–28 April 2023. Almost half of our staff from the Department of Game Design will be attending and presenting.
-
Presentation at GDC in San Francisco
Game Developers Conference, GDC, was held in San Francisco, California in May 2023 connecting the Global Game Development Community in one place. One of the speakers was Associate Professor Patrick Prax from the Department of Game Design, together with other colleagues.
-
Transformative Game Design: Freestanding Graduate Courses and Certificate 2023-2024
The Transformative Play Initiative at Uppsala University’s Department of Game Design is offering four (4) freestanding Master's level courses in Autumn 2023-Spring 2024!
These courses focus on the applied use of analog role-playing games as vehicles for personal and social change, whether facilitated in-person or in online environments. The courses are online, half-time, and freestanding. Anyone with a Bachelor’s degree can apply for the courses and take them from anywhere in the world.