Game Based Learning 2010

News | Jörg Hofstätter

I attended the Game Based Learning (GBL) conference in London last week, which I found on the Web during my research on serious an educational games last year. It seemed to be the right place to deepen our knowledge on educational games and meet companies also committed to develop "games of good".

The conference is rather small, I was as far as I know the only austrian among about 400 delegates. The programme was pretty promising and I can safely say now that it left me everything but disappointed.

The first highlight was Media Molecules (the Makers of Little Big Planet) talk on Learning & Little Big Planet. I particulary loved to get a glimpse into their approach to make a game inspired by Lego ("Basically it´s just blocks, very approachable and friendly"). Another impressive talk was given later by Alice Taylor, the Commissioning Editor for Education at Channel 4.

My personal Favorite as for many others was the talk of Matt Mason, Author of the Pirate´s Dilemma, I loved his talk from the first slide on saying "Talent borrows, genius steals", a quote by Oscar Wilde. Meanwhile I bought his book on Amazon although it is available for free on the web which proofs him right I guess.

The first day closed for me with a not very well organised speed dating on potential partnerships and fundings. At the second and final day I had set up a couple of meetings before I watched the talk of Sara de Frietas, Research Director at the Serious Games Institute presenting latest research and findings in the area of serious games. Justin Bovington, CEO of  Rivers Run Red gave the following talk on the need to develop application for games and virtual worlds within the business environment.

Jesse Schell, Professor of Entertainment Technology gave his closing talk when I was already on my way to Heathrow. 

Altogether GBL 10 was a great experience, you can find more than 20 hours of Video material here. I am looking forward to GBL11 on March 28-30th in Brighton!