Traditionally play and games have been understood as frivolous, creative, free, separate from everyday life, and standing in contrast to productive activities like work and education. Many are familiar with the thrilling excitement of taking risks on a whim, knowing that it’s “only a game”. ’Gamification’, or, ’ludification’, i.e. the use of game elements in non-game context, promises that the ‘magic’ of game-playing could be added into productive activities to make them more enjoyable, efficient, and productive. Is it without…

Public talk with Dr. África Periáñez   The video-game industry is experiencing a major revolution. Nowadays, games are always connected to the Internet and developers have at their disposal a huge amount of data, which can be used to try to increase player engagement and game monetization through big data analytics. In order to do so, they can employ suitable machine learning methods to model and predict player behavior. In particular, by using sophisticated churn prediction models, developers can now…

The Center for Computer Games Research is pleased to announce a guest talk by Hanna Wirman, from Hong Kong Polytechnic University's School of Design, titled "Wider Margins, Countless Others". The talk will take place on Tuesday, April 17th, from 12:00-13:00, in room 2A08 at the IT University of Copenhagen.   “Wider Margins, Countless Others” A game's eSports compatibility is considered a mere 'feature' and freemium game 'whales' comprise just the 0.15% minority of players. Yet, these are both aspects that…