X|Media|Lab Sydney "Serious Games" conference presented in partnership with ABC TV and Screen Australia at the Sydney Film Festival
June 12, 2009 @ The Establishment, Sydney
XIMediaILab Sydney presents "Serious Games", Australia's first conference dedicated to the rapidly growing serious games industry that features the use of interactive games technology within non-entertainment sectors.
While the market for entertainment games is relatively mature, 'serious' games-based learning for education, training and teaching, is growing globally at six times the rate of the conventional entertainment based computer games industry, and represents a huge opportunity for local games developers.
This one-day international gathering in Sydney provides a forum for game developers, documentary filmmakers and industry professionals to examine the future course of serious games development in areas such as education, government, health and corporate training.
International Keynote speakers include:
• Noah Falstein, one of the gaming world's pre-eminent authorities and founder and CEO of The Inspiracy (San Francisco)
• Ondi Timoner, Director of internationally award winning documentaries DIG! and WE LIVE IN PUBLIC. He is also Director/Producer at Interloper Films (Los Angeles)
• Lee Sheldon, Video Game Writer and Designer, Professor, Indiana University and former writer and producer of popular TV shows including Star Trek: The Next Generation, Charlie's Angels and Cagney and Lacey(Indianapolis)
• Ian Bogost, Founding partner, Persuasive Games; Associate Professor, Georges Institute of Technology (Atlanta)
• Joshua Harris, Internet Pioneer (founder Jupiter Communications) and Entrepreneur (Los Angeles, Sidamo)
• Michel Moi, Director of Innovation and New Media, Netherlands Public Broadcasting (Amsterdam)
Plus Australian experts: Bill McIntosh, Managing Director Torus Digital Concepts; David Hewitt, Creative Director Tantalus Interactive; Dr. Yusuf Pisan, Assoc. Professor and Director of Games Studio, University of Technology; Mandy Solomon, Senior Researcher Smart Services Cooperative Research Centre; Sohail Dahdal, Filmmaker and Interactive Designer, The First Australians; Stephen Sewell, multi-award winning writer (The Boys, The Blind Giant is Dancing), and Alana Valentine, multi-award winning writer (Parramatta Girls, Run Rabbit Run).
Mr Noah Falstein, keynote speaker at Serious Games says: "I think it is inevitable that computer games with purposes beyond entertainment will some day grow to rival and eclipse the current entertainment-only game market, perhaps even within the next 10 years.
"All that is needed is for game-based applications to grab just 1 or 2 percent of the multi-trillion dollar global education and training market," he said.
Serious Games market in Australia is still in its infancy with edutainment titles including console based brain training titles comprising a mere 1.4% of the total value of computer game titles sold in Australia in 2008 however according to Megan Elliott, Director of XMediaLab, this figure is set to change as more industry sectors start to embrace games based learning.
"With more and more people growing up emersed in video games, interactive training is second nature and more efficient than many traditional educational methods. We are already seeing the education, healthcare and corporate sector using games as learning tools.
"Australia is well placed to become a world leader in the development of these titles by offering a strong talent pool and comparative advantage as a result of the currency fluctuations over the past 12-months," she said.