Bizplay – Enterprise Gamification 2014

Last week GEElab Europe, located in Karlsruhe Germany, co- hosted the third annual Bizplay, a two day conference that gathers speakers and audience members from a wide variety of backgrounds and industries to discuss the increasingly contentious topic of gamification in various areas of business and life. The event was divided into a two day symposium with a series of talks and workshops and attracted over 150 particpants.

 

Curated by GEElab Director Dr Steffen P Walz, the symposium started with keynote speaker Adrian Hon, creator of ‘Zombies, Run!’, who spoke about the future of the gameful world and how engaging systems can be used to help people achieve their goals.

Juho Hamari of the University of Tampere then took the audience through the research and discussion of the viability of gamification and persuaded us to acknowledge the complexity of the question and the fact that the necessary approaches to the concept are as diverse as their implementation scenarios. Hartmut Heinrich of Mistress.tech followed and used the example of the logistics field to illustrate how gamification can be used to make previously obscure processes more transparent and engaging to the customers.

 

Marigo Raftopoulos of GEElab Australia explained how key human desires play into the usefulness of game systems by providing personal growth through factors like self-confidence, agency and feeling involved in a bigger whole, while Emmanuel Guardiola of Seaside Agency talked about the importance of player profiling and data gathering through games and apps for crafting an experience that meets the often diverse needs of the target group.

 

And last but not least, Martin Nerurkar of Sharkbomb Studios and Peter Klement of GEElab Europe used Godzilla to explain what we need to know when making gameful systems for a gaming literate audience and what traditional game design teaches us about how to make systems engaging and rewarding to play.

 

On the second day visitors and presenters split off into groups to brainstorm and discuss possible applications for what they had learned. Many interesting ideas were produced, from a systemic analysis of playing with Lego bricks to a business model that combines the yellow pages with the idea of ‘paying it forward’. Gameful systems were central to all ideas and have been found to improve many fields of business and life, if implemented correctly, always taking the inherent complexities and possible negative side effects into account.

 

After the talks and the workshops people used the time to mingle, network and share coffee – and ofcourse discuss the topics of the day and their applications and implications in and for the world of business and game design alike.

 

For enquiries about future Bizplay events email info@geelab.rmit.edu.au

 

To read the Press Clippings

Suddeutsche.de - Computer Games in Operation

The World - With "Gamification" is the job for the computer game

Handlesblatt -Play until the yield true