Center for Game Research

The central hub for disseminating game research from Utrecht University
 

Playing the Hidden Curriculum

Playing the Hidden Curriculum: Exposing, materializing and questioning the unwritten rules of higher education is a research project that aims to adress the unwritten social and cultural rules in education, so that the UU will foster its education in a more social and inclusive way.

Editorial Team
31-05-2024 // Education, Insights, News // Games Beyond Entertainment, Multi theme, Social Games and Play

Research Projects

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ANTICIPLAY

Making Game Studies’ Research Practical with Discursive Game Design

Co-creation of games, participatory design, open dialogue, and social perspective-taking currently lie at the centre of game research at Utrecht University. All these practices are characteristic of Discursive Game Design (DGD), a method that highlights the processes underlying practice-based game research, rather than a final "fixed" product.

Marijn Benschop
02-03-2026 // Insights // Criticism and Analysis, Game Design, Games Beyond Entertainment

Comenius - Fostering an Open Mind

Open Mind game challenges to look further

From now on, the Open Mind game, a creative educational game in the style of “whodunit”, is available in the Apple App and Google Play store. Students play the game on their own smartphones and receive mysterious messages from an unknown sender. By talking to various characters about their traits, values and beliefs, they have

14-07-2025 // Education, News // Games Beyond Entertainment, Social Games and Play

Shape2Gether - Erasmus+

Shape2gether: Sharing our knowledge about discursive game design

Last November Aengus, Isabel and Mick visited two conferences to share some of the outcomes of the Erasmus+ hape2gether project with a broader audience.

Mick Raamsteeboers, Isabel Rump, Aengus Schulte
10-01-2026 // Education, Events // Games and Sustainability, Games Beyond Entertainment

Virtual Reality as Empathy Machine

CFP: “VR as Empathy Machine: Media, Migration and the Humanitarian Predicament”

 Book Title: Beyond the Empathy Machine: Critical Perspectives on Virtual Reality  Editors: Professor Sandra Ponzanesi (s.ponzanesi@uu.nl), Dr. Jenny Andrine Madsen Evang (j.a.m.evang@uu.nl), Dr. Wouter Oomen (w.a.oomen@uu.nl), Laurence Herfs (l.l.herfs@uu.nl), and Lisa Burghardt (l.burghardt@uu.nl)  Over the last decade or so, Virtual Reality (VR) has been honed as a new frontier in social tech. From Chris Milk and Gabo

Editorial Team
07-01-2026 // Books // Extended Realities (AR/VR/XR)

Themes

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Criticism and Analysis

New minor “Games and Play in a Changing Society” open for registration

Cover image (c) Christopher Paul High via Unsplash. The new curriculum, which replaces the previous minor “Game Studies’, is a transdisciplinary collaboration between the Department of Media & Cultures studies (MCW), the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development and the Department of Information and Computing Sciences and enables students to analyze games and play in contemporary

08-06-2026 // Education // Criticism and Analysis, Game Design, Games Beyond Entertainment, Play Research, Social Games and Play

Social Games and Play

Open Mind game challenges to look further

From now on, the Open Mind game, a creative educational game in the style of “whodunit”, is available in the Apple App and Google Play store. Students play the game on their own smartphones and receive mysterious messages from an unknown sender. By talking to various characters about their traits, values and beliefs, they have

14-07-2025 // Education, News // Games Beyond Entertainment, Social Games and Play

Play Research

Pinball Research at School

Utrecht University performed play experiments at Basisschool De Odyssee (Utrecht) to understand the positive effects of playing for children. To what extent does playing together promote self-disclosure? Specifically, the researchers were interested in to what extent playing together creates feelings of safety and social connectedness for children, and to what extent those feelings promote self-disclosure,

dr. Sander Bakkes
14-02-2025 // Insights, News // Play Research, Player Research and Psychology

Games Beyond Entertainment

ASS POWER: Gaming at the Theatre

A review of Patrick Blenkarn and Milton Lim's 8 hour revolutionary donkey epic that sits between theatre and videogames. A collective gaming experience that will have you braying heeeee-haaaww while you contemplate issues of labor, automation, violence, and the good life.

03-06-2026 // Insights // Criticism and Analysis, Ethics of Play, Game Design, Games Beyond Entertainment

Disciplines

>> All Disciplines

Media and Culture Studies

New minor “Games and Play in a Changing Society” open for registration

Cover image (c) Christopher Paul High via Unsplash. The new curriculum, which replaces the previous minor “Game Studies’, is a transdisciplinary collaboration between the Department of Media & Cultures studies (MCW), the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development and the Department of Information and Computing Sciences and enables students to analyze games and play in contemporary

08-06-2026 // Education // Criticism and Analysis, Game Design, Games Beyond Entertainment, Play Research, Social Games and Play

Geosciences

Shape2gether: Sharing our knowledge about discursive game design

Last November Aengus, Isabel and Mick visited two conferences to share some of the outcomes of the Erasmus+ hape2gether project with a broader audience.

Mick Raamsteeboers, Isabel Rump, Aengus Schulte
10-01-2026 // Education, Events // Games and Sustainability, Games Beyond Entertainment

Computer Sciences

Open Mind game challenges to look further

From now on, the Open Mind game, a creative educational game in the style of “whodunit”, is available in the Apple App and Google Play store. Students play the game on their own smartphones and receive mysterious messages from an unknown sender. By talking to various characters about their traits, values and beliefs, they have

14-07-2025 // Education, News // Games Beyond Entertainment, Social Games and Play

History and Art History

Jamming for Climate Justice!

How do you simulate a climate crisis? How can you convey an ecocritical message that invites reflection and, perhaps, action? Participants of the Mzansi Game Jam (MGJ) developed games that addressed these questions from various angles.

Marijn Benschop
18-02-2026 // Education, Events, Interview // Criticism and Analysis, Games Beyond Entertainment