Are Game and Play the same thing or different things? If this question intrigues you – this will be the first thing that we will tackle in this unique serious game design workshop. Games are an increasingly important part of popular culture today but they have been part of human history for a long time. Games are an interesting way to learn and also allow for different aspects to be explored. However, have you ever thought of using a game as a research tool or as a method in your research. We will delve a little into the world of citizen science games and learn how this has been made possible and then we will try and do the same using your own research themes or education themes? Does one have to be a game designer to create a game? This is a yes and no question as it depends on what you want to do. But what we will try and do in this workshop is to think like a game designer without being one and see how far we can get in trying to address some of our own problems – whether it be in teaching or in research. The aim of this short workshop is to be a hands-on interactive workshop where you will try and create some game concepts and learn some basic game design principles while doing so. Designing a game from scratch is a long process – but at least we can get you started in that direction with this inspirational process. Come with an open and playful mind.

Rajiv Vaid Basaiawmoit Bio

Dr. Rajiv Vaid Basaiawmoit, Ph.D., MBA, is currently the Head of Sci-Tech Innovation & Entrepreneurship at Aarhus University, Denmark. He is a polymath of sorts having a PhD in Biophysics (2007), a double Masters in Biotechnology (2001) and in Business Administration (MBA - 2011). Rajiv has since straddled various disciplines and spent various amounts of time in various fields such as Nanoscience, Molecular Biology, Organizational Psychology, Environmental Sustainability, Marketing, Social Entrepreneurship, Gamification, & Ludology. In parallel, he also launched a Game studio – Biosymfonix Edu Games under his consulting business Biosymfonix. One of it's flagship products is a multi-award-winning board game called ESHIP:NavigatingUncertainty which is currently in use in over 60 different institutions across 22 different countries. During COVID Rajiv used the down-time to create even more games and one is spin-off to the aforementioned flagship, now called GRANTED: The Research Grant Game – which helps interdisciplinary teams come together and create a skeletal grant proposal in under 3 hours.  

Owing to his multi-disciplinary background and ability to innovate as well as coach on how to innovate, he is an invited speaker and thought leader at many conferences, events and institutions around the world from TedX to NATO and many others. Rajiv’s multi-specialty achievements and interests have spawned various inter-disciplinary collaborations with disparate entities and individuals that range from artists to scientists, to philosophers to entrepreneurs as well as Museums, Communication agencies, Game studios and of course universities and schools.