We’re celebrating a great achievement from Dr Lee Scott, our Head of Higher Education whose games company Echo Games, has just won the Best Poster Award at the international GALA Conference 2025 in Utrecht.
As Co-Director of Echo Games – a community interest company creating “seriously fun” games that inspire, inform and engage – Lee and the team presented their innovative framework for developing games for learning and games for change. Their short paper, “An Integrative Process for Making Serious Games,” outlines a practical, collaborative approach built around three phases:
- Co-Discovery – exploring key facts, insights and messages with subject specialists
- Co-Design – transforming those insights into meaningful game mechanics
- Co-Evaluation – testing with real users and planning how to measure impact
It’s a model rooted in creativity, openness and genuine partnership, values that run right through Boomsatsuma’s own approach to teaching and making.
Serious Games at Boomsatsuma
Across our courses and studios, students are already applying game technology to complex real-world topics. Right now, Year 2 Game Design and Production students are working with University of Bristol archaeologist Professor Stuart Prior to create an immersive historical learning game that puts players in the shoes of a 12th-century royal prisoner at Bristol Castle.
At the same time, students and alumni at Venture Studio, our in-house creative technology studio, continues to accelerate. Led by Richard Blows, the studio connects students, graduates and interns with commissioned projects that push the boundaries of creative technology, offering paid, real-world experience with industry partners.
Lee’s award-winning research highlights the exciting direction of serious games globally, and it’s brilliant to see Boomsatsuma students and staff contributing to that momentum right here in Bristol.
