This year’s Video Games Studies (SVI) conference is dedicated to the topic Video games as a challenge to Academia – 50 years of the gaming industry. Focusing on the science and production of video games, the conference examines various aspects and levels of the connection between science and industry. It was conceived as an opportunity to review and elaborate the conclusions that crystallized during last year’s SVI conference, where, for the first time in Serbia, video game studies were promoted as a new scientific field.
The second international scientific conference Video Game Studies will be held on December 9th and 10th. The program on December 9th will be held in the Central Building of the University of Novi Sad (Dr. Zorana Đinđića 1). Entry is free with on-site registration. All of the presentations on December 10th will be realized online.
Proposals for presentations were sent by 54 researchers from Serbia, Israel, USA, Italy, China, Sweden, Thailand, Great Britain, Turkey, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, France, Croatia and Austria. A number of questions will be discussed at the conference, some of which are: What meanings can we discover in the textual analysis of the game? What is the relationship between video games and art? What is the potential of serious games in education and therapy? What are the dynamics of creating gaming communities? What is the future of the development of video game criticism? Where are the meeting points of industry and social sciences?
You can view the complete agenda of the conference on this link.
As part of the conference, the SGA through the Creative Tech Serbia supercluster program is also organizing a working round table entitled Perspectives and challenges of education in the field of gaming in Serbia. The idea is to bring together representatives of all relevant academic and non-formal education institutions that have either courses in their curricula, or entire majors or study programs dedicated to professional development for the domain of video game development and related disciplines, or programs that cover topics and areas that are complementary to work in this industry.
The goal is to review the current capacities and current programs, as well as to exchange information about further plans and challenges that the actors of the education system face in this regard. The wish of the SGA is to jointly develop educational and academic initiatives dedicated to gaming, to contribute to their improvement and to connect them with the real needs of the industry. This round table will be closed and is intended for representatives of educational institutions and companies from the domestic video game development ecosystem.
In addition to the Academy of Arts (University of Novi Sad), the Faculty of Philology (University of Belgrade) and the Serbian Games Association (SGA) are participating in the organization this year. SGA supports the conference through the Creative Tech Serbia supercluster program. The pilot supercluster is supported by the Serbia Innovates project implemented by the ICT Hub from Belgrade, with the support of USAID.