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< Back ResCOM Retreat 2022 - Ammerdown iGGi PGRs Carlos González Díaz, Cristina Dobre, Dan Gomme, Nuria Peña Perez, and iGGi Manager Tracy Dancer are currently attending the CDE CDT 's ResCom 22 Writing Retreat which takes place at Ammerdown Retreat in Somerset, 23 - 25 May, and the programme is filled with workshops, talks and socialising opportunities. A rather cosy time was had last night, as you can see on the images! Previous 25 May 2022 Next

< Back iGGi Talk at Develop:Brighton - Dominik Jeurissen iGGi PG Researcher Dominik Jeurissen held a talk on " LLM Agents For QA - Potential & Limitations " at this year's Develop:Brighton conference. Abstract: With tight deadlines and a constantly evolving game, properly testing a game is challenging. Using AI agents to simplify this work sounds promising, but machine learning is often too slow, and manually implementing the agents takes time. As such, one particularly exciting application for QA is to use Large Language Models (LLMs) as zero-shot game-playing agents. LLM-based agents can play games without pre-training, making them a valuable asset to test a constantly changing game. But how well do they play games? What are their strengths, and what do they struggle with? In this session, we will review how to implement zero-shot agents with LLMs and show examples of existing LLM-based game-playing agents. We will also show that although these agents have many limitations, they have the potential to be a valuable tool for QA to automate many repetitive tasks. The objectives of Dominik's talk were to provide the audience with an overview of the cutting-edge research on LLM-based zero-shot game-playing agents show what these agents can do well and what their limitations are give practical tips on how to utilize LLM agents as QA tools Dominik's talk has been recorded and will be made available to Develop ticket holders. Please contact Dominik directly if you have any queries regarding the presentation. Previous 11 Jul 2024 Next

About iGGi is a collaboration between Uni of York + Queen Mary Uni of London: the largest training programme worldwide for doing a PhD in digital games. About iGGi Your Future in Games Research The EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Intelligent Games and Game Intelligence (iGGi) is the world's largest PhD research programme focused on games research. Our mission is to unlock the full potential of games research to contribute to wellbeing, prosperity, and science by training the next generation of leading researchers, designers and developers in games. Based at the University of York, Queen Mary, Goldsmiths, and Essex, iGGi students undertake a four year PhD in impact-oriented games research, working closely with more than 80 partner organisations in the games industry and society. iGGi students advance games with research, software, patents, algorithms, data analytic techniques and creative works across a wide range of areas , from game AI and analytics to player experience and game design to games and play for health, education, or research. Game Research that Matters iGGi embraces a diversity of research approaches and topics: from humanistic studies of how autobiographical games convey meaning or designerly work on using stage magic in game design to rigorous trials of games for mental health or creative play with machine learning and advancing AI techniques for real-time MOBA play. At the heart of iGGi's approach to research are two principles: fostering dialogue between research and practice: we engage game creators, players, and other stakeholders throughout our research to ensure our work is inclusive, responsible, and makes a positive impact on the real needs of people and organisations fostering dialogue between engineering and human sciences: we believe innovative and responsible game research happens in interdisciplinary work that brings together perspectives from engineering (AI, data science, game-making) and humanities and behavioural sciences (HCI, psychology, design, game studies) While we welcome work across many themes, iGGi particularly focuses on two lines of work: Intelligent Games: Unlocking the value of research for the entertainment games industry, creating new engaging gameplay agents as well as new data- and AI-assisted tools and methods for making games and studying players Game Intelligence: Unlocking the value of games for wellbeing, learning, and science by advancing the design of applied or ‘serious’ games and gamification, the use of game data to understand the human condition, and our understanding of the positive and negative uses and effects of games. Game AI Player Research Applied Games Game Audio Design & Development Accessibility Creative Computing Esports Immersive Technology Game Data iGGi THEMES A Unique Community and Network PhD research is often solitary. Not so in iGGi : PhD students can collaborate with more than 70 other current PhD students and 60 leading academics all working on games. iGGi's past and present closely linked networks include the Digital Creativity Labs , XR Stories , WEAVR , and the Arena Research Cluster at the University of York, cutting-edge research and development centres for games, immersive storytelling, and esports, and the Game AI Research Group at QMUL, one of the largest research groups for technical games research world-wide. PhD students form a lasting cohort with everyone joining the programme in the same year, from joint training to working together in shared offices, and iGGi runs regular local and remote events to connect students further across sites and cohorts. The iGGi Con Every year, students co-organise the iGGi conference showcasing their research to academia and industry, and participate in the Global Game Jam. Students also travel to major industry and academic conferences like Develop, CoG, CHI, CHI Play, or FDG to network and disseminate their work. Finally, students co-organise research workshops on joint topics of interest with leading researchers and practitioners, and can conduct research visits with iGGi's academic partners abroad. iGGi Con info Meet the Team Meet The Team PG Researchers Meet our iGGi PGRs Supervisors/Staff Meet our Supervisors and other Staff Management Team Meet our iGGi Management Team Alumni Meet our iGGi Alumni Engaging Industry and Society To foster dialogue between research and practice, iGGi draws on a network of more than 80 partner organisations, spanning industry bodies (UKIE, TIGA, BGI, IGDA), developer studios (e.g. Sony Interactive Entertainment, Bossa Studios, Square Enix, Ubisoft, Creative Assembly, Revolution Software), industry suppliers (e.g. deltaDNA, Spirit AI, Player Research), advocacy groups (e.g. Women in Games, AbleGamers, BAME in Games, SafeInOurWorld), research centres at other universities and organizations (e.g. Microsoft Research, Nokia Bell Labs, UC Santa Cruz, UC Irvine, GeorgiaTech, Utrecht University, Monash University, NC State University, University of Waterloo, Tampere University), and media organisations (e.g. Screen Yorkshire, BBC). iGGi students spend at least eight weeks working with one or more of our partners to understand the realities and challenges of applying research in practice, tackle real-world problems, and make a positive difference. Beyond the members of our partner network, iGGi students have also worked with e.g. Splash Damage, Media Molecule, Google DeepMind, Prowler, Sue Ryder, BT, and many others, and iGGi is always looking for new partners to join our network. iGGi Partners Show all iGGi Partners A Rigorous Training Programme Over their four years of study, iGGi students receive a full year's worth of training to prepare them to do excellent and impactful research. In their first year, students take four 'core' training modules: Game Design: Students learn how to conceive, design, prototype and playtest their own games, be it for entertainment or a 'serious' purpose like health, education, or research. Game Research & Data: Students learn various methods for empirically studying games and players, including standard HCI methods and data science techniques for gaining insights from big data sets. Game Development & AI: Students learn how to develop game prototypes using standard industry game engines, explore novel interaction techniques and interfaces, and the state of AI applications in games, like AI opponents and collaborators, procedural content generation, or player modelling. Impact & Engagement: Students learn how to engage industry, players, and other societal stakeholders early on in their research, how to conduct responsible research and innovation that is overall beneficial to human wellbeing, and how to present their work online, to the media, and industry. These formal training modules are complemented by regular events and workshops, academic and industry knowledge exchange, and a wide range of optional modules depending on each students’ needs. See info on iGGi Training An Inclusive and Responsible Environment iGGi wants to be a positive agent of change for more inclusive, diverse, and responsible games and research communities. We especially welcome students from underserved communities, celebrate diversity in our events, and work with e.g. Women in Games and BAME in Games to reach out to students from diverse backgrounds. We work hard to increase the intellectual, ethnic, and gender diversity of our supervisor pool so students can find the right fit for them. We support flexible training and work arrangements to fit students’ family and health situations. We work with leading figures in responsible innovation and rigorous, open science media effects research to ensure our training and research critically engages with the potential positive and negative impacts of games and research innovations. Please note that iGGi CDT is now closed for recruitment: the last iGGi intake is September 2023. A Word from Peter Cowling, iGGi Director Word from iGGi Director General Note Please note: iGGi is funded via a grant from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) / Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC) . This means that studentships awarded by iGGi are subject to UKRI/EPSRC regulation as well as terms and conditons of the grant agreement. iGGi CDT is now closed for recruitment: the last iGGi intake is September 2023.

< Back iGGi @ Develop:Brighton 2025 What an exceedingly exciting Develop we had this year! With 24 sponsored/official iGGi PG Researchers and Staff, and a fair few Alumni/soon-to-be Alumni, iGGi's presence confidently reached the count of 30. Here are some of iGGi's highlights: The iGGi Stand on the Develop Expo Floor With above-average footfall compared to previous times, the iGGi stand proved to be busy and popular this year. Visitors to the stand included familiar, friendly faces (big thanks to all of those "Friends of iGGi" who managed to drop by!), games industry folks who were new to the idea of iGGi and interested to hear about potential collaboration with iGGi , and then there were also those who thought about pursuing games further on an academic pathway . In summary, many vivid conversations were had, and regardless of whether they were future-opportunity-focused or more just-in-the-moment, we enjoyed them all! Displays at the stand were: "Exploring Human Behaviour in Social Virtual Reality" by Karl Clarke "Interactive Tool to Explore Different Playstyles in MicroRTS" by Ruizhe "Jay" Yu Xia "Detachment Undone" by Luiza Gossian "Future Factory - a Card Game" by Prasad Sandbhor An invitation for Indie Devs of Narrative Games to participate in a focus-study by Alex Flint Our this year's showcase video and " iGGi @ Develop " lookup iGGi Speaker at Develop This year, we were thrilled to hear Francesca Foffano's presentation on Player Emotional Design where she talked about how we experience emotions best design practices emotional design design solutions for Emotional Accessibility If you missed the talk or you would like to recap, Francesca shared the slides and you can find them under this link . iGGi Speaker at the Game A11y Gathering The Game A11y Gathering was a satellite event to Develop and organisers included iGGi Alum Jozef Kulik , last year's iGGi Con Keynote Cari Watterton, and Mollie Evans (Nothing Without Us). The second iteration of this game-accessibility-focused micro conference was sponsored by Sony Interactive Entertainment PlayStation Studios, Games User Research, PlaytestCloud, Scopely, and hosted at Unity Technologies. Like last year, it brought together developers and advocates from across the industry to discuss accessibility in games. Notably, iGGi PG Researcher Steph Carter was a speaker at the event. Steph's presentation was titled "Why Words Matter: Accessible Language in Games" and discussed how the words we use - whether in menus, dialogue, or instructions - shape how players understand and interact with game worlds. Steph shared why language is a crucial part of games accessibility, drawing on their experience as a neurodivergent player, an accessibility consultant and linguistics specialist. Quite a few of the other iGGi PGRs also attended the event and found it very instructive in its practical focus. Big thank you to organisers, sponsors and hosts, for putting on this fabulous event! >>> PICTURES TO FOLLOW Develop Impressions In comparison to last year's slightly subdued vibes and despite the fact that we've still not seen the end of incoming waves of layoffs (e.g., Microsoft), this year's atmosphere felt relaxed and cautiously optimistic. The sunny weather certainly helped! Two of the iGGis in particular struck lucky during the Develop Expo and won things at other stands. Namely a PS5 (in the raffle from GamesAid ) and a Packman Machine (in a contest at Big Games Machine ) After three days of full-on networking, it was finally time for a bit of chillin by the beach. The week left us looking forward to next year already! See you again in 2026, Brighton! Previous 10 Jul 2025 Next

iGGi PhD Projects - listing iGGi PhD Projects 2023 Immersive Technology This page displays the supervisor-proposed PhD projects on offer under the above stated theme: If you are interested in any of the projects listed and would like further details and/or to discuss, please email the project supervisor. Please note that you can also frame your own project independently granted that you have secured a supervisor's support. For a list of available supervisors please see the accepting students section of our website. While iGGi has checked that the project descriptions listed below are within iGGi's scope , we wish to highlight that you are still responsible for ensuring that your proposal, too, is in line with this scope, and we would further like to point out that supervisor-framed projects are not prioritised in the application selection process: they are judged by the same criteria as applicant-framed proposals. For guidance to make sure that the proposal you submit (regardless of whether it has been supervisor-framed or created entirely by you) sits within iGGi's scope please refer to this link: https://iggi.org.uk/iggi-scope Navigate to other Themes on offer: Game AI Design & Development Player Research Game Audio Game Data Immersive Technology Creative Computing E-Sports Applied Games Back to ALL Projects Immersive Technology Places That Don't Exist The goal of this project is to combine state-of-the-art 3D computer vision and procedural content generation to create game-ready scene models and assets from existing media. Price Immersive Technology Duration William Smith Read More Immersive Technology Tactile Interaction With Virtual Reality Content In this project the student will explore the use of vibrating motors distributed over the human hand (e.g. using a wearable glove) to give tactile feedback about the physical interactions happening in a VR. Price Immersive Technology Duration Lorenzo Jamone & Valkyrie Industries Read More Load More

< Back NATS - iGGi Collaboration showcased at NATS Research Conference A recent collaboration between the University of York and NATS, the UK's leading provider of air traffic control services, is being shown at NATS’ Virtual Research Collaboration Conference . The 6-month A2URE project investigated what a suitable methodology for the development and approval of decision-making automation in Air Traffic Control operations would look like. Alongside this, what changes would be required to operational procedures and policies were considered. Nathan Hughes , a third year IGGI student, worked with NATS to produce three reports for the project. The first considered how current safety assurance processes for changes introduced to the Air Traffic Management (ATM) system could be applied to decision-making automation. The second summarised the factors commonly seen in controller-automation interactions. The final report described a new methodology for designing and developing automated decision-making tools, which could also provide evidence of safety assurance, validation and verification. Alongside these reports, two workshops were run internally to gain feedback from NATS experts, with attendees from the departments of safety assurance, validation, and human performance. The project aims to support future research into introducing decision-making automation to ATM, including the continued development of procedures and policies as more automation is introduced. Find link to the project summary here: https://i.nats.aero/rc21/site/automation/a2ure/ and the project's video for the exhibition below: The exhibition continues until 15 October 2021. Follow this link to access the online venue: https://i.nats.aero/rc21/ Previous 1 Oct 2021 Next

< Back Festive Wishes from iGGi Festive Wishes from iGGi As another calendar year is drawing to a close, iGGi wishes you a happy & relaxing Festive Break and a good start into 2023 !!! In other news: Selected recordings of the last iGGi Conference are OUT NOW and can be accessed via our iGGi YouTube channel: iGGi CON 2022 Talks here https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrhB7hwYCdScgdnGraofca1YhhL3BfGyd iGGi CON 2022 Keynotes here https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrhB7hwYCdScXSOX3vDlGwUzQLu1WciTd Subscribe to https://www.youtube.com/@iGGiPhD for further updates! We look forward to seeing you all in the New Year! Previous 21 Dec 2022 Next

< Back *New Partner Alert* - Safe In Our World iGGi is proud to introduce our new partner Safe In Our World . The charity (which was founded in 2017 by a group of dedicated folks from games industry) wants to foster positive mental health wellbeing and deliver support not only for players but also developers, publishers, retailers and the other incredible folk and teams who make up the video games industry. The main goal of Safe In Our World is to create and foster worldwide mental health awareness within the video game industry; to eliminate the stigma surrounding mental health, to make it a natural topic of discussion, and to promote the dialogue surrounding mental health so people are not afraid to reach out for help if they need it. iGGi is definitely happy to get behind that goal! As part of our pledge, we are committing to address the following points over the forthcoming year and beyond: Continue to create awareness among iGGi Staff, Supervisors and Researchers in respect of mental health related matters Make sure that all iGGi Supervisors have completed some form of mental health training Offer access to Safe In Our World’s resources to all iGGi Staff and PGRs, including training on mental health first aid and similar Update our annual mental health newsletter which contains important local contacts and resources and other information relevant to the topic Campaign for the cause, disseminate and foster “best practice” and support Safe In Our World in its mission Collaborate with Safe In Our World via sharing mental health-related iGGi research/publications and via joint events such as workshops, talks, panels, etc. So, here’s an official WELCOME to the Safe In Our World Team! We look forward to working together on that mission. #LevelUpMentalHealth Please note: Safe In Our World will feature in our upcoming iGGi Conference (06+07 September in York, find the Registration Link here . Previous 24 Aug 2022 Next

< Back iGGi 2021 CON The iGGi 2021 Conference concluded last week and we look back on two days that were fully packed with Talks Keynotes Panels Workshops the customary iGGi Buzz Talks knowledge exchange + networking and not to forget, a much-needed dose of socialising + fun If you've missed some or (hopefully not) all of it - we've compiled selected recordings, so that you can catch up via YouTube at your own leisure. A MASSIVE THANK YOU to the team of conference organisers: Nick Ballou , Timea Farkas , Dan Gomme , Joe Hesketh , Bobby Khaleque , Charlie Ringer , Michael Saiger , Evelyn Tan , Marko Tot , Kyle Worrall - this could not have happened without your dedication, effort, and creative input!This year's IGGI 2021 CON took place online on gather.town : with customisable avatars and an engaging conference map it felt like the next best option to an in-person event. Having said that, we can't wait to run IGGI 2022 as a face-to-face experience again, and we are very much hoping to see you there!! Previous 17 Sept 2021 Next

< Back iGGi Becomes WIG Education Ambassador iGGi is proud to officially announce that we are now Women in Games (WIG) Education Ambassadors as of last week. We at iGGi feel strongly that the future in games industry and research must include a more level playing field for all the groups which currently lack visibility and/or voice. We want to do our part in creating societal change in that respect. Here's a link to the article in the WIG newsletter featuring our senior academic spokesperson Raluca Gaina. >> iGGi joins Women in Games as Education Ambassador . We are very happy that Raluca has accepted this new role: as she is both, an iGGi Alumna and an iGGi Supervisor/Staff, she is particularly suited to representing women, not only within iGGi but also in games research as a whole. Included in the iGGi WIG team will be any interested PGRs who we will introduce in one of the forthcoming iGGi News articles, so, watch this space! If you as an iGGi PGR are interested in joining in, please let iGGi Admin know. (Note: You don’t have to identify as female to become a WIG Ambassador.) Here’s also a general link to this month’s WIG July Newsletter And finally, a big THANKS goes to the WIG Team who have been amazingly supportive already. We look forward to many years of collaboration ahead of us! Previous 20 Jul 2023 Next

iGGi PhD Projects - listing iGGi PhD Projects 2023 Game AI This page displays the supervisor-proposed PhD projects on offer under the above stated theme: If you are interested in any of the projects listed and would like further details and/or to discuss, please email the project supervisor. Please note that you can also frame your own project independently granted that you have secured a supervisor's support. For a list of available supervisors please see the accepting students section of our website. While iGGi has checked that the project descriptions listed below are within iGGi's scope , we wish to highlight that you are still responsible for ensuring that your proposal, too, is in line with this scope, and we would further like to point out that supervisor-framed projects are not prioritised in the application selection process: they are judged by the same criteria as applicant-framed proposals. For guidance to make sure that the proposal you submit (regardless of whether it has been supervisor-framed or created entirely by you) sits within iGGi's scope please refer to this link: https://iggi.org.uk/iggi-scope Navigate to other Themes on offer: Game AI Design & Development Player Research Game Audio Game Data Immersive Technology Creative Computing E-Sports Applied Games Back to ALL Projects Game AI Automatic Evaluation of Tabletop Games This project proposal aims to research and develop methods to accurately evaluate the impact of modern Tabletop Games components in different aspects of gameplay. Price Game AI Duration Diego Pérez-Liébana Read More Game AI Principled and Scalable Exploration Techniques for Reinforcement Learning In this project, you will develop principled and scalable exploration techniques based on reducing model uncertainty. Price Game AI Duration Paulo Rauber Read More Game AI Evolving Perception for Game Agents This project will investigate game agents in open world games which evolve their senses and world representation alongside learning what actions to take in each state. We will evolve game agents with highly alien behaviours which nevertheless have high fitness in the open world environment, while investigating important scientific questions about how senses and world representations evolved in humans. Price Game AI Duration Alex Wade, Peter Cowling Read More Load More

< Back Joint Writing Retreat - November 2023 Another fantastic Joint Writing Retreat was had with our colleagues at MAT , CDE and AIM this week at the beautiful High Leigh. Feedback from the event, was, as always really positive with: 100% of respondents saying the retreat was useful and beneficial to their research/progress 96% saying they would recommend it to others 95% saying they produced more content than expected With comments about the primary benefit of the retreat being: Scheduled writing time and not having to worry about preparing food, chores etc Refreshing and networking with people in a similar but different sphere made me reframe I feel good writing in a big group. And I have good mood in here Very focused working time and environment. More productive than the office. Very quiet and focused. Not having to think about what food to buy and to prepare and to cook takes the mental load off to just focus on writing. It's surprising how much fretting about food preparation for the week takes out of your day. Here is the word cloud created from the Mentimeter “poll of 3 words” to describe the retreat: Previous 24 Nov 2023 Next