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The Serious Games Initiative is focused on uses for games in exploring management and leadership challenges facing the public sector. Part of its overall charter is to help forge productive links between the electronic game industry and projects involving the use of games in education, training, health, and public policy.


Serious Games Talent Directory Project

Posted by Ben Sawyer on 04-04-22

Proposal for a 'Serious Games' Developer and Talent Directory

Mission: Create a set of objective criteria that will allow a vetted listing of developers and other third-party talent related to the building of serious game style products and projects in order to stimulate wider adoption of such games.

Details: The Serious Games Initiative is asking for suggestions in how to build a database of vendors, and talent, that could help peers, funders, and other interested parties more readily build serious game projects. The database would allow potential listees to submit information about their company, personal skills, and related project history. Volunteer reviewers would verify the information against a published set of criteria. If the reviewers found the information is properly verifiable then the record would be approved and published. It could subsequently be updated and re-reviewed for the life of the database.

Users could search the database to find useful partners, and contractors to work with.

The following is our current detailed thinking on such a system:

1. It should be vendor only. Posting RFPs makes puts the project, or any operator at risk of charges of conflicts of interest and it invites lots of unqualified people to contact the posting organization. This directory would focus on making it easier for clients to find the right leads for partners.

2. Vendors would in the DB would be peer reviewed based on a compliance with a predesigned set of criteria. The peer reviews would just be verifications of the information not subjective evaluations of how good or not good your work is. For example, to be in the database as a 'game designer of serious games' you must show references to your work that fit a specific profile. Same with 'commercial developer with serious games technology' etc. A level designer would have to provide a level that was affiliated with a 'serious game' project (i.e. non entertainment use) A serious game developer would have to prove they had shipped a project by providing some qualified proof (be it a client letter, a Web site, a demo, a press release, etc.) or they could qualify with a prototype or demo for unpublished work. This criteria would be best developed publicly by this community.

Three reviewers would look over the submissions. If there were any disputs majority would rule (so essentially 2 of 3 must agree to the vetting principal).

3. The database would require you to have a working Web site, and email. The system would periodically check these and flush those that didn't update their profile or whose site or email was found and verified to be offline. The system would also allow clients to send notes to its operators. That way if someone got through the vetting but didn't work out as advertise we could take action against them. Customers who sent kudo quotes could ask for them to be attached publicly to the record.

The trick is to create a system that potential clients feels contains vetted information and can make it easier to identify developers qualified in this space in some way that helps them focus on those best tuned to the concept they may be seeking to produce.

Current Criteria Ideas
The criteria ideas we have so far are more rough examples then absolute ideas. They include:

DEVELOPER
General goal would be to distinguish between those submissions which listed supposed credentials and those developers with qualified histories of either commercial game development and/or serious game development. Not subject to how good the games were, just that a game got built, and delivered to market.

To be listed as developer must show example of work via:

� Link to one or more press stories on product and/or
� Link to publicly available download of product (not demo) and/or
� If self published then provide link to online ordering system (must also show reviews and customer quotes)
� Link to publisher related project page and/or
� Submission of three or more verifiable client users
� Link to publisher related project page and/or
� Submission of three or more verifiable client users

If not then the developer could be listed as a developer in waiting utilizing remaining criteria

System would designate difference between commercial game developers, verified serious game developers. You could be one, or both but must be qualified as either.

The idea here is to be listed as a product developer you must have some core credit to a product that is clearly in use in the marketplace. Demos, prototypes, and self-developed but unused projects would not qualify for such status. Instead these would be listed as examples.

CONSULTANT
To be listed as a consultant must show example of work via:

Link to one or more press stories on project related to serious games work which mentions your company or name
and/or
Link to project page which mentions your company or name
and/or
Links at least two articles at an ISSN listed publication, or qualified academic journal
and/or
Submission of three or more verifiable client quotes representing work

If none of these could be provided the person would not qualify

TALENT/CONTRACTOR
To be listed as a qualified talent must show example of work via:

Link to published resume on Web or qualified corporate Web site
Link to publicly available downloads and examples of work
Proof of credit on one or more commercial game or verifiable serious game work
Provision of at least one verifiable reference

Person could choose to qualify as designer, producer, artist, programmer, etc.

Special Talent Listings:

Assessment Specialist: Must show proper degree proof, or qualified project and references

Instructional Designer: Must show proper degree proof, resume, or qualified project and references

General Information we'd Ask for:

Verifiable Email
Verifiable Address
Verifiable Phone
Verifiable Web Address
History of Company
Posted Web Resume (if individual)
Customer Quotes (must provide name, email, and phone, for each for verification)
Capabilities
Categories (art, programming, full development, etc.)
Key Technologies (this wouldn't be verified per se would be assumed correct if other info pans out)
Market focus...
K-12, Higher Ed, Military, etc. (need suggestions)

Critical Needs
Please provide further ideas for what to categorize, questions for evaluation, and evaluation criteria for this part of the project. We need things that result in verifiable proof that is objective (i.e. either you have it or you don't) not subjective (i.e. great art vs. bad art, good game vs. bad game).


Serious Games Market Size

Posted by Ben Sawyer on 04-04-01

I've posted some thoughts on the size and scale of the Serious Games market to my personal blog on the site.

You can read more at:
http://www.seriousgames.org/ben/