Digital serious games have shown to be effective in promoting citizen engagement and social interaction. The reasons for their success are, however, unknown. This paper proposes design recommendations to support designers of serious games for meaningful social interaction, based on player preferences, needs and desires, based on literature study and a case study for which a location-based game framework was designed, developed and evaluated. The case study with and for children/teenagers in Rotterdam focussed on the design of challenges by the children/teenagers for meaningful interaction with their environment, and the strengthening of their engagement with their own neighbourhood. The paper focuses specifically on: 1) if and when meaningful social interaction occurred during game play, how it occurred, and with which impact, and 2) the design choices/features that contributed to (the experience of) meaningful social interaction. On the basis of these results and the literature this paper proposes design recommendations to support designers of serious games for meaningful social interaction, taking not only the current players’ needs and desires into account but also those of future players.

Social interaction is part of the fabric of society and is essential to challenge many types of social barriers. Location-based games (LBGs) provide a means to foster such interaction in local communities. The design of such games is currently based primarily on designer experience and on the literature on game design in general, and not on an understanding of user requirements. This article explores the preferences and desires of adolescents in neighborhoods of Rotterdam South to socially interact with others and engage with their own neighborhood via LBGs. Adolescents are informants in the exploration of gaming activities for social interaction, which, when subjected to expert review with the mechanics-dynamics-aesthetics framework, produce gameplay requirements for the desired purpose: social interaction in public space. Such requirements provide researchers and game designers insights on the game dynamics best suited to foster location-based social interaction.

Location-based games (LBGs) successfully promote playful experiences engaging millions of players throughout the world. The potential of embedding such location-based experiences in educational practice has been recognised but not yet fully embraced. LBGs and educational location-based applications have been used to enhance critical thinking, but not for the acquisition and development of 21^st century skills: key competences required to understand, live and thrive in the local communities of today. This paper introduces the LBG 'Secrets of the South', designed to orchestrate social interaction in public space, and foster communication, collaboration, IT literacy, and social/cultural skills through 1) interaction-based social encounters with both friends and unknown members of the community, and 2) in-situ learning about the history and social context of the neighbourhood. A 4-step general procedure is proposed for the creation of LBGs designed to foster 21^st century skills.

Fidelity of games as a concept describes the level of representation of, or accordance with reality. The level of fidelity has influence on the interaction between player and game. Our study discusses the outcomes of a literature study and three cases with the goal to propose a comprehensive framework of game fidelity. This framework could help game designers and researchers to adopt the ‘right’ or sufficient level of fidelity to achieve the intended objectives related to applied games. Our results show that functional and psychological fidelity have a higher impact on the experience and effects of applied games than their physical fidelity. Social and ethical fidelity are proposed as new dimensions of game fidelity that still have to be explored. In literature, both low and high levels of fidelity are described as effective in applied games, while a medium level seems not to be beneficial for the player.

This paper describes different types of activities/challenges designed for social interaction, while discussing the performance of such challenges using the mobile digital game “Secrets of the South” (http://secretsofthesouth.tbm.tudelft.nl/, Secrets of the South). The game was played as part of a scientific meeting, with participants from 25 to 62 years of age and a varying degree of cultural differences. The presentation and discussion of the results of the gameplay provide insights on the appropriateness of the different challenges for social interaction in a playful city. Directions for future work for such challenge designs are presented.

In order to support the decision-making process of industry on how to implement Augmented Reality (AR) in production, this article wants to provide guidance through a set of comparative user studies. The results are obtained from the feedback of 160 participants who performed the same repair task on a switch cabinet of an industrial robot. The studies compare several AR instruction applications on different display devices (head-mounted display, handheld tablet PC and projection-based spatial AR) with baseline conditions (paper instructions and phone support), both in a single-user and a collaborative setting. Next to insights on the performance of the individual device types for the single mode operation, the study is able to show significant indications on AR techniques are being especially helpful in a collaborative setting.

The goals of Superhuman Sports games include to involve physical activity and enhance the skills and abilities of a human through technology. They are played for fun, competition or to improve the players’ health condition. To meet these goals, we designed and developed STAR: Superhuman Training in Augmented Reality, an augmented reality adventure shooter, and implemented it on the Microsoft Hololens. Our game promotes physical activity by making you avoid dangerous enemies and gather energy to deal with this threat while navigating a narrow path above lava. Social interaction is stimulated by its multiplayer mode, in which players have to work together to destroy an energy core. Player testing showed that we achieve our goal of physical exercise by making the player move at a pace slightly less than brisk walking and that the game is fun and immersive. These results show that STAR is a promising step in the right direction for the development of superhuman sports using augmented reality.

Purpose: This paper aims to explore the relationships between participants’ perceived benefits of sharing knowledge privately, within a group or with the general public within an organisational knowledge network. The quality and quantity of knowledge shared are explored in relation to the level of knowledge sharing visibility (both content and participants’ profiles). Design/methodology/approach: A research framework of perceived benefits of knowledge sharing is designed; survey and content analysis are used to explore influences of perceived benefits on the quantity and quality of knowledge shared by participants for each level of knowledge sharing within an organisation. The research model is empirically tested using a questionnaire survey with 205 participants and content analysis of their contributions in a high-tech corporate group. This study uses the partial least squares path-modelling method to explore relationships between constructs of the research model. Findings: The current research results show that intrinsic benefits are more influential than extrinsic benefits for private knowledge sharing, while extrinsic rewards play an important role at the public knowledge sharing within organisations. In addition, results indicate that both the quality and quantity of knowledge sharing at the group-level knowledge sharing are significantly higher than at the private and the public levels. Practical implications: Contemporary knowledge management systems are developed by integrating communication channels in different visibility levels of knowledge exchange. Managers of knowledge management systems are advised to use the research outcome for developing incentive strategies in different levels. Originality/value: In contrast to previous studies that focus on only one level of knowledge sharing, this paper explores relationships between perceived benefits of knowledge sharing with the quantity and quality of shared knowledge for three distinct levels of knowledge sharing.