Oman To Host Third Serious Games Conference

The Knowledge Oasis Muscat, Oman is to host its third Serious Games Conference from the 31st March to 1st April, with a program considering the application of virtual environments to tourism, heritage, culture, health, education, defense and the generation of local web content. Presenting at the two-day program include Professor Lizbeth Goodman, Director, SMARTlab, Digital Media Centre at the University of East London and Professor Bob Stone from Birmingham University. Professor Stone’ presentation is to look at the resurrection of interest in Virtual Heritage and, using the Virtual Stonehenge and Virtual Scylla (artificial reef) projects show how lessons learned from the 1990s should be taken forward to underpin serious games developments in the early 21st Century. “Virtual worlds have hit the mainstream,” suggested Ibtisam Al Faruji, KOM’s Head of Marketing. “Today they are being used not just for consumer applications, but also for a wide range of serious professional purposes. These purposes range from scenario planning to medical training and from collaborative role play to cross-cultural awareness sessions.KOM’s eGames Conference will look at how private virtual worlds are being used now as the basis for serious collaborative activities in a variety of professional domains.”