Ever wanted to decimate the world's population or see if you could develop a super-bug that would leave the globe in utter pandemonium? If the answer is yes, browser-based Pandemic 2 is your game; even if the answer is 'uh, no,' it's an interesting way to while away some time. Watch as your customized disease of choice is let loose on the world, then use your 'evolution points' to mutate the perfect delivery method for a global pandemic — the goal is to have a trail of devastation (and bodies) left in your wake. There are two different modes, 'realistic' and 'relaxed,' so if you're not sure you're ready for a realistic onslaught, you can try your hand with the easier mode.

Pandemic 2 [CrazyMonkeyGames via IndieGames]

The Utility of Serious Games for Marketing

'Performative Play': Games and the 'Real World'

What Gaming Needs: More 'World' Games?

UCSD's SoftWhere 2008 -- Now With Videos

Missed UCSD's SoftWhere 2008 conference and curious what went on? Well, video of the public portion of the conference is now popping up on the SoftWhere 2008 page in QuickTime and YouTube. A lot of big names (like Ian Bogost, above) had some very interesting presentations on a variety of topics — even my Japanese historiography professor showed up and had a lot to say about history, time, and software. It was a pretty diverse group, and owing to the zippy format, you can get a good feel for a lot of the research and ideas without spending half an hour or more listening to one presentation. Confining academics to such a short period of time? Sheer brilliance.

SoftWhere 2008 videos [Grand Text Auto]

Takayoshi Sato on Silent Hill, Serious Games, and Art

UCSD's Softwhere 2008: A Few Roundups

In "Creatively Dead" Industry, Change Comes From The Outside

In mid-1980s Nicaragua, a woman stood beside a burnt out bus in a tiny, remote town. Game designer Jim Gasperini was in the region to visit his brother, a journalist covering Contra issues during the Reagan administration.

The bus, the woman told Gasperini, had been provided by the Nicaraguan government, and she had relied on it as her only means of visiting her sister. The Contras - anti-government guerillas funded by the U.S. - had destroyed the bus. The woman, passionate about American democracy, told Gasperini that if he could just tell everyone back in the States about what had happened to her bus, Americans would vote to help, the Contras would cease their attacks, and she could travel to her sister's again.

Touched by her plight and by her faith, Gasperini wondered what he could do to disseminate information about the Contra situation. In the end, he decided to do what he did best: Make a game.

MSU Offering New Chinese Language/Culture MMO

Sandra Day O'Connor, Henry Jenkins Back Socially-Conscious Gaming At Games For Change

Games For Change, a nonprofit organization that addresses games as "agents of social change," will be holding its fifth annual festival in New York City next week, June 2-4 at Parsons The New School For Design. Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor will give a keynote, as will MIT's Dr. Henry Jenkins and Arizona State University's Dr. James Paul Gee.

This year, Games For Change kicks off the event with a MacArthur Foundation-funded one-day workshop aimed at non-profit professionals, to teach them how to make games about social issues. On June 3, Microsoft will host the event's Expo Night, which showcases serious games from designers around the world competing for recognition in the Microsoft-sponsored Imagine Cup, which the company announced last year. The challenge to designers asks them to develop games themed around supporting a sustainable environment.

The United Nations will also present games it created, including games about malaria prevention, water conservation and global poverty, and various other non-profit organizations are set to offer demonstrations as well.

Full announcement follows the jump. I'll be covering portions of the event next week, and I can't wait to play the Malaria Game! — In sincerity, I attended Games For Change last year and am looking forward to this year's, which looks much bigger than before!

Grants Awarded For Inspiring Health Games Research

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has revealed 12 universities that will receive grants to research the use of video games as healthcare tools. Games have shown clear potential to serve healthcare, from helping stroke victims rehabilitate, encouraging seniors to exercise and teaching behavior for therapy. Exhaustive research and hard data will further drive the growth of games as healthcare tools for people of all ages, and the grant recipients aim to support this goal.

It's about taking advantage of the burgeoning video game trend instead of attacking it, said Deborah Lieberman Ph.D., communications researcher at the University of California at Santa Barbara, during the organization's announcement conference today.

"Research has shown you can learn whatever a video game offers. The question is, what are you going to teach?" said Lieberman.

12 universities were awarded $200,000 grants for innovative research concepts that will either develop new games or use existing commercial games to address specific health issues across all areas of the population. An MMO designed to help alcoholics learn relapse prevention and a social mobile game that would teach healthy eating habits to adolescents are just a couple of the winning ideas - one of them even involves Crazy Taxi.

The Life Love Game Design Challenge named its winners today. The Flash game design challenge sponsored by Jennifer Ann's Group asked developers to come up with games about teen dating violence prevention without using violent content or a violent theme.

The $1,000 winning design "Escape Your Boyfriend's Room" by Jorge Goyco is an interesting point and click game that manages to get both the warning signs of an abusive relationship across as well as how you can get yourself out of the relationship. I loved the look of the game and its approach to the subject matter really impressed me.

The first runner up $100 prize was handed out to "A Walk in the Park by Jared Sain." I loved the look of the game. My only suggestion is that maybe the game could do a better job of explaining how to get out of an abusive relationship. The final $100 runner-up was "Decisions, Decisions by Mark Kakareka"

Dozen Research Teams Get Games For Health Grants

More than $2 million in grants is being handed out to teams researching how video games can improve players' health.

While the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation doesn't plan to announce the dozen research teams who will be awarded the grant money until Thursday, they did say that the funded studies will explore topics ranging from how motion-based games may help stroke patients progress faster in physical therapy to how people in substance abuse treatment can practice skills and behaviors in the virtual world to prevent real-world relapses.

I'd like to think that at least one is looking at the WiiFit and how it does at raising awareness of BMI, but maybe it's too soon for it to have soaked into academia.

It's heartening to see that the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the nation's largest philanthropy devoted to improving the health of Americans, has decided it's worth investing so much money to "explore how games can increase physical activity and enhance prevention, self-management of health conditions".

Hit the jump for the full release.

MSU's 'Meaningful Play' Call for Papers

Can't We All Just Get Along?

Michael Abbott of The Brainy Gamer and Angela of Lesbian Gamers recently collaborated on a short essay aiming to address what they define as "the hostile climate that frequently arises within the gaming community." They tried isolating specific concerns about some gamer behavior and raising questions about how to handle them, and just published what they've come up with.

Here's an excerpt:

Ironically, the medium we love that provides us with so much joy has also developed a fanbase with a reputation for anti-social, intolerant behavior in both Australia and the United States where we live. We know it's a gross and unfair mischaracterization, but the broad set of cultural assumptions about games and gamers is largely negative, and we too often affirm those assumptions by our own behavior.

Play Game, Combat Malaria In Africa

The challenge: race the sun and hand out as many insecticide-treated bed nets as you can to African families. The more nets you deliver - before the mosquitoes come out - the more lives you save. Once you're done playing the game, sign up, confirm your email, and a life-saving bed net will be sent on your behalf!

Weird Artistic Timewaster of the Day: Gravitation

Back in December, I mentioned a little game called Passage. Well, Jonathan Blow clued me in to the fact that Jason Rohrer is back with yet another weird, artistic little game, this one called Gravitation:

I'm not going to provide an in-depth explanation for Gravitation. I'm hoping that most people will understand it as it stands. However, it involves more complex game mechanics than Passage, and it is trying to express something much more subtle .... The mechanics themselves are relatively simple, but the emergent behavior harbors a lot of texture. Know that there are no "accidents" in this game design. Everything you notice about the game, and every subtle interaction that you experience, is intentionally packed with meaning. Gravitation explores how a particular corner of my life feels, as only a game can.

It's definitely worth a quick play through; Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux versions are available.

Gravitation: a video game by Jason Rohrer