Supporting game research

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  • Event
  • Past

  JARPS 2025 - "Tools of the Trade: Props, Techniques, and Inspirations for Analog Role-Playing"

  The Japanese Association for Role-Playing Game Studies and Game in Lab are pleased to present the 2025 edition of the Japanese Journal of Analog Role-Playing Game Studies (JARPS), a free, entirely online event taking place on November 22, 2025.   This edition explores the equipment, methods, and technologies used in the creation, design, and gameplay of tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs) and live-action role-playing games (LARPs) through presentations by researchers and role-players from around the world. Various aspects of game tools, conceptual frameworks, and materiality will be explored!   Researchers, players, designers, and anyone curious are invited to check out the program and register!   You may also find the recordings of the past presentations on our YouTube channel, following the link below.

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  • Event
  • Past

  SPIEL 2025 - “Neuropsychological intervention with modern board games”

  Game in Lab supports the conference “Neuropsychological intervention with modern board games.” at the Educator’s Day, SPIEL, on Friday 24 October, at 4:30 pm, Hall 4.   Learn about play and learning! Modern board games go beyond mere entertainment: they engage essential skills, necessary to learn and adapt. Game in Lab invites you to explore how scientific research sheds light on the links between board games and the development of cognitive skills.   Through Prof. Jorge Moya-Higueras and Dr. Nuria Vita-Barrull’s studies, discover how gameplay influences learning, concentration, and group dynamics, with concrete findings that can inspire players, game designers, and any curious mind!

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  • News

  Follow us on LinkedIn!

  We’re pleased to announce the launch of Game in Lab’s official LinkedIn page!

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  • Event
  • Past

  Generation Analog 2025 - PUNK

  Analog Game Studies and Game in Lab are happy to announce the return of Generation Analog for the fifth year in a row. The online event is free and open to the public with registration. All presentations will be recorded and made available after the event AGS YouTube’s channel.   This edition will explore Punk through games. Questionning Punk attitude, aesthetics, mode, legacy and histories in play. The conference will examine mechanics, genres, platforms, stories embracing the Punk spirit.   The event also aims to to highlight recover, remember, and reinvigorate the stories, voices, bodies, places, practices, and play of those forgotten and marginalized. Give back a place to forms of play and universes too often set aside, promoting alternative, subversive or experimental dynamics of play.   Generation Analog 2025 is open to researchers, teachers, artists, professionals and curious minds altogether!

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  • Project
  • Underway

  Benjamin Le Hénaff
  Collective Role Play as Inclusive Territory (CRIT): Role-playing as and with diverse others to promote gender and sexual orientation social inclusion

  In 2024, Game in Lab selected Dr. Benjamin Le Hénaff’s project to explore how playing characters with different genders and sexual orientations can foster empathy and intergroup interaction. Through a series of experimental studies, this research investigates the potential of role-playing games to reduce prejudice and promote social inclusion among players of the Dungeons & Dragons community. This contributes to a deeper understanding of how games can become spaces for experiencing and transforming gender and sexual norms.

Founding Members