Successful ECGBL at Nord, Levanger

Nord University at Levanger, with Helga D. I. Sigurdardottir and Robin I. Munkvold from Excited as conference co-chairs, organized the 19th European Conference on Games Based Learning (ECGBL) from October 1–3, 2025 (https://www.academic-conferences.org/conferences/ecgbl/). The conference had nearly 200 registered participants, and even if most were from Europe, there were also participants from as far away as Hong Kong, Thailand, South Africa, and Brazil. We interviewed Helga and Robin after the conference.

Was it hard work organizing such a big international conference?

Answer: It is a lot of work preparing such a big international conference. Luckily for us, the conference administrators are very experienced when it comes to organizing the program of the conference. For us, the main workload was to contact potential keynote speakers and make sure that all practicalities were properly planned. There were also some unforeseen minor challenges during the conference itself that had to be handled, hence making us "run" around to help with emergent issues. We are also happy to have eager and efficient student volunteers assisting us with various tasks during the conference (guiding the participants, assisting with catering, making room for playtesting, poster sessions, and more).

What does it mean for the staff in the games study program in Levanger to have ECGBL come here?

Answer: It means a lot to us, from many different angles. It is a great acknowledgement to be trusted with hosting such a conference, and it shows that we are active within the field and the international community. Even more importantly, it inspires both staff and students in many ways, enabling the exchange of perspectives on games development, games for learning, games for good and how to use game development as a pedagogical approach to learning activities. To our pleasant surprise we also received numerous invitations for further collaborations via Erasmus student and staff exchange, visiting professors etc. In general, this is an entirely positive event and something that we are proud to host.

To what extent have students been involved in the conference?

Answer: Several of our students submitted games to the conference, whereof a total of five games were accepted into the student-made games competition. The game that was awarded the prize for the “Best student-made digital game” was called Monkey Business, a game that some of our current students and (now) alumni worked on as a summer job, financed by Excited. This is a game about running a small game lab project/company. Another student team also got an honorable mention in the same category for a game about living with depression, called The Peak.

In addition to the student games, there were several Excited-related research contributions presented at the conference. Guttorm Sindre and Line Kolås had the paper Mastery Learning as Gamification: Level-Up Through High-Transparency Assessments, analyzing to what extent mastery-learning with transparent autoscored tests could be considered an example of gamification – cf. the course design explained at https://www.ntnu.edu/excited/mastery-learning-in-introductory-programming. Teddy Nambaziira, Helga Sigurdardottir, and Victor M.P. Colada from Nord University presented the poster Empowering Student Developers: Integrating Mental Health Recovery Narratives in Social Impact Games, a result from the project NEON Young Norway funded by the Norwegian Research Council.

PhD student Nipuna H. Weeratunga presented two papers, both co-authored with his supervisor Rune Hjelsvold: Enhancing Cyber-Security Education Through Multi-Opposing-Role Gameplay and Simulation and Enhancing Cyber-Security Learning with In-Game Feedback. Both these articles are strongly related to Nipuna’s PhD project on the use of games and gamification to help students learn about cybersecurity, and they will be important components in his PhD thesis.

Interview with Nipuna H. Weeratunga

Q: What was it like presenting at the ECGBL conference?
A: Attending the conference was a valuable learning experience, especially since it was my first time participating in a game-based learning conference. It was my supervisor who encouraged us to target this conference. Previously, I had attended other educational conferences, but participating in a conference directly related to my field of research proved to be particularly beneficial. The organizers had done a good job of creating opportunities for the sharing and gathering of knowledge and experiences.

Q: How important was it for your PhD project to have these two papers accepted in a good international conference like ECGBL?
A: I would say it was vital. I received valuable feedback not only on improving the two papers but also on enhancing my thinking and analytical skills, which will undoubtedly benefit my educational and research career in the long term. As researchers, we sometimes tend to be wary and apprehensive about receiving feedback that is critical of our research, but as much as it is a cliché, good critical feedback is an important way to improve. Additionally, it was the right time for me, as I am currently writing my PhD thesis.

Q: Did you meet any other researchers who are interested in related topics, with whom you might have future collaborations?
A: Yes, I met other PhD students, professors, and industry representatives who were working on similar research projects, with whom I connected through LinkedIn and email. It was particularly encouraging to see similar research done around the world, which opens up doors for potential collaborations.

In addition to having a conference program of great interest both to researchers and practitioners, Levanger showed itself from a picture-perfect side for international visitors, with beautiful autumn weather — blue sky in the day, and aurora borealis during the night.

Article produced by Excited and Nord University – October 2025.