Serious Play Awards Name Finalists

The Serious Play Conference has announced 20 finalists in its debut Serious Play Award Competition, with winners to be announced at the conference this week. Entries into the competition were examined by a panel of experts for Serious Play Certification, signifying that the title "offers a high standard of performance." Certified games will receive a seal of approval that's valid for three years. "Our aim is to create an award program for serious games that is the high watermark of success," said conference director Clark Aldrich said when announcing the awards in March. "We're looking for programs that deliver a high level of engagement to their audience, superior learning and demonstrate measurable results." Finalists will be on display for voting by Serious Play Conference attendees, and winners to will be honored at an awards reception August 23 at Redmond's DigiPen Institute of Technology. The finalists are as follows: Commercial Organization/Development Studio Finalists * Air Medic Sky One, University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands (Games for Health) * Aircraft Marshalling Virtual Trainer, Heartwood Inc. (Government/Military) * Virtual Reality Dome Controller, TNO Defense & Safety and VisionShiftStudios (Government/Military) * Distraction Dodger, Web Courseworks (Education) * Gamestar Mechanic, E-Line Media (Education ) * McGraw-Hill Education Practice Marketing, McGraw-Hill Education International (Education) * MiddWorld Online Language Roleplay Game, Middlebury Interactive Languages (Education) * Waterkeeper, First Nations Education Steering Committee (Education) * RoboMath, Project Whitecard Inc. (Education) * Game for Science, CREO (Games for At Home Learning) * Virulent, Morgridge Institute for Research (Games for At Home Learning) * Play True Challenge, World Anti-Doping Agency (Games for Good) * Primaires a gauche, Le Monde (Games for Good) * Fate of the World, Red Redemption Ltd. (Games for Good) * International Racing Squirrels, Playniac (Consumer Game) * Motion Math HD, Motion Math (Consumer Game) * SpaceChem, Zachtronics Industries (Consumer Game) Student Finalists (Sponsored by Microsoft) * Emergency Birth, Engender Games Group Lab – University of Wisconsin-Whitewater (Games for Good) * Treadsylvania, New Mexico State University Learning Games Lab (At Home Learning) * RiggleFish, Texas A&M University (Education)