TIPC2 happened on 8, 9 and 10 October, 2018

The Interactive Pasts Conference is a creative space for surprising meetings between people and ideas, centered around video games and the past. We welcome researchers, game developers, scholars, students, gamers, artists and everyone who is curious to learn more about heritage, history, video games and the interactive past! What can games teach us about the past? In what ways can video games be treated as cultural heritage? What do video games have to offer for historical and archaeological research? The conference will feature all manner of seriously playful answers to these questions and more!

Want to experience TIPC2?

The conference has come and gone , but you can still be part of it by watching the archive of the livestream on Twitch.

You will be able to watch many of the presentations at our YouTube channel.

Programme

We had a great programme with speakers from all across the globe working in the creative industry and academia. Check the links in the programme below to read the abstracts of the talks that were presented.

Monday October 8

09:00 Arrival and Registration
10:00 Welcome and Intro by Institute for Sound and Vision and VALUE
10:30 The Legacy Hub Archaeological Project in No Man's Sky: Final Report A. Reinhard (University of York)
11:00 Break
Session 1 Game Design
11:30 The American Story: A Look at US History in Where the Water Tastes Like Wine J. Nordhagen (Dim Bulb Games)
11:50 Personal and Social Recent History in Fragments of Him M. Haggis-Burridge (NHTV)
12:10 Localising Runeterra P. Pantazis (Riot Games)
12:30 Raising History and Archaeology Interest through Videogames G. Garbo (Universitŕ di Padova)
12:50 Discussion
13:00 Lunch
Session 2 Players as Scholars
14:00 The Adventuring Anthropologist: Notes from a Study of World-Building in Skyrim J. Majewski (Bond University)
14:20 Fork in the Road: Consuming Video Game Cartographies F. Smith Nicholls (Independent)
14:40 To Fell a Digital Tree: Perceiving History and Environment in First-Person Survival Games G.L. Vlachos (European University Institute)
15:00 Interpreting the Fictional Past: How Fans of the Elder Scrolls Games Deal with "The Battle of Red Mountain" D. Jansen (Utrecht University)
15:20 Discussion
15:30 Break
Session 3 Learning through Games
16:00 Learning by Gaming: The image of history in games and its potential for teaching history P. Jahnke (Universität Greifswald)
16:20 Gaming the past: Video Games and Historical Literacy in the College Classroom J. Lawler & S. Smith (California State University)
16:40 Learning to Preserve the Past: Game-based Cultural Property Protection Training K. Himmer (Articulated Python)
17:00 World, Rules, and Play: Digital Games and Researching the Medieval World R. Houghton (University of Winchester)
17:20 Discussion
17:30 Social Event TIPC at the Institute for Sound and Vision

Tuesday October 9

08:30 Arrival and Registration
Session 4 Creating Diverse and Inclusive Pasts
09:30 Mi Rasna: Enhancing historical and cultural heritage of central Italy while playing like an Etruscan S. Mariotti (Independent) and M. Amoroso (Entertainment Game Apps)
09:50 Tradigital Intergenerational Narratives: First Nations Games as Living Archives B. Ridgeway (RMIT University)
10:10 Inclusive Gaming at the Museum: Can App Games Help Us with Becoming a more Inclusive Place for Visually Impaired Visitors? A. Riethus (Stiftung Neanderthal Museum)
10:30 Their Memory: Exploring Veteran's Voices, Virtual Reality and Collective Memory I. Donald & E. Houghton
10:50 Discussion
11:00 Break
Session 5 Play with the Past
11:30 Playing (Dutch) Game History: Designing Games with Historical Datasets R. Glas, D. Jansen, B. de Lint, A. Moss, A. di Pastena, J. van Vught and S. Werning (Utrecht University)
11:50 Artificial Anasazi: Applying immersive game design and storytelling to an agent-based model in archaeology A. Angourakis (University of Barcelona) and S. Graham (Carleton University)
12:10 Life Was Really Hard! Designing and Using Digital Games to Explore Medieval Life in Primary Schools J. Hiriart (University of Salford)
12:30 The Desolation of Vixens J. Aycock & H. Kroepfl (University of Calgary)
12:50 Disccussion
13:00 Lunch
Session 6 Playing with Representations
14:00 Video Games for the Palaeolithic: A Case Study of Echo: The Secrets of the Lost Cavern J. Majewski (Bond University) & B. Bielinska-Majewska (District Museum Toru?)
14:20 Ancient Greece and Rome in Fighting Videogames D. Lowe (University of Kent)
14:40 Fiction Dressed in Facts: The Reception of Assassin's Creed: Origins Narrative M. Low (Methodist College Kuala Lumpur)
15:00 Synthetic Spaces and Indigenous Identity: Decolonizing Video Games and ROM Hacking Super Mario Bros. A. Bird (UC Davis)
15:20 Discussion
15:30 Break
Session 7 Game Collections
16:00 The International Game Collection: What for? W. Bergmeyer (Stiftung Digitale Spielekultur)
16:20 Historical Games in GLAMs and Playing Them Today J. Garvin (Independent)
16:40 Discussion
16:50 Pitches Various
17:30 End
Travel to Amsterdam Center
18:30 Social Event TIPC at the Y.Create Culture Arcade

Location

TIPC2 has been held in Theater 1 at the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision. The Institute for Sound and Vision is located on the Media Parkboulevard 1, 1217 WE Hilversum.

Curious what this is all about?

TIPC2 is a follow-up the original Interactive Pasts Conference held in April 2016. Want to see how much fun we had there? Here, you can find the YouTube playlist of all the presentations. Or read the open-access publication The Interactive Past (2017), with chapters by TIPC presenters.

Organizing partners

The Interactive Pasts Conference 2 was organized by the VALUE foundation together with the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision.