The title refers to a particular conference that is in favor of educational and medical uses of games and gaming technology.
Who would have expected a D-Pad to be next to a stylized stethoscope?
INTRO:
The conference is not recently conceived; it had started way back in 2004 and only obtained more publicity years onwards. This was likely due to attention from the press, such as Washington Times (which is a conservative media group, mind you), that has an interest in showing the brighter side of gaming after having gotten tired of the rants from the likes of Jack Thompson.
Games for Health also happens to be backed by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation - which I personally find to be a surprise because that Foundation had spoken out against many perceived vices, such as drinking, before. That the Foundation would see something good in video games is refreshing to me.
[spoiler] (In case you are a darksome person who seeks out anything dirty about anything bright, you may want to know that the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is currently one of the parties involved in a recent fund-soliciting scandal in the USA. Also, you may want to know that another Johnson-&-Johnson philanthropic endeavour, the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, has slipped from a high four stars in 2005 to just two on Charity Navigator in the present day.) [/spoiler]
However, I wasn't without misgivings, as is typical of a person that has encountered so many too-good/wholesome-to-be-true things. These misgivings will be described later where relevant, though I would say here first that I ultimately find nothing to scoff at about Games for Health.
The matters that the conferences have highlighted are:
Simulation & Modelling:
In all its conferences, Games for Health, through its Ludica Medica event, has never failed to mention that the game engines that happen to power games are also apparently of use to medical research, specifically for purposes of simulations and virtual modelling.
The ones who have participated are people from higher institutions of learning, specifically those that have programmes for game design and development, such as the University of California and University of Minnesota. They also include indie/contractor game developers, such as Breakaway Games (which is unfortunately associated with Electronic Arts for having worked on less-than-stellar games such as the Kane's Wrath expansion for Command & Conquer).
It's rather difficult to believe that someone who worked on that crazy EA LA game had worked on dental-work sims too.
I am very glad that there are indeed people that are interested in developing games for such purposes; I will make a conveniently related plug for Clinical Playground here.
Yet, here's one peculiarity that I have noticed: the participants in Ludica Medica do not appear to include a single high-profile entity from the mainstream gaming industry.
In fact, I have yet to find any big-name game-makers that you (the reader) and I know of from our common hobby that are actively involved in such work. If they are involved, they often act as mere (paid) licensors, such as Epic Games, whose engines are being used in more than a few projects, such as HumanSim, but otherwise they do not have a direct hand in it.
Aid Technologies:
There are ideas that concern the adaptation of gaming devices and peripherals for use in assisting the physically challenged. Examples include adapting the designs of video game controllers into the controls that paralysis-affected patients can use to operate motorized chairs, or monitoring systems that make use of camera peripherals for gaming.
Speaking of camera peripherals, Microsoft - yes, that Microsoft - did chip in to have a speaker for a keynote address in the 2012 conference for Games for Health. The topic was how Kinect can be helpful in physical rehabilitation.
Picture of Dr. Crounse here because GameSpot's shitty video-embed feature doesn't always work.
Now, I can hear your chortle there - I know, I snickered too, especially at the use of "Kinect" as a verb. However, before you act like some NeoGAF cynics, you may want to know that Dr. Bill Crounse is quite earnest in pursuing or highlighting the use of computer and information technology for purposes of medicine (though it has to be disclosed here that he was not fantastically great at running businesses).
(On a side note, you may want to know that Microsoft has had long relationships with the healthcare industry, especially in IT work that involve sharing patient and treatment data, i.e. tele-medicine. In other words, not every policy-maker at Microsoft is a heartless asshole.)
Of course, it is not just Microsoft peddling its technology at Games for Health's conferences. There is Oculus VR, which, via its CEO Palmer Luckey, is pitching the use of Oculus Rift for the treatment of PTSD and physiotherapy, according to an informal interview conducted by a YouTuber at the conference.
(I would have embedded the video here if not for GameSpot's perennial break-downs of blogging features.)
It is in this endeavour that the gaming industry has a more significant hand in, though its involvement is arguably not yet high-profile and neither has it produced any convincingly fruitful advances in medicine. Still, at least the technical know-how of the gaming industry is being put to some other practical use than just churning out yet another entertainment product.
Therapy/Rehabilitation:
This is perhaps where the gaming industry has a high-profile in, as highlighted in Games for Health's 2013 conference, though not as a keynote address this year.
A Gamasutra article has mentioned that out-of-the-norm games like Papo-&-Yo, Depression Quest and That Dragon, Cancer (which Carolyn Petit happens to be enamored with) have been given a spotlight by Games for Health, mainly for their heavy themes and stories that people that have gone through traumas would easily relate to.
However, not everyone would appreciate the mention of the likes of Surgeon Simulator, which does not exactly have therapeutic value for the player (though it may have plenty for watchers).
[video=6407386]
If "laughter is the best medicine" adage is to be believed, watching Danny O'Dwyer might help you cure cancer.
However, there are a couple of issues that may just dog this endeavour indefinitely, and which Games for Health unfortunately does not highlight.
The first is the need to secure licenses for patients to play these games.
Of course, there are programmes such as Penny Arcade's Child's Play that is putting games and toys into the hands of patients (though I should remind you that Child's Play is still an unaudited charity), it remains to be seen whether there would be a game-maker that is altruistic enough to want to develop therapeutic games and let them be used for rehab work on a non-profit basis.
I do hope that in the future, Games for Health might just have a keynote address featuring one such game-maker though.
The other issue is a much more uncomfortable one.
Now, I am much aware of - and am not afraid to make mention of - the criticism that such games can receive from perennial sceptics; one of the harshest criticism is that someone is trying to make a buck out of his/her or others' personal trauma, fictional or real.
Of course, this accusation does not hold water when levelled at games that can be played for free, such as Depression Quest (though there is something akin to a "please donate" button on its website). When this is the case, the critics can be conveniently shouted down as the ignorant cynical assholes that they are.
However, it is difficult to dismiss this accusation when the likes of Papo-&-Yo, which is based on its creator's childhood worries, still carry a price tag. Certainly, it can be argued that money is needed to cover the costs of making any game, but this argument is not so effective when the tugging - or shredding - of heartstrings are involved.
Visual symbolism (notice that gnarly tree in the dude's own home) won't deter hard-hearted people from questioning Ryan Green's motives for his upcoming game.
It is an issue that can result in ugly debates and arguments, but I, for one, do not wish for this issue to go away and I will not certainly skirt around it. The Games for Health conferences appear to do just that, unfortunately.
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It may be difficult for someone that has known gaming mainly for the entertainment that it provides to empathize with efforts to apply the talent and technology behind video games for Hippocratic purposes. However, conferences such as Games for Health at least shows that things that we know, namely games, do not necessarily have to be utilized for single-minded purposes.
The efforts highlighted by Games for Health offer a glimmer of hope that something impactful and good would be produced from the game industry than just inconsequential amusement. The wise (or jaded) can see the stumbling blocks ahead of course, but if there is anything that is worth being naïvely wishful for, this would be it.