3GGS: 3rd Geogames Symposium: Games and Play for a Better World! Iowa State University Ames, IA, United States, May 3-6, 2026 |
| Conference website | https://geogameslab.net/ |
| Submission link | https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=3ggs |
| Abstract registration deadline | January 5, 2026 |
| First submission for peer-review | January 5, 2026 |
| Submission deadline | January 5, 2026 |
| Reviews completed | January 30, 2026 |
| Acceptance letters sent to the authors | February 15, 2026 |
| Upload the final contributions | March 16, 2026 |
You are invited to join us for the 3rd Geogames Symposium (3GGS) at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa, USA!
The 3rd Geogames Symposium (3GGS) provides an international forum for researchers, developers, and game enthusiasts to present, exchange, and advance knowledge in the field of geogames. The symposium examines the potential of analogue and digital geogames as catalysts for understanding and transforming communities, environments, and societal practices. This year’s theme focuses on the role of geogames in fostering awareness, responsibility, and care for our planet. In particular, the symposium highlights how geogames can be employed to explore Earth as a complex, living system of interdependent actors and self-regulating processes, thereby inspiring more sustainable ways of living and informing the reshaping of human–environment interactions.
3GGS symposium uses the following definition of geogames: Geogames are digital, analogue, or hybrid games that center on Gaia as Earth’s interconnected system of the physical environment, living organisms and its non-physical elements. They create playful experiences grounded in the use of real-world geographic data, locational knowledge, and spatial reasoning. Geogames are purposefully designed to foster systems thinking, problem-solving, and environmental awareness, with the aim of contributing to the resilience and well-being of Earth’s systems. They are distinguished by their integration of location-based features, real-world data, and interactive, often collaborative, gameplay that reflects the complexity of environmental and societal interconnections.
Let’s explore how geogames can:
- Raise environmental awareness and ecological literacy
- Strengthen community engagement and social cohesion
- Inspire creative, playful solutions to local and global sustainability challenges
- Contribute meaningfully to a just, resilient, and regenerative world
We warmly invite everyone working on theories, methods, and application areas of geogames to join the symposium. Application areas may include urban planning and design, community engagement, history, religion, cybersecurity, architecture, cultural heritage preservation, geography, climate resilience and disaster preparedness, geotechnical engineering, psychology, anthropology, health, well-being, and more. Feel invited to check accepted and published contributions of the 2nd Geogames Symposium from the following repository: https://geogameslab.net/2nd-geogames-symposium-proceedings/
Submission Guidelines
Submissions
All submissions should include the title, names of the author(s), their affiliation(s), and their emails.
- Short papers. Between 750-1000 words. Please include a problem statement, research focus, research methodology, results and conclusions.
- Geoame demonstrations and game play. Around 300 words. Propose a demonstration or testing of your game or game prototype.
- Geogame workshops. Around 300 words. You may submit a suggestion for a 2 to 3-hour workshop.
- Student forum. Dedicated to students to foster their career. Submit around 500 words. Created games, graduate or PhD thesis, class work or research in progress.
Deadlines
- Extended abstract submission: January 5
- Reviews completed: January 30
- Acceptance letters sent to the authors: February 15
- Upload of the final contributions: March 16
Submission platform
The submission Web page for 3GGS is https://easychair.org/conferences?conf=3ggs
List of Topics
Key 3GGSymposium topics include and are not limited to:
- Geogames and community engagement – Showcase how geogames facilitate residents' participation in urban planning, co-creation of living environments, and citizen science through digital data collection.
- Envisioning the future with geogames – Explore how geogames can be used to enable envisioning and debating future scenarios with stakeholders, contributing to more sustainable and inclusive solutions.
- Applications of Geogames – Share about learning, exploration, and experimentation in and with geogames addressing domains such as planning, architecture, cultural values, disaster management, health, history, religion, cybersecurity.
- Geogames and emerging technologies – Demonstrate the use of novel technologies including augmented -, virtual – or mixed-reality, artificial intelligence, digital twins and geospatial science in geogames to create immersive, responsive, and data-rich interactive environments.
- Geogame design and evaluation - Discuss how geogames are developed, prototyped, tested, and assessed to investigate their purposes, impacts, and potential for broader societal application.
Journal contributions of your work can be submitted to the Special issue on Geogames titled Can Geogames make the World a better Place? in the Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and Citizen Science journal co-edited by Alenka Poplin and Ítalo de Sena: https://journals.sagepub.com/page/epb/collections/special-issues
Committees
Program committee
- Alenka Poplin, Iowa State University, USA
- Ítalo Sousa de Sena, University College Dublin, Ireland
- David Schwartz, Rochester Institute of Technology, USA
- Arghavan Akbarieh, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands
Scientific committee
- Ola Ahlqvist, The Ohio State University, USA
- Mónica Alcindor, Portucalense University, Portugal
- Arghavan Akbarieh, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands
- Bruno Amaral de Andrade, Federal University of Bahia, Brazil
- Jeremy Best, Iowa State University, USA
- Stefan Göbel, Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany
- Anson Call, Iowa State University, USA
- Marta Brković Dodig, Singidunum University, Serbia
- Joanna Kocsis, Cornell University, USA
- Deepak Marhatt, Tribhuvan University, Nepal
- Konstantinos Papangelis, Rochester Institute of Technology, USA
- Alenka Poplin, Iowa State University, USA
- Christoph Schlieder, University of Bamberg, Germany
- Ben Schouten, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands
- David Schwartz, Rochester Institute of Technology, USA
- Ítalo Sousa de Sena, University College Dublin, Ireland
- Micael Sousa, Center for Advanced Preparedness and Threat Response Simulation, USA
- Brian Tomaszewski, Rochester Institute of Technology, USA
- Eszter Tóth, University of applied sciences Darmstadt, Germany
- Jeffrey Wheatley, Iowa State University, USA
- Aaron Yang, Iowa State University, USA
Local organizing committee
- Alenka Poplin, Iowa State University, USA
- Aaron Yang, Iowa State University, USA
Invited Speakers
- t.b.d.
Publication
3GGS proceedings will be published by Iowa State University library repository.
Venue
The conference will be held at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa, USA.
Contact
All questions about submissions should be emailed to Alenka Poplin (apoplin@iastate.edu) or geogameslab@outlook.com.