This paper introduces an approach to water responsibility education and communication through the design of a serious game centered around the behaviors of beavers. With a growing global concern for water conservation and responsible usage, innovative methods are necessary to engage and educate diverse audiences. Building upon traditional ecological knowledge and leveraging the captivating characteristics of beavers as ecosystem engineers, this research delves into the development of an interactive game aimed at fostering a deeper understanding of water conservation practices. The game design integrates key aspects of beaver behavior, such as dam construction and habitat management, to simulate real-world scenarios related to water resource and landscape management. By gamifying these concepts, the aim is to promote awareness, inspire responsible water usage, and facilitate meaningful conversations about conservation practices among players. Drawing upon principles of traditional ecological knowledge, education and game design, this study outlines the theoretical framework behind the game's development. Additionally, the paper discusses the design process, highlighting the challenges, considerations, and strategies employed to create an immersive and educational gaming experience.

Discomfort in digital design has recently emerged as an open space for exploration, challenging notions that play and digital experience should strive towards pure "fun" or frictionless interaction. Pervasive games, which blend gameplay into players' regular lives, offer an apt means of exploring discomfort by situating play activities within the real world. Uncomfortable pervasive games are uniquely positioned to prompt critical reflection in players by integrating discomfort from game mechanics with real-world concerns encountered during everyday life. This paper details the design process for Under Watch, a pervasive game aimed at investigating the relationship between uncomfortable interactions and moments of critical reflection during play. Under Watch's design considers the ethical and safety concerns of both pervasive play and discomfort design. This work offers implications and poses challenges to those seeking to further explore artistic works and interventions within the space of uncomfortable pervasive games.

Dark Forest is an ongoing speculative and critical art-game project exploring how individuals perform, adopt and exploit language online for personal gain post Web-2.0. The Dark Forest theory of the internet describes this cultural phenomenon as a communication game, and we use it as the metaphoric basis for our game design. We see an opportunity to engage players through game mechanics with the aim for players to reflect on how they perform, exploit or engage with language online to navigate social capital. The first iteration of Dark Forest engaged players in an open world built in Unreal Engine 5, where they could construct tweet-like phrases and send them into a dark forest environment. Monsters and elements of the forest environment would respond in different ways to these phrases based on their implicit alignment towards the player-composed phrases and open or close pathways based on their endorsement. We hope that players understand and absorb some of the critiques made by the piece through their interaction. Future iterations of the work, based on reflection after its first showing, will streamline the design so that consequences for players are more explicit and encourage deeper progression.