August 10, 2026
Submissions
April 3, 2026 April 8, 2026
Notifications
April 24, 2026
Camera Readies due
May 15, 2026
Workshop
August 10, 2026
This workshop aims to help better encourage reuse of existing game research software systems (broadly defined) developed in the game research community, disseminate knowledge about such systems, explore the space of what is possible with existing systems, and foster new collaborations centered around existing systems.
Game Research Software Systems are those that are designed to support research through their re-use. Such systems that could be reused for new research purposes include but are not limited to:
Game design or development tools for researching game design techniques or use in game design
Entire games for researching gameplay
AI NPCs or opponents that could be used as comparisons
Methods for online or offline content generation of levels, sprites, audio, cards, meshes, mechanics, etc.
Declarative PCG or narrative planning tools
Experimental social simulation and/or "social physics" engines
Research game software in educational setting for class projects
The workshop is accepting two types of submissions:
Artifact + Tutorials on existing game research software systems that could be reused.
Case studies about new reuses of existing game research software systems.
Further information on each type of submission is given below. A primary goal of the workshop is to connect researchers developing such systems and those who could use them.
Submissions should be made to the appropriate FDG 2026 track through EasyChair to the track Game Research Software System Re-use. It is expected that at least one author on accepted submissions will register for and attend the workshop to present. Both types of submissions are submitted as short papers, 2–4 pages double column, excluding references, in ACM primary article template, and should be anonymized. Both types of submissions will be peer reviewed and we aim to include all accepted submissions in the conference proceedings. Thus, submitted work should not be previously published and must include sufficient new work to merit publication on their own.
Submissions: Artifact + Tutorials describe an existing reusable game software system that is publicly and freely available. They should be written about existing systems by the developers of systems themselves. The submission should describe the reusable software artifact, what it does, and how to access it, with enough information that a reviewer can try out the artifact themselves: the review process will involve evaluating the artifact itself. Artifact + Tutorials need not describe a specific research project using the system but may provide example intended use cases. While the artifact itself should be existing, the description should be new, and thus artifacts should not be already extensively described in an existing publication.
During the workshop: Accepted Artifact + Tutorials authors will give an interactive tutorial presentation on using the system at the workshop, expected to be roughly 1–1.5 hours. Tutorials should be interactive, with something like a template project for other attendees to work from to create a small demo of their own building on the artifact.
Submissions: Case studies describe a new project using an existing system. These would be reflective about the process, what worked and what was challenging, and extensions (if any) developed in the system to support the new work. These could potentially be in a "postmortem" style. Ideally these will be submitted as a collaboration between two research groups — one developing the system and one developing the new project.
During the workshop: We expect case studies will be given roughly 20 minute presentations at the workshop.
TBD
Seth Cooper (seth.cooper@gmail.com) is an associate professor in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences at Northeastern University. His research often involves procedural content generation and incorporating video games into crowdsourcing. He has co-organized workshops at FDG, CHI, and the European Citizen Science Association conference.
Samuel Hill is a PhD candidate on the AI/ML track in the Computer Science department at Northwestern University. His research is on social simulation and making tools for game developers.