Serious Games (Targeted Games) are a key part of the Digital Games Industry that are considered as effective tools for Education, Advertising, Healthcare and other serious purposes. In addition to the technical knowledge of Game-Development, making serious games also requires specialized scientific knowledge of the field in question and academic Research & Development.
By holding three events, the Serious Games Festival 2023, Serious Games Hackathon 2023, and the International Serious Games Symposium 2023, the 6th Comprehensive Serious Games Prize Event, attempts to provide scientific and industrial infrastructure for the development of more serious games in Iran and to expand development circles from academic research to commercialization of existing products in the industry. Serious Games Prize 2023, as in previous terms, with millions of cash prizes and a large network of sponsors and partners, is an opportunity to contribute to the growth of serious games in Iran. As in previous years, this event will be held with a broader view of serious game. Accordingly, the SeGaP2023 Secretariat invites all game researchers and game developers interested in producing and studying in the field of serious entertainment to join this large community and, as a member of this network, collaborate in the production of articles, games and sharing experiences.

Sponsers
The sponsors of this course are the Headquarters for the Development of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, the National Elite Foundation, the Headquarters for the Development of Digital Economy and Intelligence Technologies on behalf of the Presidential Vice President for Science and Technology, the National Public Libraries Institution, the Faculty of Computer Engineering of Amir Kabir University of Technology, the Center for Innovation and Acceleration of Cognitive Sciences and Data Mining, the Innovation and Prosperity Fund, the Center for the Intellectual Development of Children and Adolescents, the Multimedia Faculty of Tabriz University of Islamic Arts, the University of Isfahan, the Islamic Parliament Reaserch Center (IPRC), the Institue for Cultural, Social and Civilization Studies (ICSCS), AmitisGen Accelerator, Razmandegan Scientific Institute (Setup Creative and Innovation House), Aparat Game, Hoosmand Aval Beheshti (HUB), Magnet Hoshmand Aval Beheshti, Jahesh Aval Game House, National Institute of Game Development and Avagames Accelerator.

Festival 2023
Similar to previous years, in this period, the Serious Games Prize hosts the works produced in this field. The owners of the work can send their game (a new version of a game or an updated version of the game in previous editions of the festival) to the award secretariat until Friday October 27. After receiving the submitted works, serious games will be judged in three stages: production, commercial and scientific judging, and after the judges' reviews, the teams selected for the finals will present their achievements. In total, more than 4 Billion Tomans will be awarded to the winners of this section. The event secretariat will award cash prizes to selected works in the following topics: The serious game of the year will win the grand prize of 250 million Rials of the foundation. The finalists of the festival will receive a total of up to 250 million Rials. Selected serious university games will receive a total of up to 150 million Rials. The selected serious game of the international section of the festival will be awarded up to 1500 euros to non-Iranian game makers. The games that participated in the previous periods of the event, if they update their game, can try again in the best update section of the company and their chance to win a prize of 100 million Rials. In a special way, the chosen ones will be considered by the foundation in order to receive commercialization facilities, advertising or game production grants. In a special way this year, the event secretariat has prepared a total of up to 100 million Rials for serious games in the field of Metaverse and NFT.

2023 Hackathon
 Serious Games Hackathon is a three-day gaming event that will be held in Tehran, Tabriz and Isfahan. The fifth hackathon of serious games in 2023 is accompanied by a special event. Since this year, hackathon has been included as a problem-oriented competitive event under the project of Shahid Babaei of the National Elite Foundation, and with the material support of this foundation and the awarding of elite points to the chosen ones, it has provided a special opportunity for the participants. Also, with the aim of increasing people's visits to libraries, the organization of public libraries of the country is the financial sponsor and designer of this event in the cities of Tehran, Tabriz and Isfahan, which will be held simultaneously and will honor the best board or digital games of this sector. Therefore, interested individuals and teams can register individually or as a team to take advantage of this opportunity and participate in the event until Friday September 1. It is noteworthy that in order to empower and train the participants before the hackathon, specialized training workshops will be held, which is a prerequisite to receive the elite score of the National Elite Foundation and is mandatory. The time of the workshops will be announced later. The developed games are finally up to the demo version, the experience and the initial idea of making a serious game on the subject. In total, up to 180 million Rials will be awarded to the winners of this section. In addition to the cash prize, the games selected by supporters will be supported for game development.

Symposium 2023
 The Serious Games Symposium section accepts specialized articles in the field of serious games. Articles will be accepted only in English and finally until Friday, October 27. The judging of the articles will be strict and at the level of scientific-research articles with the aim of increasing the quality of the submitted articles. Among the submitted articles, the selected articles will be presented orally on the day of the symposium, in addition to receiving a cash prize. In total, up to 600 million Rials will be awarded to the selected articles. Authorization procedures are underway to index articles in the IEEE citation database. In a special way this year, the event secretariat has prepared a total of up to 100 million Rials for articles that deal with topics related to Metaverse and serious games or the use of NFT in serious games, and also has considered a cash prize of 500 euros for the best article by foreign authors. How to register: To participate in the Festival or Hackathon, two separate forms have been designed, and depending on your desire to participate in each, you can complete one or both forms. Regarding sending articles to the symposium, it is also necessary to upload your articles through the system of sending articles to the secretariat.


To download the complete SeGaP2023 call in Persian,click here.
To download the complete SeGaP2023 call in English,click here.
Click here to submit your work to the 2023 Serious Game Festival.
Click here for individual or group registration in the 2023 Serious Games Hackathon.
Click here to submit an article to the 2023 Serious Games Symposium