Engaging History Through Play: The Potential of Digitally-Enhanced Tabletop Role Playing Games for Promoting Historical Empathy in Museums
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Date
2025
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
The Eurographics Association
Abstract
In an era of rapidly advancing digital technologies and changing visitor expectations, museums face the ongoing challenge of making history engaging and accessible to diverse audiences, through encouraging active participation and emotional connections. In this study, we investigate the potential of digitally enhanced tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs), incorporating digital technologies such as virtual reality and other interactive media, in fostering historical empathy and learning within the museum setting. Thirteen museum educators with diverse professional backgrounds provided key insights into the objectives and challenges of museum educational programs and the potential use of role-playing activities in them. Results reveal their main challenge is balancing creativity, interactivity and emotional impact with practical constraints such as space, time, and limited resources. While digitally enhanced TTRPGs are seen as an effective tool for enabling active engagement with historical figures and events in immersive, participatory ways, there is a need for clear guidelines and adaptability in their design, to ensure alignment with both the goals of the museum and the diverse needs of history learners.
Description
CCS Concepts: Human-centered computing → User studies
@inproceedings{10.2312:dh.20253215,
booktitle = {Digital Heritage},
editor = {Campana, Stefano and Ferdani, Daniele and Graf, Holger and Guidi, Gabriele and Hegarty, Zackary and Pescarin, Sofia and Remondino, Fabio},
title = {{Engaging History Through Play: The Potential of Digitally-Enhanced Tabletop Role Playing Games for Promoting Historical Empathy in Museums}},
author = {Koutiva, Georgia and Servi, Katerina and Savvani, Eirini and Fragkaki, Foteini and Katifori, Akrivi and Petousi, Dimitra and Boile, Maria and Ioannidis, Yannis and Papoulias, Evangelos and Pichou, Myrsini and Tsitou, Foteini and Kitta, Elena},
year = {2025},
publisher = {The Eurographics Association},
ISBN = {978-3-03868-277-6},
DOI = {10.2312/dh.20253215}
}