Books
Calleja, G. In-Game: From Immersion to Incorporation Gualeni, S. Virtual Worlds as Philosophical Tools. Yannakakis, Georgios N., and Julian Togelius. Artificial intelligence and games . Vol. 2. New York: Springer, 2025. Gualeni, S. & Fassone, R. Fictional Games: A Philosophy of Worldbuilding and Imaginary Play.
Gualeni, S. & Vella, D., Virtual Existentialism: Meaning and Subjectivity in Virtual Worlds .
Gualeni, S., The Clouds: An Experiment in Theory-Fiction.
Gualeni, S., Il Videogioco del mondo: Istruzioni per l’uso.
Featured Publications
A selection of publications by our researchers past and present.
Gualeni, S. “Playing with the Dead: Dead Pools and the case of Fantamorto ” , Game Studies: the international journal of computer game research, 26 (1), 2026.
Yannakakis, Georgios N., and Julian Togelius. Artificial intelligence and games . Vol. 2. New York: Springer, 2025.Khalifa, Ahmed, et al. "The procedural content generation benchmark: an open-source testbed for generative challenges in games. Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games . 2025. Gualeni, S. “Antagonistic Game Design: The Author as a Player ” , Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Cultures, 16 (2): 95-116, 2025.
Vella, Daniel. "On Ludic Beauty: Kant, Schiller and the Aesthetics of Gameplay , The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Games. Routledge, pp. 221-242, 2025. Roberto Gallotta, Graham Todd, Marvin Zammit, Sam Earle, Antonios Liapis, Julian Togelius, Georgios N. Yannakakis: "Large Language Models and Games: A Survey and Roadmap, " in IEEE Transactions on Games , 2024 (Early Access).
Vella, Daniel. "A Beachfront Property in Gaza is Not a Dream": Utopia, the Digital and the Image of the Ruin in Palestine Digital Culture & Society 10(2), 147-164, 2024. Oliva, Costantino. "How Musical Are Game Players? Exploring Musical Situations in Video Games, " in W. Gibbons and M. Grimshaw-Aagaard (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Video Game Music and Sound, pp. 727-744, 2024. Yannakakis, Georgios N., and David Melhart. "Affective game computing: A survey. Proceedings of the IEEE 111.10 1423-1444, 2023. Calleja, G. Unboxed: The Experience and Design of Board Games. Oliva, Costantino. "Otocky: Adventures in Improvisational Musicking Journal of Replaying Japan 5(1), pp. 135-146, 2023. Khalifa, Ahmed, et al. "Pcgrl: Procedural content generation via reinforcement learning. Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment . 2020. Antonios Liapis, Georgios N. Yannakakis, Mark J. Nelson, Mike Preuss and Rafael Bidarra: "Orchestrating Game Generation ," in Transactions on Games, vol. 11, no 1, pp. 48-68, 2019.
Khalifa, Ahmed, Gabriella AB Barros, and Julian Togelius. "Deeptingle. Proceedings of the International Conference on Computational Creativity. 2017. Liapis, A. , Yannakakis, G. N. , Togelius, J. 'Towards a Generic Method of Evaluating Game Levels 'Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment 2013. [Best Student Paper Award] Oliva, C. 'Soundmarks in Digital Games Soundscapes' , paper presented at the Society for Cinema & Media Studies 53rd Annual Conference, Chicago (IL), 2013.Vella, D. 'No Mastery Without Mystery: Dark Souls and the Ludic Sublime' . Game Studies , 15(1), 2015.Yannakakis, G. N. , Togelius, J. 'Experience-driven Procedural Content Generation ', in IEEE Transactions on Affective Computing, 2(3), pp. 147-161, 2011. [Most Influential Paper Award] Calleja, G. In-game : from immersion to incorporation . MIT Press. 2011.
For an updated list of all publications please check their individual Google Scholar profiles:
Scholar's Codex: Academia Explores the Games of FromSoftware The book is edited by Dom Ford (University of Bergen), Stefano Gualeni (Institute of Digital Games), Nele Van de Mosselaer (Tilburg University) and Daniel Vella (Institute of Digital Games) . In Scholar’s Codex Bloodborne , Dark Souls and Elden Ring .
VIDEO
Games
Hamm3r - Stefano Gualeni, Ahmed Khalifa, Costantino Oliva
Doors - Stefano Gualeni, Constantino Oliva
Here - Stefano Gualeni
Something Something Soup Something - Stefano Gualeni
Fateforge - Gordon Calleja
Night Parade of 100 Demons - Costantino Oliva
Ottogarden - Costantino Oliva
Queen Boat - Ahmed Khalifa
Hollow Floor - Ahmed Khalifa
worDefense - Ahmed Khalifa
Coloured Moth - Ahmed Khalifa
DivCircle - Ahmed Khalifa
Atomic Plus - Ahmed Khalifa
Village Voices - "Best Learning Game" in Europe at the 2013 Serious Game Awards. Research Projects GameChanger: AI-assisted tools for Board Game design Collaborators: Antonios Liapis, Marvin Zammit
Funding Scheme: R&I Thematic Programmes: Digital Technologies Programme 2025
PULSE-ART: Promoting Understanding and Lifelong learning Successful Education through the ARTs and culture Collaborators: Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis, Iro Voulgari
Funding Scheme: Horizon Europe
OPtiMaL: Online Procedural Content Generation via Multi-objective Optimisation a
Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis, Ahmed Khalifa, Konstantinos Makantasis
Funding Scheme: SINO-MALTA Fund of the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST)
RECLAIM: AI-powered Robotic Material Recovery in a Box
Collaborators: (at UoM) Antonios Liapis, Georgios Yannakakis
Funding Scheme: Horizon Europe
RoadSTEAMer: Developing a STEAM Roadmap for Science Education in Horizon Europe Collaborators: Collaborators: (at IDG) Georgios Yannakakis, Iro Voulgari
Funding Scheme: Horizon Europe
HUMAINE: Human-Centered Machine Learning Collaborators: Antonios Liapis, Georgios N. Yannakakis
Funding Scheme: FUSION R&I: Research Excellence Programme
LAW-GAME
Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Iro Voulgari, Antonios Liapis
Funding scheme: H2020
SG4NS Developing Emotional Competences for Nursing Students
Collaborators: (at UM) Prof. Georgios Yannakakis
European project focused on developing emotional competencies for nursing students through serious games.
Funding scheme: Erasmus+
UPSKILLS: UPgrading the SKIlls of Linguistics and Language Students
Collaborators: (at IDG) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
European Project to identify and tackle the gaps and mismatches in digital skills for linguistics and language students
Funding Scheme: Erasmus+
FRAME: ReFRAMing MachinE Learning via Ordinal Tensors and Deep Quality Diversity
Collaborators: Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
Funding Scheme: University of Malta Research Innovation and Development Trust Reserch Excellence Fund
TAMED: Tensor-based machine learning towards general models of affect
Collaborators: (at UoM) Konstantinos Makantasis, Georgios Yannakakis
Funding Scheme: H2020 - MSCA-WF
PrismArch Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
PrismArch will design and develop a VR-aided design environment that will be able to host both architects and engineers towards a common goal, the effective realization of an architectural project.
Funding Scheme: H2020
AI4Media Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Konstantinos Makantasis, Antonios Liapis
Centre of excellence and network of researchers across Europe and beyond for delivering the next generation of core AI advances to serve the key sector of Media
Funding Scheme: H2020
Learn to Machine Learn
Collaborators: (at UoM) Georgios Yannakakis, Iro Voulgari, Antonios Liapis, Vanessa Camilleri
The LearnML project transfers the notion of AI literacy to primary & secondary education and introduces students to the core principles of AI and machine learning
Funding Scheme: Erasmus+
Ubisoft Research Project
Collaborators: Georgios Yannakakis (University of Malta), Alessandro Canossa (Massive Entertainment - A Ubisoft Studio)
AI research in collaboration with Ubisoft
Funding scheme: Industry funded research
COM n PLAY SCIENCE
Collaborators: (at UM) Georgios Yannakakis, Iro Voulgari, Antonios Liapis
A project that aims to help better understand how informal science learning is taking place through coding, making, and play activities
Funding Scheme: H2020
CURIO: A Teaching Toolkit for Fostering Scientific Curiosity
Collaborators: Stefano Gualeni, Marcello A. Gómez Maureira, Sandra Dingli, Andre' Xuereb, Danielle M. Farrugia
Funding scheme: ERASMUS+ strategic partner action KA2
ENVISAGE: ENhance VIrtual learning Space using Applied Gaming in Education
Collaborators: Georgios N. Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
Funding scheme: H2020
Crisis: Europe in Crisis
Collaborators: Georgios N. Yannakakis, Vanessa Camilleri, Owen Sacco, Antonios Liapis
Funding scheme: Erasmus+
Deep Design
Collaborators: Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
Funding scheme: University of Malta Research Innovation and Development Trust
CrossCult: Empowering reuse of digital cultural heritage in context-aware crosscuts of European history
Collaborators: (at UM) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis
Funding Scheme: H2020-REFLECTIVE
FORETELL: Flood and Fire Safety Awareness in Virtual Worlds
Collaborators: (at UM) Stefano Gualeni, Marcello Gómez Maureira, Philip Bonanno
Funding scheme: Erasmus +
GADTRAP: Game Design as a Self-Transformative Practice
Collaborators: Stefano Gualeni, Marcello A. Gómez Maureira
Funding scheme: University of Malta Research Fund
Go Go Gozo
Collaborators: University of Manchester, Warwick University, Utrecht University, University of Malta, Palacky University Olomouc
Funding scheme: Erasmus +
Autonomous Computational Game Designers
Collaborators: (at UM) Georgios Yannakakis, Antonios Liapis, Phil Lopes, Daniele Gravina, and Daniel Karavolos
Funding scheme: FP7 Marie Curie CIG
REFLECT: Reflective Game Design
Collaborators: Rilla Khaled, Pippin Barr
Funding scheme: Marie Curie
C2Learn: Fostering Creativity in Learning through Digital Games
Collaborators: (at UM) Georgios Yannakakis, Mirjam P. Eladhari, Antonios Liapis and Phil Lopes
Funding scheme: FP7-ICT
ILearnRW: Integrated Intelligent Learning Environment for Reading and Writing
Collaborators : (at UM) Georgios Yannakakis, Rilla Khaled, Héctor Martínez, Vincent Farrugia, and Thom Cuschieri
Funding scheme : FP7-ICT
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