Current Opportunities and Challenges of Digital Game-Based Learning

Digital game-based learning (DGBL) has been discussed for over 50 years. Despite countless studies over several decades, DGBL is still the exception rather than the standard in most educational contexts. A workshop at the 21st International Conference on Entertainment Computing 2022 (IFIP ICEC) in Bremen, Germany, prepares an overview of the current state of DGBL. This article provides a systematic overview of the fundamental concepts of DGBL. For this purpose, a life cycle model for learning games is proposed for structuring the overview. At each phase of the life cycle model, opportunities and challenges are identified and discussed through a literature review. Overall, the result is an overview serving as a framework for the workshop and as an orientation for the design, development, and deployment of learning games.