Building context-aware gamified apps by using ontologies as unified representation and reasoning-based models

Abstract

Mobile serious games (MSGs) or gamified apps are kind of user-centered applications where fun and serious aspects are combined in order to enhance users’ experiences. Typically, apps are developed to target a specific purpose for also a specific audience. However, in real settings, a given app could have different users with different characteristics, preferences, contexts, and goals related to gamification. Besides, context awareness is the capacity of a system to take into account the user’s context and adapt its behavior accordingly to that context. This chapter proposes a generic framework that helps developers to build context-aware MSG or gamified apps. This framework relies on a unified representation of gamification expertise and context by making use of ontologies and micro-services. As a proof of concept, the framework is used to design a context-aware gamified app prototype for promoting campus facilities.