During the last two decades, I have been working with various wonderful and talented people in academia and industry. My current team, Game Design Praxiology Group is dedicated in advancing praxiologically critical perspectives in game studies and further the discussion between game scholars and the practitioners of play.
Members of the Game Design Praxiology Group:
Dr. Annakaisa Kultima, Aalto University
Dr. Annakaisa Kultima has led several academic and industry projects and teams throughout the past two decades. Kultima is part of the teaching faculty at Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. She has been publishing over 120 academic papers on game design, industry trends and development cultures since 2006. She has been teaching and studying game design and development in several universities in Finland and Sweden as well as touring as a visiting lecturer around the world including universities in the US, China, Denmark, South Korea and Japan. Her research is concentrating on game development cultures, creativity, game industry trends, and game jams. Kultima is an active member of the game ecosystem in Finland and internationally: she is working as a judge in several game competitions, running game jams as well as curating exhibitions on games. She is also a member of the founding team of The Finnish Museum of Games, CEO of MurMurious company working on playful spaces, products and services, and the co-founder of non-profit organization Finnish Game Jam advocating the game making hobby and indie cultures in Finland. She is also hosting playful and playable art at her art gallery, Kumma, in Helsinki Punavuori.
Solip Park, Aalto University
Solip’s ORCID
Solip’s Google Scholar
https://www.parksolip.com/
Solip Park (DA) is a post-doc researcher at Aalto University School of Arts, Design, and Architecture, and the University of Jyväskylä. Her research interests focused on immigrants in the video game industry, cultural diversity in game productions, and gameplay cultures in Finland and South Korea. Solip’s doctoral dissertation, “Understanding Game Work Migration: Game Expats in Finland”, was announced as the winner of the Dissertation Award 2024 by Aalto University. She is also the author and artist of “Game Expats Story” comic series, which is part of her doctoral dissertation (https://www.instagram.com/solip.comic/). Solip has two master’s degrees, one from Carnegie Mellon University in the USA (Master of Entertainment Technology) and Aalto University in Finland (Master of Arts), which was announced as the winner of the Game Thesis Competition 2020 by the Finnish Game Research Society. Prior to her academic career, Solip worked at game companies and startup scenes in the USA, South Korea, and Finland, focusing on project management, event coordination, and international relations, and was the first South Korean national to acquire Finland’s startup entrepreneur residence permit in 2018. Solip is also one of the founding members of Nexon Computer Museum – the first permanent museum in East Asia dedicated to the history of computer and video games, located in South Korea.
Jaakko Kemppainen, Aalto University
Jaakko is a future doctoral researcher with a long and meandering history with game development, education and research. He is currently teaching game design in Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. He is specialized in different aspects of game design, having more than 15 years of professional history on designing games on various platforms and genres. He worked as the first (and only) Regional artist of games at Arts Promotion Centre Finland, promoting the value of games as their own artform.
His academic interests are in theoretizing the design aspects of games, based on his experiences of working in the game industry. He is also interested in the indie game culture and how indie games, developers, publishers and players evolve through time. As an explorer / achiever he is quite easily lured into participating in other research activities.
He has written three books about games and game design, and holds a MA in Game Design and Production from Aalto University, and a MA in Digital Culture studies from University of Jyväskylä. He is a frequent member of different competition juries, and has given more than 120 talks, presentations and panels about games and their design.
Ville Kankainen, Aalto University/, Tampere University
Ville’s ORCID
Ville’s Google Scholar
Ville Kankainen (PhD) is an independent game scholar and designer with over 20 peer-reviewed articles and several published board and digital games. He is an affiliate researcher of the Game Design Praxiology Group and the Tampere University Game Research Lab. His dissertation “Hybrid Play Experience and Design in Tabletop Gaming” was accepted with distinction in 2025 at Tampere University, Finland. His research interests include postdigital tabletop gaming, neurodiverse identities in hybrid media, mediatization of material culture, game design research, and the intersections of games and learning. Ville has published several games, including a board game on a famous tv-show Duudsonit. He has authored several research articles on different topics of game studies, in addition to teaching games and design in multiple academic courses in several Finnish universities. Internationally, he has lectured in Gothenburg University, Sweden and Leipzig University in Germany. In 2025, Ville gave two invited lectures at Oswaldo Cruz Institute in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Between 2018-2021, Ville was the main organizer for Ropecon Academic Seminar, and in 2024 he acted as a co-organizer of the Board Game Studies Colloquium XXVI, in addition to being a member of the organizing committee of Tampere University Game Research Lab several times over the years. He has been a board member of Finnish Game Jam Ry since 2017, in addition to being a co-founder of Murmurious oy, a company behind the playful interactive seats Murmurs.
Laura Piispanen, Aalto University
Laura is a quantum physicist and game developer whose research is conducted between the Computer Science and Applied Physics departments at the Aalto University School of Science. She is exploring the use of interactive art, such as playful installations and games, in order to solve and explore active research problems in the framework of quantum technologies. Laura is particularly intrigued by the development process of quantum physics related games (quantum games) and the ways in which games may be developed to both communicate quantum physical phenomena and also aid in the study of quantum sciences. Laura’s aim is to identify design constraints and to deepen the understanding of the design process of quantum games. For some years she has been organising events like Quantum Game Jam, where quantum games are developed over the course of a weekend, and Fun in Theory, which introduces theoretical physics studies to new physics and maths students. Through these experiences Laura has learnt how best to introduce quantum physics to people and help them connect quantum physics to their projects in a meaningful way. In her research, Laura is also interested in identifying the ways in which art and visualisation can be used to communicate quantum physics and possibly make quantum physical phenomena more tangible for all of us. This translates to projects like QMoss, an outdoor art installation discussing biodiversity, bio-materials, sustainability and quantum technologies through wood construction and moss. Laura earned her Master of Science in theoretical physics from the University of Waterloo, through the Perimeter Scholars International program; completed pedagogical studies at the University of Turku; studied quantum foundations in the research group of Turku Quantum Technology and is finishing her Master’s degree in Interaction Design and Gamification at the University of Turku.
Doctoral Researcher Edward Morrell, Aalto University
Edward Morrell is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Art and Media at the Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. His research explores speculative approaches to videogames, utilising design fiction and (pre-/post-)production art to further explore games as art alongside experimental game design and asset creation. He holds an MSc in Internet and Game Studies and a BA in Design for Digital Media, and works as an independent artist, freelance designer and fictional developer.
Doctoral Researcher Heikka Valja, Aalto University
Heikka Valja is an art educator, designer and a researcher conducting his research in the field of art and art education. His research interests include games and pragmatist aesthetics, game design education and game art and he is fascinated by all kinds of games and game-like activities, digital and non-digital. Heikka is the head of games program in Helsinki Vocational College where he teaches game art and design and works as the WorldSkills expert for 3D digital game art. He has taught graphic technology, digital art, and game design in Aalto University from 2009.
University Lecturer Miikka Junnila, Aalto University / Doctoral Researcher, Tampere University
Miikka works as a lecturer at the Department of Art and Media at Aalto University leading the master’s level game design and development major. Miikka graduated from Helsinki University as a Master of Science in Computer Science in 2006 and as a Master of Arts in New Media from University of Art and Design Helsinki in 2007 and worked as a lead game designer at Ironstar Helsinki, designing experimental social F2P mobile games before it was cool. Alongside the teaching, Miikka game jams occasionally and has done some freelance game writing/narrative design. Miikka’s research interests include game mechanics, thematization and genres.
Doctoral Researcher Constantinos Miltiadis, Aalto University
Constantinos Miltiadis is a transdisciplinary architect and researcher, occasionally also a programmer, media artist, curator, teacher, and librarian. His primary focus lies in the exploration of the aesthetic capacities of contemporary digital media. Currently, his research delves into the affective experience of movement specific to virtual navigable environments, pursued through the experimental design exploration of non-Euclidean navigation. Constantinos holds a diploma in architecture engineering from NTU-Athens, and a postgraduate degree in Architecture and Information from the Chair for CAAD ETH Zurich, with additional studies in computer music at IEM KU Graz. As a researcher he has contributed to multiple seminars, exhibitions, conferences, journals as well as international press publications. As an educator he has developed and taught courses on creative programming and experimental VR game design for both larger academic modules and shorter workshops. Moreover, he has contributed as curator, organizer, and producer for various lecture series, exhibitions, concerts, and conferences. Between 2015 and 2019 he served as assistant professor at the Institute of Architecture and Media of TU Graz. Since late 2019 Constantinos is a doctoral researcher at the Department of Design and the Department of Architecture at the School of ARTS at Aalto University in Helsinki.
Alumni of the Game Design Praxiology Group:
Researcher, Dr. Ylva Grufstedt
Designer, Joaquin Rossi
Designer / Resarcher, Christina Lassheikki
Programmer, Teemu Kokkonen
Designer, Noora Heiskanen
AaKoo's Game Lab 