User:Kofjell/Industrial Gaming

The IG incentive
The most basic motivations and business needs behind the Industrial Gaming initiative is to


 * Use plant and equipment CAD 3D models actively in mission critical industrial operations
 * Take advantage of the huge investments implemented into the gaming industry
 * Automate the process of transforming CAD models into the game domain as much as possible

The Industrial Gaming as a term was intentionally constructed in Statoil by Knut-Olav Fjell in 2007 to highlight the potential in combining industrial operational competence and game developer knowledge. The timing in 2007 was overwhelmingly ready for taking advantage of the technologies available from the gaming industry. Functionality offered by the PC based game applications represented possibilities to revolutionize the way industrial plants are run and maintained, especially in a lifecycle management perspective.

The multidisciplinary challenge
Many of the operations in a modern plant are complex and require multidisciplinary skills. Also, to be sure the plant operations are executed safe, learning and training on specific work operations must be part of the work preparations. The training can take place in a virtual environment. Unwanted events, accidents, fires and leaks can be trained for, without damage on “real” persons or buildings. The combined knowledge and skills of industrial plants engineers and game developers is anticipated to have a great impact on finding new ways to design, run and maintain industrial plants, be it land based facilities, offshore platforms, or remote operated plants.

The Industrial Gaming Conference
To put focus on the issues mentioned above, the first Industrial Gaming conference was arranged in Oct 2007. Many of the issues above has since beeen highlighted, as indicated by the programs of the IG conferences held so far. A special arena for the 3 first conference was chosen. The largest cinema in the Nova cinema centre of Trondheim Kino  was used to give the audience a good audiovisual experience, as indicated by the illustration below

Embedding industrial knowledge
IG is also about the challenge of embedding industrial knowledge into the game domain. Game designers are used to design a game stories, which in the industrial plant domain can be compared to designing work flows. Also, to make the training realistic, game technology can be used to enhance the learning experience, measure and log progress, and to make learning more fun and efficient. The latter is recognised by the Statoil Academy as a key goal for their business.

The “gaming” part of the IG term is of some considered to represent a risk element, or unserious approach to operation of plants and facilities. The concepts in Industrial Gaming will show the contrary; that the incentive behind it is targeted, professional and aims at keeping industrial plants safe, efficient and economical. To summarise: Industrial Gaming is not to game with safety, it's to game for safety.

IG requirements
For an application to be part of an Industrial Gaming concept, the following requirements must at least be met:
 * 3D plant models and equipment must originate from official approved "as built" CAD models
 * CAD-to-Game data conversion chain must be part of an automated replication system
 * CAD model attributes, such as equipment identifiers (TAG’s) must follow the CAD-to-Game chain
 * CAD-to-Game chain must support transfer of visual attributes for auto-texturing of Game models
 * CAD model content must be preserved in such detail that all training, maintenance and mission critical operations can be visualised and trained for

To sum up, use of 3D plant model data for specific work tasks implies that more than the geometric CAD data description must be part of the conversion process. Plant equipment TAG’s and mechanical objects properties is also important context information. CAD model attributes that are needed for specific operational tasks, must also be built into the conversion chain.

Future of Industrial Gaming
The concept development of Industrial Gaming is in its initial stage, and is currently an initiative in Statoil that focuses on the value of using CAD models more actively than today. The key enabler for this is a “live transition" of designed CAD-and-attributes between the industrial and the game domain. The connection between geometry and attributes is well explioted in today's GIS systems. More extensive use of the models will also provide a better Quality Assurance (QA) feedback loop for the CAD design professionals. The development of better integration tools between the two domains looks promising, and will stimulate the gaming community to go in front and use more and more pre-built models in their content production. There are lots of examples on YouTube and other sites with “How-to-do” tutorials on how to transfer (animated) CAD models to games, texture and use them. In the Industrial Gaming conferences the motivation is to show the industry the possibilities in using components of game technology in daily operations. The multidiscipline challenges of implementing a good interaction between Man, Technology & Organisation (MTO) is imperative in this work, irrespectively of geographic location. In the game domain, industrial activity it can be trained for in a safe and controlled environment. In this context, the Industrial Gaming will by intention, play a catalyst role, and will therefore host future conferences for it.