gamescom congress reveals its big three focus tracks with the reveal of the first speakers. Industry experts such as Jukka Laakso, Johanna Pirker, Eric Vezzoli and Celia Hodent will present their thoughts and methods on Immersion, Responsibility and Well-Being in and around games.

On Thursday, 21 August, the gamescom congress 2025 takes place at the Confex building on the Cologne fair grounds. While the detailed schedule will be made publicly available at the beginning of August, the organisers and curators have now released the first speakers and programme points as a teaser.

For the usual three focus topics, this year’s congress will feature Immersion, Responsibility and Well-Being. In these three areas as well as selected political, societal and cultural other topics, more than 150 speakers will share their knowledge.

Among them, Eric Vezzoli (Razer) will speak on the topic of high-resolution haptics for more immersion in gaming, Fadl Speck and Tabea Böker (Kreuzberger Initiative gegen Antisemitismus e.V.) will present on games as spaces for tolerance and social dialog, Daniel Goldberg (BASF SE) talks about the opportunities and challenges between e-learning and games in immersive learning environments and Prof. Johanna Pirker (TU Munich) on how games make science tangible and actively involve players in research processes.

Furthermore, Celia Hodent (Game-UX-Strategy) speaks about ethic code in game creation, David Helgason (Co-Founder of CleanPlay) shares thoughts on renewable energy and gaming, Jukka Laakso (CEO Soihtu DTx) connects psychological research on neurocognital illnesses and Y-Lan Boureau (Founder & CEO ThrivePal) connects games and long-term well-being.

Tickets for gamescom congress 2025 are already on sale. The regular ticket costs 109.00 euros, discounted tickets are available for 39.00 euros. Selected program points and stand-alone online sessions can also be followed digitally via livestream.


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Pascal Wagner
Pascal Wagner is Chief of Relations of GamesMarket and Senior Editor specialised in indie studios, politics, funding and academic coverage.
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