Dr. Chris Bateman is an outsider philosopher, game designer, and author. Graduating with a Masters degree in Artificial Intelligence/Cognitive Science, he has since pursued highly-acclaimed independent research into how and why people play games, and written extensively on the neurobiology of play. In 2009, he was invited to sit on the IEEE’s Player Satisfaction Modelling task force, in recognition for his role in establishing this research domain, and in 2013 became the first person to be awarded a doctorate in the aesthetics of play.

Chris works in the digital entertainment industry as an expert in game design, narrative and player satisfaction modelling, and has worked on more than forty published games. As a game designer and writer, he is best known for the games Discworld Noir and Ghost Master, as well as the books Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames, 21st Century Game Design and Beyond Game Design. He also teaches game narrative at Laguna College of Art and Design.

He has a lifelong interest in mythology and religion, and has travelled the world studying religious practices and beliefs. He has taken part in everything from Native American sweat lodges to Pagan solstice celebrations, as well as visiting Buddhist and Shinto shrines in Japan, and witnessing traditional tribal religions in Africa whilst briefly living in the Sahel Reserve near the Sahara desert.

His work in philosophy includes Imaginary Games, which explores the relationship between art and play, The Mythology of Evolution, which examines the role of imagination in the evolutionary sciences, and Chaos Ethics, which argues for the centrality of imagination to morality and ethics. His blog Only a Game (http://onlyagame.typepad.com) deals with both philosophy and game design, and contains a prolific array of articles, many of which have been featured elsewhere.