Serious Games for Public Safety: How Ontario Can Leverage Gamified Education to Prepare Its Residents for Emergencies

According to the Canadian Emergencies Act, a national emergency is an urgent, critical situation that threatens the health and safety of Canadians (Department of Justice of Canada, 2022). Emergencies can also take on many forms: pandemics, natural disasters, civil unrest, or armed conflict. Currently, the Provincial Emergency Response Plan implemented by the Chief of Emergency Management Ontario is the framework that keeps Ontarians safe, allowing for organizations and municipalities to organize disaster relief, send out emergency alerts, and educate Ontario residents on emergency preparedness (PERP, 2019). This project explores how serious games can prepare the public for emergencies based on response frameworks currently in use in metropolitan Ontario, Canada. This paper will present the positive features of serious game applications concerning public safety and emergency management education, in addition to case studies of serious game applications in this context. Serious games may be a useful instrument for public safety education to enhance existing emergency preparedness and public safety education frameworks. The accompanied game prototype teaches young players cold-weather-related emergency protocols and demonstrates possible ways Ontario can leverage gamified education for public safety education purposes.