For a while now, I’ve been fascinated by the potential of gamification in Oil & Gas and Energy.
It’s a vast space with many possibilities—from simple knowledge-testing games to complex decision-making challenges involving negotiation, resource management, and strategy.
The creative opportunities are huge, which is why I’m reaching out to those who might be interested in getting involved. But to make it work, we need to start simple.
At this stage, I’m not thinking of a complex, graphics-intensive console game like those on PlayStation or fully developed 3D apps. Rather, I envision something simpler—like a plain-screen, Q&A-style game. This is just to get the ball rolling.
Let me introduce Twine (twinery.org), an open-source platform for creating interactive, nonlinear stories and games.
With Twine, you can craft branching narratives without any coding knowledge—a perfect tool for developing educational, text-based adventures.
Twine is incredibly user-friendly:
To give you a flavor, I built a simple 5-level Twine game: PetroQuest: The Engineer's Journey.
You’ll face ethical dilemmas, technological innovations, environmental concerns, and stakeholder challenges. Every decision shapes your journey, highlighting the delicate balance between profitability and responsibility, innovation and practicality, and leadership and collaboration.
After designing the levels, challenges, and the interactions between the branches, this is what the Twine map looks like:
Each box in the image represents a passage where the user faces a question and must make a decision based on the alternative answers provided. Each answer leads to a different box, representing the various paths available depending on the user’s choice. On the front end, this is what the user sees on their screen.
You can try the demo and have a quick click-away game on my CrowdField website.
Again, I want to emphasize—this is not a fully developed game but merely an example with a few stages to showcase the kind of dynamic that can be created with minimal resources. All it takes is imagination and creativity to put your skills to work and craft an engaging narrative for users.
Launch Game 👉 https://www.crowdfield.net/narrative-game
The potential applications for gamified learning tools are enormous, from training programs to leadership development. Here are a few examples for inspiration:
So many possibilities!
A good story draws people in, makes your message clear, and keeps them interested. How could you turn your work into a story worth hearing?
I’m looking to explore this space with anyone interested in narrative game design and its applications in Oil & Gas—whether in the areas mentioned above or beyond.
I believe 'Gaming in Oil & Gas' as a value proposition has yet to find its place in the industry, and exploring new possibilities could lead to something truly exciting.
If you’re interested, let’s connect and start building!
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Alan Mourgues is a Petroleum Reservoir Engineering Consultant with 25 years of international experience. He is the founder of CrowdField — the go-to hub for Oil & Gas subsurface professionals to upskill, freelance, and monetize their expertise. CrowdField brings together a global community through: i) Freelance marketplace for niche talent and task-based solutions; ii) Digital Store & Vault of engineering tools, workflows, and resources; iii) AI Hub showcasing startups, workflows, and use cases; iv) Learning resources including webinars, blogs, and curated datasets. Alan’s mission is to empower professionals to turn knowledge into income and future-proof their careers as the energy transition unfolds.
