This study will examine how branded games in the LEGO Ninjago franchise communicate the brand narrative through their mechanical, semiotic and referential design. Digital games as communicative tools facilitate a new paradigm of marketing focusing on experience creation through integrated marketing communication plans. The LEGO brand creates highly successful games that communicate the brand effectively. To explore the possibilities and counteract the simplistic use of branded games, this study introduces an innovative framework to formally analyze branded games and their communication of a brand narrative through mechanical, semiotic and referential layers. This framework introduces formal game design to advertising studies, while dragging game studies into branded ecosystems. Using the framework, we analyze LEGO Ninjago the Movie – The Videogame, to identify how this paid digital game expands the Ninjago universe and fulfills specific marketing purposes oriented to LEGO toy sets. Our analysis shows that on a mechanical and semiotic layer, the game presents a standalone experience catering to the universe of the Ninjago movie and the values of the Ninjago brand narrative. However, by framing the whole game as LEGO – in its materiality and interactable objects – the LEGO brand narrative of creative construction informs the act of play. The referential design in these games makes use of playful disruption of rules to instill additive comprehension in the player related to purchasable sets and content.
The European Commission aims for a full circular economy (CE), an economy that aims to reuse all resources in 2050. CE is a promising way to increase welfare and wellbeing while decreasing environmental footprints. Industrial symbiosis, in which companies exchange residuals for resource efficiency, is essential to the circular transition. However, many companies are hesitant to implement business models for industrial symbiosis because of the various roles, stakes, opinions, and resulting uncertainties for business continuity.This dissertation supports researchers, professionals, and students in understanding and shaping circular business models for industrial symbiosis networks through collaborative modelling and simulation methods. Three theoretical perspectives, design science research, complex adaptive socio-technical systems, and circular business model innovation, shed light on designing business models for industrial symbiosis. A serious game and agent-based models were developed in multiple case studies with researchers, practitioners, and students. These were then used to design circular business models and explore their efficacy under uncertain conditions, such as various behavioural intentions of potential partners in diverse natural and societal contexts.This thesis advances business model design and experimentation by integrated simulation of social and technical aspects of industrial symbiosis. Furthermore, the research shows how simulations facilitate learning processes in designing circular business models. Ultimately, the thesis equips researchers, practitioners, and students with knowledge, tools, and methods to shape a circular economy.
Business rules change at an increasing pace which is caused by rapidly changing customer requirements, legislation and policy. Simultaneously, a shift arises that demands an enhanced transparency with regard to the business operations of organizations. This shift forces organizations to demonstrate which business rules are applied in which situations. In order to be able to keep up with the high frequency of change and to comply with the transparency demands, the management of decisions and underlying business rules becomes increasingly important
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