Data-driven asset management through gamification (VA-SPEL)

Sweden's water and wastewater networks are facing major challenges, including aging infrastructure, deferred maintenance, climate change, and a shortage of skilled personnel. Despite the availability of advanced data-driven tools like AI and machine learning, their use in asset management remains limited. This hinders municipalities’ ability to make well-informed decisions and use resources efficiently.

In VA-SPEL, the player takes on responsibility for a water and wastewater network: planning maintenance, prioritising investments and managing risk over time, with a limited budget and incomplete information. Players, primarily acting as utility managers and engineers, interact with different models, explore how data quality affects outcomes, and experience the consequences of their decisions in a dynamic simulation environment. The prototype was developed by RISE together with Gold Town Games. 

The project is being developed in collaboration with water utilities and municipalities, and targets staff at strategic, tactical, and operational levels. In addition to the game, the project includes interactive workshops and an online platform offering access to the game, educational materials, and a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course).

By enhancing the understanding and practical use of data-driven approaches, the project will contribute to a more resilient water infrastructure, more efficient maintenance practices, and smarter use of resources. It also supports several goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including Clean Water and Sanitation, Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, and Sustainable Cities and Communities.

Download and Play

The prototype is free to download, use and share. We welcome municipalities, water utilities and universities to try it and send us their feedback.

• Download the game (Windows): LINK
• Licence: VA SIM is open-source software licensed under the Apache License 2.0. You may use, modify and distribute the software in accordance with the terms of the licence.
• Version: prototype

System requirements 

• Windows 10 or later, 64-bit.
• No installation needed — download the file and run it.
• Windows may show a security warning the first time because the file was downloaded from the internet. Select “More info”, then “Run anyway”.

About session logs

The game saves session log data locally on your computer in a folder called data_logs, in NDJSON format (one JSON object per line). The folder is created automatically. These logs make it possible to analyse how decisions are made during a session and feed into the research  but nothing is sent to RISE automatically. If you would like to share your logs with us ahead of a pilot study, contact the project manager.