Digital escape rooms : a tool for orientation and promotion

Jug, Tjaša (author), Švab, Katarina (author)

Digital escape rooms are interactive puzzle-solving games increasingly used for educational, training, and promotional purposes. In library settings, they provide engaging formats for instruction, orientation, and outreach. Although such games can be developed on various platforms, Google Forms remains one of the most widely used free tools due to its flexibility. Using Google Forms, we designed an informative digital escape room for the Department of Library and Information Science and Book Studies at the University of Ljubljana. The puzzles incorporated authentic materials, including photographs of real spaces, a promotional video, and links to departmental information sources. In 2024, our digital escape room was tested with 125 participants, followed by a survey exploring their play experience. Results indicate that participants felt enthusiastic, cheerful, and playful during gameplay, and perceived the game as innovative, creative, useful, and interesting. They also confirmed that they learned new information about the department. Although incorporating authentic and timely information into digital escape rooms enhances awareness and learning, it also introduces challenges related to ongoing verification and updating. Therefore, careful design and planning are essential to balance authenticity and timeliness with puzzle structures that enable efficient revision.

• Language: English
• Keywords: gamification, games, library and information science education, e-learning, user experience, innovation
• Typology: 1.12 - Published Scientific Conference Contribution Abstract
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 28.08.2026
• Year: 2026
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-187199
• UDC: 021.7:793.7
• ISSN on article: Y510-338X
• COBISS.SI-ID: 290412547
• Publication date in RUL: 09.09.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: IFLA repository
• Publisher: International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA)
• COBISS.SI-ID: 290217987

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: igrifikacija, igre, izobraževanje na področju bibliotekarstva in informacijske znanost, e-učenje, uporabniška izkušnja, inovativnost

Projects

• Funder: ARIS - Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency
• Project number: P5-0361-2017
• Name: Modeliranje bibliografskih informacijskih sistemov