Virtual Humans in Serious Games

Computers and video games are more and more used for serious purposes such as education and health care. Virtual humans are the inhabitants of the simulated worlds in these games and the challenge is not only to make them look like humans but also to make them behave as humans. Thus, they should be equipped with properties such as social and cognitive intelligence, personality, emotions and user awareness in order to engage the users to the game and to be sensitive to the users´ state. This paper gives an overview of serious games applications and mention about research on socially intelligent virtual characters and their use in serious games.