Learning to Deliberate Through Hybrid Role-Playing Games: Evidence from Participatory Budgeting Simulations

Hybrid role-playing games are increasingly used to support democratic learning, yet there is limited empirical evidence on how such hybrid designs function across contexts. This study analyses the pedagogical and deliberative effects of Empaville, a hybrid role-playing game designed to simulate a green participatory budgeting process by embedding deliberation, competition, and voting within a fictional urban setting. We analyse six implementations conducted between 2023 and 2025 in the United Kingdom and Morocco (N = 118), combining participant observation with post-game survey data. The analysis examines role activation, phase-level enjoyment, and participants’ reported learning and deliberative experiences, using descriptive statistics, non-parametric tests, effect size measures, and qualitative thematic analysis. Across contexts, participants report that the game supports perspective-taking, intellectual humility, and constructive engagement with disagreement, while perceived learning and participation intensity vary more substantially across individuals and sessions. Cross-national comparisons reveal some statistically detectable differences in how specific phases are experienced, particularly voting, but effect sizes are generally small or trivial, indicating limited substantive divergence overall. These findings suggest that hybrid role-playing games can foster deliberative learning outcomes in short educational interventions, while highlighting the importance of distinguishing between enjoyment, engagement, and perceived pedagogical value. The study contributes an exploratory but systematic mixed-methods evaluation suitable for small-N pedagogical interventions without causal claims.