A Serious Mixed-Reality Game for Training Police Officers in Tagging Crime Scenes

Abstract

Recognizing and collecting evidence at a crime scene are essential tasks for gathering information about perpetrators and/or the dynamics of a criminal event. Hence, the success of a crime investigation is strongly based on the ability of forensic investigators to perform these tasks. Recent studies observing and comparing the performance of experts and novices have highlighted the importance of experience and training for search and recovery strategies at crime scenes. Therefore, relevant training programs in evidence-recovery techniques should be attended by novices to improve their skills. However, the knowledge transfer between skills acquired in the classroom and their practical application in the field is a challenging task. In order to relieve this problem, this paper proposes a serious mixed-reality game, which is called TraceGame, aiming to support the training activities of novice forensic investigators by improving their skills related to the search and recovery of evidence at crime scenes. The purpose of the game is to identify the greatest number of useful traces present in a crime scene that is physically reconstructed at the training site as quickly as possible. As shown in an experimental session, TraceGame is a promising tool for supporting the training of novice forensic investigators.