Dr. Richard Cole

Richard Cole is Lecturer in Digital Classics at the University of Bristol and co-Director of the Bristol Digital Game Lab. His research focuses on how the history and culture of antiquity intersects with new media, in particular video games, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence. From 2020-2023, he worked on the multidisciplinary Virtual Reality Oracle project, which created a ground-breaking VR experience of ancient divination that is improving educational outcomes in schools. He has published leading research on Classics in video games and hosted key conferences on the topic, while his latest work looks at how questions around the authorship of the Iliad and Odyssey can help us better understand AI generated texts today. Through the Game Lab, he is leading the research component of a collaborative R&D project with industry partner Meaning Machine on generative AI systems for video game dialogue. The aim? To understand how players respond to dynamic and emergent conversations.