A long way from being the niche pastimes they once were, video games are now a huge part of modern society and culture and have been so since the late 1970s. Primarily played for leisure and entertainment, early arcade hits like Pong, Space Invaders, Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong helped grow the public appetite for video games (before these, non-video arcade games like pinball were more popular). These games were followed by titles like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat in the early 1990s which further increased the public’s interest in video games.
Driven by the technological trends of the past 2 decades, like high-speed internet connectivity and high smartphone adoption, interest in video games has expanded exponentially. These trends have made games more accessible, portable, and social, thereby driving an increase in mobile gaming and online gaming.
As of 2022, the worldwide video game industry is reported to be a multibillion-dollar market estimated to rake in around $347 billion in yearly revenue, larger than the music and film industries combined.
The nature of video games produced today has greatly evolved from the earliest iterations. Driven by technological advancements like advanced graphic processing chips, cloud, and virtual reality (VR) technology, video game developers today can create more engaging and immersive experiences. Video games that portray very detailed simulations of real-world sports like tennis, hockey, football, Rally or Formula 1 racing are now commonplace. If you wanted, you could become a virtual pro basketballer or truck driver with titles like 2K’s NBA and Euro Truck Simulator—shooting hoops or delivering long-haul goods to your heart’s content.
The modern video game landscape offers diverse experiences catering to all moods and interests. On one end of the spectrum, titles like Uncharted 4 and The Last of Us emulate an interactive cinematic-type storytelling experience complete with great visuals, orchestral scores, and very compelling narratives. On the other end, are titles which reimagine traditional board games like Monopoly as 3D virtual cities.
As video games have evolved, the technologies that enable them have also evolved. Technologies like haptic controllers, virtual, or augmented reality headsets with eye and motion tracking, etc., help deliver higher levels of immersion.
Video games and their associated technologies have also expanded to serve purposes outside of pure leisure and entertainment. From being used as therapeutic tools for treating anxiety, depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder, as learning tools in classrooms (e.g., Minecraft, Roblox), or even as training material in the form of immersive VR simulations for astronauts, machinery operators, etc. By harnessing the competitive nature of video games, some studies show that the introduction of gamification into certain elements of learning can help students be more creative and engaged.
To write this article, I researched how video gaming technologies have been used (or are still being used) in the petroleum industry as well as depictions of some components of oil and gas operations in everyday casual games. Here are some of our noteworthy finds.
Casual Oil and Gas Simulators Games
Drill Deal
Drill Deal is a fun, casual voxel-style business simulator game in which you control your own drilling rig—by building resources, hiring staff, maintaining and upgrading equipment, etc.—with the ultimate goal of selling oil, making profits, and expanding your business empire. To do this you have to juggle many components at once. You will need to strategically place buildings, hire and fire staff, keep up employee morale, and control your business cash flow. You also need to look out for threats like pirates, weather, and fire that could affect your business. The game is available on the Windows platform.
Oil Enterprise
Oil Enterprise is a 2D business simulation game where you begin as a small-scale entrepreneur investing in your first oil field with the goal of becoming a global oil magnate. This game is a little more detailed than Drill Deal as it allows you to invest in up to 15 different global regions and 90 oil fields. It also has a dynamic oil market and incorporates various real-world events like accidents, earthquakes, exchange rate fluctuations, etc., which make the game more realistic and challenging. In the game, you can invest in components like new oil fields, refineries, pumps, storage facilities, maintenance, logistics, etc. This requires you to be cautious with your investments, manage loans, and fulfil long-term contracts to improve your business reputation and avoid bankruptcy. The game is available on Windows, macOS, and Linux.
Detailed Strategy-Style Oil and Gas Operations Simulators
SimRefinery
In 1992, an unusual collaboration between video game studio Maxis and oil major Chevron produced one of the most interesting experiments in early industrial simulation: SimRefinery. Born from Maxis’s success with SimCity, this specialized simulation aimed to bridge the knowledge gap among Chevron's Richmond, California, refinery employees, marking an early attempt to use gaming technology for industrial education.
With a $75,000 investment from Chevron, Maxis Business Simulations—a division of Maxis—set out to create not just a training tool, but a comprehensive simulation that would help employees explore the complex interconnections within a modern oil refinery. Unlike traditional training software, SimRefinery's primary goal was to give employees a bird's-eye view of refinery operations, particularly valuable for workers who would typically focus on specific units within the facility.
The game’s development process was grounded in reality. Maxis developers received a firsthand experience through guided tours of the Richmond refinery, where specialists explained the intricacies of refinery operations. Chevron took an active role in the project, providing simplified chemical process formulas that were integrated into the game's mechanics.
The gameplay reflected the complex decision-making inherent in refinery operations. Players managed various inputs, including different oil blends at varying prices and balanced these against desired petroleum product outputs. The simulation captured real-world tradeoffs: producing more heating oil, for instance, meant less distillate available for higher-margin products like gasoline and jet fuel. Maintenance decisions carried significant weight—skipping routine upkeep could trigger costly plant shutdowns, creating a downward spiral of reduced income and further maintenance challenges.
Much like its cousin SimCity, the game's ultimate objective was profit maximization, but players had to think strategically about long-term sustainability rather than quick gains.
When Chevron began testing the completed simulation in 1992, they reported notable improvements in communication, particularly between technical operators and nontechnical staff in the marketing and finance departments.
While SimRefinery never achieved widespread adoption within Chevron, it found an unexpected second life in academia. The chemical engineering department at the University of California Davis incorporated the simulation into their computer lab curriculum, using it as a teaching tool until 1997. This educational application demonstrated the potential for gaming technology to bridge the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical industrial operations.
SimRefinery stands as an early example of how gaming technology could be adapted for serious industrial applications, paving the way for today's sophisticated training simulators used throughout the oil and gas industry.
Maersk’s Quest for Oil
Quest for Oil was an educational interactive video game developed by Maersk in 2013. The game was designed to simulate the life cycle of operations in the upstream oil and gas industry from the exploration phase up to the production phase. The game begins with the player choosing from different locations to explore for oil. These choices include locations in the North Sea, Africa, Southeast Asia, the Gulf of Mexico, and Qatar, with varying difficulty levels.
In typical fashion consistent with real-world oil and gas operations, the player must first acquire a license which gives them the rights to survey the field(s) selected on the map. Once that license has been purchased, the player has to analyze and interpret the stratigraphic cross sections mapped out by the seismic analysis to locate the oil. There is varying subsurface lithology which makes the game a bit technical as the player would need to apply some basic principles of petroleum geology to locate potential oil traps.
Once the oil has been located, you can begin the drilling phase. While drilling, factors like the subsurface conditions and lithology have to be considered. Problematic lithological zones can be avoided by employing techniques like directional drilling. The player also has control of variables like the drilling rate and pressure differential while drilling and must balance all these factors to avoid damaging the drilling bit and incurring extra drilling costs.
Having successfully drilled the well and reaching oil, production can now begin. Players can control the levels of gas and or water injected for enhanced oil recovery and the oil production rate. Players also have to decide the means of transportation once the well has been drilled. Transportation options include pipelines and oil tankers depending on whichever option is most feasible for that production location. Players need to monitor and maintain their wells to ensure production does not drop off. The game also employed a virtual operations safety score which players should monitor to ensure they remain in business.
Players win the game by producing the most oil among their competitors. This required a balancing act involving the prudent use of capital, proper risk management, upstream operations knowledge, and business savvy to be successful. Unfortunately, no longer available to play, Maersk’s Quest for Oil introduced the complexities of upstream oil and gas operations in a fun, engaging, and interactive manner.
FRESHHH
Freshhh was an online simulation game run by MOL—a Hungarian multinational oil and gas company—and developed by EcoSim/Intersim. In this competition-styled game, university students from more than 70 countries across the world competed in teams of three to show off their knowledge of oil and gas operations. Within the game, players were tasked with managing a virtual fully integrated oil company (upstream → refining/petrochemicals → retail) for a share of the total grand prize of more than $25,000 and an opportunity to join the MOL Group’s graduate program.
The upstream component of the simulation ran for 15 turns/years (one game turn = 24 hours) and players were ranked on the profit realized at the end of 15 turns. Each team was given a budget of about $3 billion in-game dollars complete with credit financing options and interest penalties if their books ever went into the red. Players had to strategize on an optimal field development plan evaluating 10 potential prospects to develop a portfolio that delivered the maximal return on investment (ROI).
Some information on the technical parameters of each potential field like reservoir depth, porosity, permeability, API gravity, reservoir drive mechanisms, etc., were available for teams to analyze and calculate important numbers like the original oil in place, bubblepoint pressure, oil formation volume factor, recoverable reserves, etc., to aid their decision making. Other relevant information like the field’s distance from major infrastructure like roads, pipelines or rail lines was also available. All this information helped players analyze which fields they believed to have the most promising ROI and acquire development leases for those.
After acquiring leases for the most promising prospects, players had to develop facilities for oil production including producer and injector wells, oil processing trains, storage tankers, and export infrastructure. These facilities had to be constructed based on the production capacities of the fields they were attached to.
The game included realistic financial components of oil an gas operations like fixed and variable capital expenditure (CAPEX), operating expenditure (OPEX), government royalties, and dynamic oil prices based on in-game market conditions. Players had to be strategic to make CAPEX and OPEX investment decisions based on worst-case-scenario oil price benchmarks or risk going bankrupt.
When field productivity began to decline irreversibly, players could abandon the field for the cost of 10% of the total CAPEX invested or risk the possibility of declining revenues turning into losses.
At the end of the 15th turn, the top 10 players with the highest in-game profits would qualify for the semi-final stages.
Industry Use Cases of Video Gaming Technology
Drilling and Well Control Simulators: Gaming Technology Revolutionizing Oil and Gas Training
The oil and gas industry uses video gaming technology to address one of its most challenging aspects: well-drilling operations. Given the complex, costly, and high-risk nature of oil well drilling, the latest generation of drilling and well control simulators leverage advanced 3D graphics to create realistic, immersive virtual environments that can mirror real-world operational conditions.
State-of-the-art simulators such as the DrillSIM:6000 offer comprehensive virtual recreations of drilling operations, allowing users to visualize and interact with the entire process—from the crown to the seabed and down to the total depth of the well. These systems can be configured to emulate vendor-specific equipment and scaled to match actual field conditions, providing an unprecedented level of realism in training scenarios.
What sets modern drilling simulators apart is their sophisticated downhole modeling capabilities. Supporting both vertical and directional wells, these systems can be programmed with well-specific data, enabling trainees to practice drilling various well types and respond to diverse challenges. The interactive nature of these simulators allows operators to control all aspects of the drilling operation while experiencing the direct consequences of their decisions in real time.
The technology spectrum ranges from basic training modules to highly customized solutions that incorporate digital twins and even live data feeds from active wellsites. This versatility enables training across various scenarios, including complex situations like multiphase drilling and stuck-pipe events, which would be impractical or dangerous to recreate in real-world training environments.
These advanced simulation tools have become invaluable assets for both educational institutions and operators, providing a safe, controlled environment where students and workers can develop critical skills without the risks and costs associated with actual drilling operations. The result is a more competent workforce better prepared to handle the challenges of real-world drilling operations.
Virtual Reality: The New Frontier in Oil and Gas Safety
The industry has also embraced VR technology as a revolutionary approach to safety training, marking another significant adoption of gaming-adjacent technology in this high-risk sector. By creating immersive 3D simulations of real-world scenarios, VR training is transforming how workers prepare for the challenges of oil and gas operations without exposing them to actual dangers.
The impact of VR training in the industry has been substantial, with data from training provider, 3t Global, showing a 43% reduction in injury rates among companies that have implemented these programs. This significant improvement in safety metrics can be attributed to VR's unique ability to create consequence-aware workers through experiential learning—allowing them to "fail safely" in virtual environments where mistakes don't cost lives or equipment.
What sets VR training apart from traditional methods is its ability to replicate highly specific, high-risk scenarios that would be impossible or prohibitively expensive to recreate in real life. Workers can experience everything from routine maintenance procedures to emergencies, and developing muscle memory and decision-making skills through repetitive practice. The technology tracks users' movements, gestures, and decisions in real time, providing immediate feedback and allowing for quick corrections of potentially dangerous habits.
This acceleration in skill acquisition has proven particularly valuable for oil and gas operations, where rapid but thorough training is essential for maintaining both safety and productivity.
Industry leaders have taken notice. Saudi Aramco Nabors Drilling Company, for instance, has reported significant success with VR training implementations, leading to plans for expanding the technology across various rig roles and procedures. Their experience highlights how VR can address workforce development challenges in ways traditional training methods cannot match.
Beyond the immediate safety benefits, VR training offers practical advantages for the oil and gas sector. It eliminates geographical barriers to training, allowing workers to access specialized instruction without the need for travel to physical facilities. This accessibility has proven particularly valuable for offshore operations, where bringing workers to training sites can be both costly and logistically challenging.
As the oil and gas industry continues to prioritize safety while seeking to improve operational efficiencies, VR training stands out as another example of how gaming technology has evolved to serve critical industrial applications, fundamentally changing how workers prepare for the challenges of their high-risk environment.
For Further Reading
The Impact of Gamification on Students’ Learning, Engagement, and Behavior Based on Their Personality Traits by R. Smiderle, S. Rigo, University of Vale do Rio dos Sinos; L. Marques, Centro de Educação; et al.
When SimCity Got Serious: The Story of Maxis Business Simulations and SimRefinery, Obscuritory
Maersk Quest for Oil Uses Real-Time Strategy, Sky News
Drilling and Well Control Simulators, 3t Global
