Lorenzo James, PhD

Hi, I’m Lorenzo! My story starts in Cole Bay, on the Caribbean island of St. Maarten. Like many young people from the Caribbean, I left the island to study abroad, trading the relaxed yet wonderfully chaotic island life for grey skies and the order and punctuality of the Netherlands. One thing came with me: a love of games, so studying game development in Utrecht felt like the natural choice.

Curiosity has always been my compass, and there it quickly took over. The more I learned about making games, the more I wanted to understand the technology behind them, which pulled me into artificial intelligence and software development. A big moment along the way was picking up Artificial Intelligence and Games by Georgios Yannakakis and Julian Togelius. It showed me how those two worlds could come together, and that idea has shaped my path ever since.

After my studies I put those skills to work as a software developer, building web applications. I learned a lot, but it was there that I realised I wanted my work to have a real impact on society. GGZ Centraal, a mental health institute in the Netherlands, and Eindhoven University of Technology gave me the opportunity to do exactly that: a PhD combining AI and games to support people with severe mental illnesses. I’m very grateful to both. Even reaching one person makes it worth it.

Outside of research, games are still where it all comes back to. I enjoy every kind, retro or modern, and these days I build retro games for fun, which I hope to release once I find the time. I also really enjoy travelling, and research has given me the chance to present my work all over the world, so curiosity keeps taking me to new places.