Investigate artificial intelligence. Classify the risk. Understand the AI Act.

01Why NO AI ACT exists

The EU AI Act is the regulation that defines when an AI system is prohibited, high-risk, or subject to transparency obligations. It's a technical text, written for experts — but the decisions it describes affect real people: who gets hired, who can access a service, who ends up under surveillance.

NO AI ACT is an educational simulation that puts the player in the position of someone who has to assess these systems: gathering evidence, classifying risk, justifying a decision. It doesn't replace the regulation's text, and it won't turn anyone into an expert in an hour — it's designed to make a mechanism that stays abstract on paper feel concrete.

02What it is

NO AI ACT puts the player in the role of an inspector in a city where artificial intelligence makes decisions about real people. Each case is a file: read the documents, open the evidence, cite the proof and sign a risk classification following the logic of the European AI Act. It is not a multiple-choice quiz: the right decision, poorly justified, remains contestable.

03What you learn

NO AI ACT trains you to reason about risk, not to memorise articles. By the end of a session you can tell what the law prohibits from what it asks you to govern.

• Recognise prohibited AI practices (such as social scoring) and why they are banned.
• Identify high-risk systems and the obligations they entail.
• Assess transparency, effective human oversight and deployer responsibility.
• Understand why a disclaimer or a formal human check is often not enough.
• Distinguish the context of use: the same system can be legitimate or critical depending on how it is deployed.
• Argue a decision with evidence: contestability as a measure of quality.

To study beyond the game: the plain-language AI Act guide, the risk categories and the glossary.

04A serious game, not a quiz

The reasoning matters as much as the answer. A quiz has one right answer to remember. NO AI ACT has a case to understand: an AI system, a dossier of evidence, a context that changes what each clue means. The game is designed to help players reason through a decision — not just check what they remember. Before classifying a case, players can review the context, weigh the evidence, and consult the rule linked to the case. At the end, a debrief explains why a decision holds up or doesn't — not just whether it was "right" or "wrong."

• Every case's context stays available throughout, not just as a one-time intro text.
• The rule linked to each case is available during the decision, as support for reasoning — not as a ready-made answer.
• A final debrief helps players understand why a choice wasn't fully correct, not just that it was wrong.

05The 13 cases

From the clearest cases to the deliberately ambiguous ones. Each file tests a different part of the AI Act.

• FILE 01The city of scoresSocial scoring of citizens: the boundary of prohibited social scoring.
• FILE 02The interview that does not existAutomated recruitment and risks in employment.
• FILE 03The synthetic cityGenerated content and transparency obligations toward the public.
• FILE 04The observed classMonitoring in education and the rights of minors.
• FILE 05Invisible triageHigh-risk clinical decision support in healthcare.
• FILE 06Faces in the crowdBiometric recognition in public spaces.
• FILE 07Civic creditA mirror case: prohibited social scoring vs welfare and credit.
• FILE 08The desk that always answersPublic chatbot, reliance and the human channel.
• FILE 09The opaque tenderPublic procurement of AI without documentation or governance.
• FILE 10The profiled classroomAdaptive learning platform that profiles students.
• FILE 11The do-it-all modelGenerative model (GPAI) used downstream in internal decisions.

06Who it is for

07How to use it

• Solo: open the investigation and work through the cases at your own pace. Choose language, difficulty and mission.
• In class: turn on teacher mode for the local end-of-session debrief and export an anonymous summary (.txt / .json).
• In groups: use a case as a discussion prompt; the "decisive evidence" line makes explicit why a classification holds or is contestable.

Want the full game loop in detail? Read how it works. Teaching? There is a guide for educators with 30, 60 and 90-minute session formats, learning objectives and discussion prompts.

Start playing

08Early feedback

NO AI ACT has been shared, in an early stage, with a small group of educators, researchers and professionals. Informal early reactions have highlighted interest in its investigative approach to AI Act education, and its potential relevance for serious games research.

• Educators and trainers
• Researchers and PhD candidates in serious games and AI governance
• Professionals and consultants interested in AI regulation

In the press

• Absolute Gamer — NO AI ACT, the free serious game about the EU AI Act (in Italian)

09Privacy by design

10Frequently asked questions

11Learn more

Dedicated guides to understand the project before playing or bringing it into the classroom.

12Educational hub

Around the game there is a full, free teaching hub: plain-language guides, teacher materials, ready-to-run classroom activities and a glossary. The starting point is the education hub.