Future Museums and Interconnected Virtual Heritage Experiences: Eliciting Requirements

This paper presents findings from a mixed-methods study eliciting requirements for a Future Museum ecosystem connecting tangible artefacts with their historical, social, and cultural contexts through citizen curation and connected heritage experiences, including virtual worlds and game-based experi-ences. Thirty participants watched a concept video, completed semi-structured interviews, played two levels of the Discover Babylon serious game as a technology demonstrator, and completed post-game evaluation and requirements elicitation questions. Participants valued digital artefacts that could be collected, curated, shared and connected to contextual information and experiences. They also wanted virtual museum spaces to retain the architectural character and presentation conventions of physical museums. Connected heritage experiences were expected to place artefacts within historical environments, demonstrate their creation and use, and support exploration, puzzles, quizzes and challenges. Participants identified limitations in Discover Babylon’s dated controls, navigation, pacing and audiovisual presentation, but valued its historical setting, opportunities for exploration, puzzles, educational content and representation of Mesopotamian life. Across the Future Museum concept, col-lection was valued not only as a game-like incentive, but also as a means of personal curation, learning and social sharing. The study contributes requirements for Future Museum ecosystems, connected heritage experiences and modern game-like implementations. Its originality lies in conceptualising the Future Museum not as a single virtual museum or standalone application, but as an interconnected ecosystem linking physical museum contexts, virtual artefacts, museum architecture, personal and shared collections, and heritage experiences to support access, contextual understanding, curation and engagement with less familiar histories and overlooked cultural artefacts. Its significance lies in identifying requirements for connecting these elements to support access, contextual understand-ing, curation, and engagement. Its significance lies in identifying requirements for connecting these elements to support access, contextual understanding, curation and engagement.