Digital entertainment become increasingly important; not only as a source of fun but also in serious applications. For instance, games are being used in education, training, decisions support, communication, marketing and even as art forms, enabling people to experience environments and situations that could never be experienced in real life. They can create new social networks in which people from all over the world meet, talk, and play together. They also pose really though challenges in networking that, if properly addressed, could provide useful solutions even for many other networked applications such as distributed environments/simulations, VoIP, Virtual/Augmented Reality, real time control, etc. 

New technology, like faster computers and graphics cards, 3D multimedia technologies and systems (for display, audio and haptic systems, etc), new interface techniques, broadband connections and mobile devices, lead to new entertainment possibilities. But they also put a large burden on those of us who must create such systems. Users get more demanding. They expect not only realistic and immersive graphics and physics but also network interactivity and fairness. They expect gripping storylines and systems that automatically adapt. 

This is only achievable by hard work and new research. Research in new 3D multimedia technologies and systems, artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, automatic scenario design, and networking support. Fortunately, digital entertainment and creative technology is nowadays considered as a serious academic domain and the number of researchers studying these topics is rapidly increasing. 

The IEEE Digital Entertainment, Networked Virtual Environments, and Creative Technology Workshop is an excellent opportunity to bring together academic and industry researchers, designers and computer entertainment developers and practitioners, to address and advance the research and development issues related to computer entertainment.