Code your way to victory

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Think you've got the skills to create the next super-popular mobile gaming application? Flex your app-creating muscles at the Great Canadian Appathon2 at the end of the month.

The GCA2 is a weekend-long game coding festival presented by National Post and mobile game developer XMG Studio Inc. It's a nation-wide event open only to students that runs from September 30 to October 2. Working in groups of up to four people, students work for 48 hours to create a game application for the platform of their choosing — iPhone, Windows or Android. Groups must spend at least 14 of those hours at one of the coding 'hubs' in a post-secondary school — some of the closest hubs to Fanshawe are Waterloo, Brock and Guelph. For a full list of hubs, check greatcanadianappathon.com.

According to Andrew Kamondy of XMG Studio Inc., participants can't do too much to prepare for the contest (though they are free to brush up on their coding skills), as the GCA2 will have a theme that all games must stick to. "We're announcing the theme the day of (the Appathon). In terms of preparation, very little can be done." In addition to the theme, judges will be looking for games to have innovative concepts, polished art and design, a high level of entertainment and stability.

The top games will take home some very serious prizes, according to Kamondy; the winning team will take home $25,000, secondplace will snag $10,000 and ten $1,000 prizes will be awarded in various categories as well. There are also prizes donated by UNITY Game Development Tool and more. Altogether, over $50,000 in prizes will be awarded.

"(Participants) definitely need some coding skills," Kamondy said. "A lot of the students who were there last (time) were in computer science programs, or were engineers, or were just game developing geeks who can do it in their own basements."

"With the onset of mobile phones, an interesting revolution has taken place where it's not as complicated as developing for console," he continued. "You see those stories of six-year-olds developing games that made it to number one in the app store. That's kind of the whole reason for this; it allows people to really get in the space and really understand and partner with some companies that have experience and can benefit from it."

The first GCA in April saw approximately 300 students divided into 100 teams. In the end, over 50 games were developed, and a superhero-themed game, Super Punch, took home the grand prize. The game developers at XMG Studio Inc. are working with the three finalists from Edmonton, B.C. and Montreal to polish and publish their games Super Punch, Valley Raid and Plasmium, and are about two weeks away from launching the games. "We're very excited and we plan to do the same thing (this time)," said Kamondy.

"Another thing we have (done) is launched an incubator," he continued. "We have 17 of the teams that participated in the last GCA as part of this incubator. We're mentoring them to develop games; we're assisting them in achieving their goals of getting their concepts and creativity out into the marketplace." He added that GCA2 participants will have the same opportunities as well.

Register now for your shot to win big money and create what could be the next hot mobile game. Applications close at 12:30 p.m. on September 30. For a full list of hubs, more contest details and additional info, check out greatcanadianappathon.com.