Interactive Games and Media

We're gearing up for a big summer tour! We'll be presenting Just Press Play at the New Media Consortium Summer conference (Professor Jacobs and Professor Phelps) at MIT, and at the Games+Learning+Society conference (Professor Lawley and Professor Phelps). We'll be showing several works at the Adobe Educational Leaders gathering (Director Phelps), and even presenting at the Teaching Professor Conference (Professor Whittington). We're still booking tour dates for the second half of the summer - be sure to catch the show!

IGM prides itself on putting the student experience first above all other considerations, and on supporting the quirky, creative culture that drives innovation in our field. That's why we are so excited to note that Associate Professor Elouise Oyzon was the recent winner of the 'GCCIS Excellence in Community Building' award, and Associate Professor David Schwartz has won the 'Extra Mile Award' from the RIT Student Government. Congratulations to both Dave and Weez! It is work such as this that grounds our creative practice in the collaborative, community vibe that enables success.

A panel of writing and gaming experts from academia and industry will convene at Excelsior College in Albany, N.Y. to discuss the use of games and interactive media as an educational tool in both on-campus and on-line environments. IGM Director Andrew Phelps of RIT is among those from academia who will participate in the panel, as well as faculty from OSU, RPI, and SUNY StoneyBrook, Dr. Jon Aleckson, CEO of Web Courseworks, and Tobi Saulnier, founder of 1st Playable Productions in Troy, New York, and Clark Aldrich, founder of Clark Aldrich Designs will moderate.

It's time for Imagine RIT again, and we're showing lots of stuff for our favorite on-campus event! The Democrat and Chronicle even featured Associate Professor David Schwartz and the Storeworld project as one of the teasers, including a video of Dave explaining the project. There's also some amazing work by our colleagues in computer science looking at facial recognition and gaze tracking. There will be lots of things to see and play with at the festival, and we can't wait to see you there!

Ever wonder what it would feel like to be inside your favorite video-game world, instead of just staring at a flat screen? Project Odyssey, the result of a collaboration between RIT’s new media interactive development and new media design and imaging programs, as well as the Center for Student Innovation, aims to make that dream a reality. University News is covering the project, and we hope you will come see it! For more information on the project, visit the Imagine RIT project listing or the Facebook wall for the project. Good luck to all of the New Media Team Project teams as they present at Imagine RIT!

It's Spring again! First, check out the University News Article about Storeworld. We're really looking forward to showing that off at Imagine RIT! Next up, there's a new story about the Princeton Review rankings over at 13 WHAM ABC, with some great interviews with our students Kate Tigue and Nick Bounarota. And finally a big shout out to Vivian Liao and and Priscilla Yin, who recently spoke about mobile game development at the Microsoft DigiGirlz event and tied for the top rated session with Xerox Engineering. Wow!

Al Biles is a professor in the School of Interactive Games and Media at RIT, where he teaches software development, computer music, and interactive media courses to students in RIT's Game Design & Development and New Media programs. He has been developing GenJam since 1993 and performs with it a couple of times a month. He also performs with people as well, and he honestly can't decide which he prefers playing with. He recently presented the system at a TEDx talk at Binghamton University.

Congratulations to Blake Gross and Dustin Kochensparger on winning the 'Best Serious Game' award at the Massachusetts Digital Games Institute Game Challenge! Also helping out the team was Amanda Imperial and Torey Scheer. They were one of four individual category winners of the contest, held at the Microsoft NERD Center in Boston. Way to go IGM students!

IGM Professor and Director Andrew Phelps was quoted in an article on 'serious games' in US News and World Report this week. The article also quotes several other members of an upcoming panel on serious games and education to be held at Excelsior College on May 11.

Fade: Case of the Stolen Diamonds ranked #7 in the top 20 mobile games over at Slide to Play . The game is the creation of IGM student Dan Sternfeld, and has been aided by design and development support from several other IGM students. Way to go! We couldn't be more proud! Go play it today! [iTunes purchase link] There is also a University News article about the game and the authors!