GIC 4.0 Recap: A Lens of Hope for Our Future Gamers! 🎮
How a Passionate Game Development Community Comes Together to Empower Each Other!
We cannot believe it has been almost two months since our Game Impact Challenge’s fourth chapter!
For ACF, the Game Impact Challenge (GIC) is more than just a weeklong celebration event to share a love for “all things game development”, but is an opportunity to get together as a community, learn from and with each other, work and play, hone our creativity, leadership, technical, and collaboration skills, and share early testing results for formative middle school projects and games. Most importantly, it is an opportunity for us to explore the unique world of game development together, and be a testimony to the magic, and meaningful change that this incredible gaming community brings to our society’s holistic development!
This year too, the Game Impact Challenge harnessed that power firsthand, thanks to our student game developers, designers, and enthusiasts from all over the world, who created games with the potential to make a real difference.
Event Line-up for the Week
We had a star-studded event line-up for GIC 4.0 week, and all our students, Coaches, and staff had a wonderful week together. From mentor talks by inspiring industry lead game developers, and founders, peer presentation sessions, boba chats, official Gamernation Version 2 launch, and game coding workshops to fun virtual gaming sessions, we did it all! Catch up on the recordings below, in case you weren’t able to join live.
GIC Day 1: Sep. 9, 2024
GIC Day 2: Sep. 10, 2024
GIC Day 3: Sep. 11, 2024
GIC Day 4: Sep. 12, 2024 [Event Spotlight]
GIC Day 5: Sep. 13, 2024
Snippets of Fun From Our ”Boba Chat” Session
How Does Game Development Benefit Young Students?
Game development is an impactful way for young students to learn a variety of valuable skills and concepts, spanning creativity, technology, teamwork, and problem-solving. Here are some key reasons why it’s particularly beneficial:
- Develops Problem-Solving Skills
- Encourages Creativity and Innovation
- Builds Coding and Technical Skills
- Teaches Project Management
- Encourages Collaboration and Communication
- Provides Real-World Applications for Math and Physics
- Introduces Career Opportunities
- Boosts Confidence and Motivation
Game development, therefore, not only equips students with practical skills but also inspires them to think creatively, work collaboratively, and persevere in the face of challenges — traits that are valuable in any future endeavor.
Gamernation 2.0 Launch
Gamernation is a platform developed by the Applied Computing Foundation (ACF) for sharing the projects (games) created by its junior “Game Development” division teams, namely, working with Pygame, Unity, Scratch, JavaScript, and beyond. It is a one-stop community where games are not only shared by teams with their peers but also with the world! You can check out our official website here.
If you would like to know more about how Gamernation 2.0 works, you can check out our detailed guide here.
GIC 4.0 Testimonials
Jaeho Lee (Student/ Event Student Leader)
“GIC 4.0 was an incredible experience, and an absolute blast! It was so much fun with enthusiastic participants, and a ton of interesting presentations and information, making it all a success. Even though it was just a fraction of the entire week-long event, I realized how many passionate game developers were in our community during the Show and Tell event I got to co-host. In my experience hosting other events, usually a little push for questions is needed, however, there was no need for that this time, as everyone seemed extremely interested in each others’ games and immediately jumped to satisfy their curiosity. Not only was I co-host in GIC 4.0, but I was also a student many years back, participating in this exact event, which was cool to experience both sides. I remember presenting would always go a little bumpy, and I would get nervous every time I unmuted to present, so I was impressed to see everyone present so well. I also remember how fun it was to get to look at everyone else’s games, which luckily, hasn’t changed. Overall, GIC–whether I’m hosting or participating–has been nothing but amazing for students presenting and learning about unique, passion-filled projects; and I can’t wait to see it return next year!”
Kenneth Luong (ACF Coach)
“GIC 4.0 was a great success this year and allowed for connections to be made within the ACF game development community. I was glad to be able to host the closing ceremony which was attended by coaches and students and allowed for conservations, advice, and perspectives to be shared. Near the end of the closing ceremony event, we were able to indulge in Gartic Phone and everyone trying to replicate one another’s art made me laugh so much and was a core memory of the whole event. I believe GIC allows for students to learn about careers in game development, highlight their own creations, meet other programmers which is an invaluable experience and something they can always look forward to. As we can continue to hold this event annually, I hope many more people attend because it is truly an educational experience where you can learn from people in the industry and absorb knowledge. I hope we continue to host GIC next year and make it even greater!”
Juan Tafolla (ACF Coach)
“I am extremely proud of our current progress of GIC this year. After being part of this wonderful event in previous years, I am more than happy to say it was more than a pleasure to help take part and make this wonderful event possible. Coding education how we can spread this information to the wider community is crucial, especially as a resident in the central valley the importance of having events with easy accessibility such as this one- are key to promoting and increasing this educational goal. It’s always a pleasure to see so many international audience members from different parts of the world and seeing these people share this enthusiasm.
The guest speakers were very enthusiastic with many tackling subjects the appeal to all sorts of age groups! From talking about Gamefication of coding education to exploring the world of game development I found students of different ages- as well as myself intrigued and entertained to the possibilities available to these ambitious programmers.
Likewise it was also enjoyable to have students show off their finished projects! Giving young students the opportunity to demonstrate their leadership, social, and technical skills challenges these students to leave their comfort zone to create their own memories of this experience. My favorite moment was mentoring one of my advanced students Thibault in putting together and preparing a presentation, I recall him being VERY enthusiastic about presenting the projects we have worked hard together for months, to show his skill.”
Izzy Lera (ACF Coach)
“GIC 4.0 I believe was a very successful event this year. Both participants and presenters had a nice and fulfilling experience for this event. GIC gives students the unique opportunity to interact with and ask questions to industry professionals in an environment that is both accessible and friendly. For my part I led the pygame introduction course for GIC and I had a great time doing so. The students were very interactive with my curriculum and each other. The students even went beyond my code that I had taught and added their own spin to the circle clicker that I was teaching how to create. I think for the future it would be great to see more students interact as this is such a unique and wonderful experience. I hope that I can be a part of GIC next year and can’t wait to see what comes next.”
Swatilekha Roy (ACF Staff)
“Nothing is more fulfilling than watching all our Coaches and students come together under one roof (or virtually, within the same Zoom room) and bring their authentic selves, creativity and storytelling, passions, and get excited together! I think GIC 4.0 manifested that spirit pretty well, thanks to the tremendous support of all our Coaches, parents, mentors, speakers, participants, and students. My favorite memory from our fourth chapter would be one of our coding workshops, where one student was voluntarily helping another with a coding bug troubleshooting, which for me, rings so true with the true essence of GIC: learning through sharing! I hope for our future chapters to be even more vibrant, and engaging. Until then, let’s keep the spirit of game development alive within the community and keep empowering each other. See you all next time! 💛”
We hope to see you again for our future GIC chapters! Let’s keep the true spirit of GIC (“game, build, share, impact”) alive always.
Want to stay updated about the Game Impact Challenge all year round? Please join our Discord server.
Signing off,
ACF GIC Team. 🎮