Where: Mining Exchange, Ballarat, Victoria. Australia
When: 22nd and 23rd July
Shining a light on real opportunities in computer games
Australia’s largest regional computer games career expo, Ballarat GiG: Get into Games, returns on the 22 nd and 23 rd of July, and will showcase the industry with two days of demonstrations, the latest games to play, competitions and talks from local industry leaders.
Ballarat GiG is free and open to the public and offers rare access to working professionals from leading Australian studios.
Friday is targeted at students and focuses on talks about entering the industries and the opportunities it offers; while Saturday offers unstructured time with the developers, a hands-on approach to games with new Wii, PS3, Xbox 360 and PC titles available for the public to play, and a variety of competitions offering big prizes to test visitors sense of fun and skills. The Ballarat GiG Guitar Hero Idol guarantees laughs with success based on how hard you rock and not how well you score, whereas the more serious events offer more serious competition and prize money running into the thousands.
The local studios and presenters have been carefully chosen to represent various aspects of the Australian industry. Firemint stamped its name on the competitive world of iPhone development with Flight Control and Real Racing, Big Ant launched one of Australia’s best selling titles, this year, with AFL Live and Blue Tongue made an international splash with its colourful title De Blob. GiG offers time with these professional game developers to answer questions about their work, their path into the industry and their games. The Big Ant guys might even give lucky gamers tips on how to take their virtual AFL team to the premiership!
Other speakers include Game Developer Association of Australia CEO Tony Reed and representatives from Ballarat University and TAFE to deliver an overview of the industry and the academic courses on offer.
Ballarat GiG: Get Into Games was established in 2006 and is an initiative of the City of Ballarat as part of the Ballarat Innovation Festival, with the support of Multi Media Victoria, University of Ballarat and the Game Developers Association of Australia. It will be hosted by Addictive Agency’s Martin Wilkes, veteran who has more than fifteen years in the industry working with game developers, publishers, websites, magazines, and who has hosted a games TV segment on Foxtel many years before the likes of Good Game.
The expo is designed to highlight careers in areas including computer science, sound engineering, music, arts, management and business studies using the eye-catching and entertaining games industry as a backdrop and focus.
Ballarat GiG is taking place at the Mining Exchange, Lydiard Street Ballarat, on July 22 nd&23 rd 2011 and the expo offers buses and free lunches for secondary school groups wishing to attend.