Concept art by Columbia River High School’s Christine Choi was selected from among thousands of submissions to win the grand prize in Google Play’s Change the Game Design Challenge.
Choi, who will be a senior at River in the fall and already has received several art accolades, concepted and created original artwork for Mazu, a game with a shape-shifting child protagonist who embarks on a journey. A panel of professionals from the gaming industry and Google employees evaluated each submission on comprehensiveness of the concept, creativity, originality, quality of game mechanics and narrative and mobile device compatibility, as well as on a written statement.
She received a trip to Los Angeles, California, to attend E3, a conference about computer games, video games and related products. Choi also got a tour of Google’s Los Angeles office, scholarship to the Girls Make Games summer camp, Android tablet, college scholarship and technology for her school.
Google Play commissioned a study that indicated about half of mobile gamers are women. The industry that creates those games, however, is only 27.8 percent female, transgender or another gender identity. The challenge, open to teens between the ages of 13 and 18, is designed to increase the number of underrepresented mobile game creators.
Related:
- “Felida teen wins Google Play scholarship with game concept art,” The Columbian (external link)
- “River student wins Southwest Washington Congressional Art Competition“