The annual event, which brings together industry experts and students for spirited competition that fosters professional growth, had the crowd test-run and provide feedback on the student creations.<\/p>\n
The event\u2019s audience gave the coveted People\u2019s Choice honour to the Brock game Goofy Lil Guys<\/a>, which sees players collect a team of adorable creatures, growing their unique abilities before they face off in a battle royale.<\/p>\n Other Brock games also made their mark at the showcase, with Green Thing from the Planet Jupiter<\/a> taking second place for Achievement in Audio, and\u00a0Ventomori<\/a> winning second place in Accessibility.<\/p>\n Brock\u2019s mascot, Boomer the Badger, cheers on the University\u2019s students during the awards ceremony at the Level Up Showcase.<\/p><\/div>\n Organized by Algonquin College, Brock University, OCAD University and University of Toronto in partnership with XP Gaming Inc.<\/a>, this year\u2019s Level Up Showcase welcomed more than 4,000 attendees.<\/p>\n More than 100 industry professionals from 20 studios across Ontario worked to judge student games in what has become one of the largest gatherings of game developers in the province.<\/p>\n Brock Instructor Michael Ferguson, President of motion capture and 3D animation company Morro Motion Inc. who taught the student producers of Goofy Lil Guys, said the talent coming from the joint Brock and Niagara College GAME program is a breath of fresh\u00a0air.<\/p>\n \u201cThese students have the best of both worlds with hands on technical skills, along with theoretical, academic approaches to the content they create,\u201d he said. \u201cThe fact that they get to approach their game development from these two avenues is a strong reason for their success in recent\u00a0years.\u201d<\/p>\n The second place win for Achievement in Audio \u2014 offered as a category for the first time \u2014 marked a promising new collaboration between Brock\u2019s Departments of Digital Humanities and Music.<\/p>\n With the mentorship of Nina Penner, Assistant Professor of Music, and third-year Music student Lex House, the team behind Green Thing from the Planet Jupiter developed the award-winning soundtrack for the game.<\/p>\n Brock\u2019s mascot, Boomer the Badger, got into the spirit of the Level Up Showcase and tried his paw at playing Ventomori, a video game created by Brock students that won second place in the Accessibility category.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cFinishing a game is a deceptively hard task,\u201d said Ericka Evans, Brock Instructor and Head of Production for Niagara-based game design company Phantom Compass. \u201cTo be successful, game developers need to know how to collaborate and communicate their vision through both art and technology while meeting the high expectations of players.\u201d<\/p>\n The student creators of Ventomori, taught by Tom Brown, Interactive Digital Media Developer and Brock Instructor, continued critical work on the area of video game accessibility building on last year\u2019s Level Up success<\/a> in the category.<\/p>\n A.R.F. Squad<\/a> was the fourth capstone project competing at the showcase and represented one of the strongest showings by IASC students. The team gained valuable feedback from industry professionals and public alike.<\/p>\n Brock organizers were also honoured at the weekend event. Interactive Ontario<\/a> and XP Gaming<\/a> recognized Jeremy Leipert<\/span>, Project Co-ordinator in the Department of Digital Humanities and Level Up organizing committee member, with the Champions of the Ontario Game Talent Award.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is the talent and dedication of our staff, students and instructors that make the Level-Up Showcase so special,\u201d said Aaron Mauro, Chair of the Department of Digital Humanities. \u201cIt is the spirit of collaboration and creativity that helps our students to be so competitive and have fun doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Not only do they have the skills, but Brock\u2019s aspiring video game designers also have the fan base.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":100855,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7484,13793,3319,37,1],"tags":[8542,15138,263,124,14451,5538,30,123,14042,6494,14450,264,10731],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100847"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100918,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100847\/revisions\/100918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Students](\"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Brock-students-Level-Up-stage-1050x664.jpg\")
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