By Renato Ruiz

On December 7th the School of Cinematic Arts hosted the 2016 the Winteractive Festival presented by USC Games. This year’s Festival showcase a variety of work from across a broader spectrum of platforms, classes and levels of experimentation including SCA’s Interactive Media and Games Division, the John C. Hench Division of Animation & Digital Arts, and the USC Viterbi School of Engineering as well as a handful of students from the USC Thornton School of Music and students from outside the University participating.

“This year we were proud to change up the traditional formula and highlight a wide selection of experiences from throughout the USC Games Family,” says Collin Kelly program coordinator for SCA’s Interactive Media and Games Division, “it was a privilege to present these emotional, engaging, innovative and exciting projects to the world for – in many cases – the first time.” Students from all divisions, not just from the School of Cinematic Arts, were encouraged to submit ‘polished and complete’ or ‘playable in-progress.’ The goal was to showcase the creative talent of our students to a wide array of public and industry professionals.

The Winteractive Festival is a festival. The submission process was designed to give students practice at submitting to the festival circuit. Submissions included basic press materials we can use to send to our alumni, industry partners, and potential press contacts. In total, there were 25 games on display from traditional board games to the most advanced Virtual Reality experiences. Here is a list of admitted Games to this year’s Winteractive Festival:

Sing, Sundown, Human Assimilation, Shades of the Past, Animal Kingdom VR, the Curious Tale of an Unexpected Visit, The Amoire, Goldrush, Tiler Teller, Underclock, I Can Feel It Coming In the Air Tonight, The LOCKER!, Downtown Browns, Scope Creep, Dandelion, Co-Operatives, Epitaph, Oblige, Sky Command, All’s Fair, Cat-A-Pillar, Spellbound, Grassdancer, 10000 YEARS, Harmonious Zero Cool.

The career fair portion of the Festival conducted over 33 internship one on one interviews from some of the leading companies in the gaming industry such as Firefly, Rockstar, and Zynga. Anyone who submitted a game for the showcase was eligible to submit a resume for the one on one interview process, a new benefit for this year’s iteration of the Festival. The event also offered ad hoc tables from industry recruiters which included The Walt Disney Company, Unity, Jam City, Firefly, ID Tech, Insomniac Games, Rock star, Treyarch (Activision Co.), and Zynga.

“We’re thrilled that so many amazing industry partners attended, and can’t wait to begin planning next year’s show!”