Canada's Top Student Game Makers Awarded More Than $35,000 at Great Canadian Appathon(4) Grand Finale

Top three teams in the Great Canadian Appathon⁴ impress panel of judges with games they developed in 48-hours - Team Friend Boat, makers of 'Size Matters' take home $25,000 grand prize

TORONTO, Feb. 14, 2014 /CNW/ - Over the weekend of January 19^th, more than 500 college and university students competed in the Great Canadian Appathon⁴ (GCA⁴): a crazy, intense and exhaustingly wonderful hackathon to design the next hit mobile game in just 48 hours. Picked as the best from a pool of more than 100 submitted games the top three teams showed off their creations to a panel of judges yesterday, February 13^th 2014 at the GCA⁴ Grand Finale. Team Friend Boat, who created the game 'Size Matters' took home the grand prize of $25,000.

"Bringing in art schools through the custom matchmaking system on the GCA website really took the quality of submission to a whole new level," said Ray Sharma, Founder of XMG Studio Inc. "The games were more polished and much closer to being market-ready than we would've expected and we're excited to work with the teams to launch them in an App Store."

Presented by award winning mobile games developer XMG Studio, the GCA⁴ also awarded:

• $5,000 for second place team Cool Beans for their game 'Kingdom Crushers'
• $1,000 for third place team Last Minute for their game 'Wildfire'
• $1,000 for winners in the categories: Best Art/Aesthetics, Team SuperSymmetry with 'Dragon Drop' Most Technically Challenging, Team Solo Penguin with 'Reddawn Return to Fishland' Best Original/Experimental Application, Schrödingers Team with 'Quest'
• $1,000 GCA⁴ Fan Favourite as determined by an open voting on the GCA website, Team Ninja Cornz with 'Princess Runner'
• $1,000 GCA⁴ Champion of Hearts, honouring the extraordinary effort of Professor Lynda Hausman and Professor Umer Noor from the Humber College Faculty in making the GCA⁴ and unforgettable event for their students
• 60 VIP tickets to participate in Canada's first national Open Data hackathon - the Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE). These tickets will give the top 15 GCA⁴ teams access to the invite-only CODE hacker-hub in Toronto and includes travel and accommodation

Previously, the more than 500 participants had developed and submitted a staggering 100 mobile games to take part in the national coding competition. The winning games were evaluated on criteria such as the degree of innovation, the fun and entertainment factor, the level of art and design polish as well as stability, all under the theme of FANTASY. The top three entries were chosen to participate in a face off in front of a panel of judges and live audience. After conferring, special guest and VIP judge Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Federal Economic Initiative for Northern Ontario, announced the winners and awarded the prizes.

About XMG Studio:

XMG Studio Inc. is an award-winning developer and publisher of mobile games. Founded in late 2009, XMG has developed a track record for innovation excellence in mobile gaming including the release of critically acclaimed games downloadable on your iOS, Android, and Windows Phone devices. Based in Toronto, XMG is one of the largest indie mobile game studios in Canada. Named as one of the top global mobile games developers to watch by popular media, XMG is focused on providing creative expression through gameplay for all fans of fun.

SOURCE: XMG Studio