Student Explorer Grant for games - up to S$50,000 funding

MIT has a call for a proposal out. Details as follows:

Turn your ideas into a business venture!

Presented by the SMART Innovation Centre

Do you have an exciting game or web application? Do you want to be an entrepreneur? The Explorer Grant will assist individual students or groups of students explore further development and commercialization of innovative games and web applications originated by them. The Explorer Grant will provide up to S$50,000 in funding to develop commercial prototypes, evaluate go-to-market strategies so that your game or web application can be licensed to an existing company or form the basis of a start-up company.

The Explorer Grant recipients will also be provided with business expertise, guidance on intellectual property, and networking opportunities with the Singapore and international venture capital community.

Important Dates

• 14 September 2009: Grant submission opens
• 30 October 2009: Grant closes, 5pm (Singapore time)
• 30 January 2010: Award Grant

Eligibility
Full time undergraduate or graduate students at:

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Nanyang Technological University
• National University of Singapore
• Singapore Management University
• Nanyang Polytechnic
• Ngee Ann Polytechnic
• Republic Polytechnic
• Singapore Polytechnic
• Temasek Polytechnic
• Other Singapore institutes and recent graduates can be considered

You must identify a faculty member at your institute to act as a Faculty Mentor.

You can work in student teams or individuals. If working as a team, a team leader must be identified. Teams from multiple institutes/universities can be formed.

Submission Process
The proposal must be submitted electronically to explorergrants@smart.mit.edu by 30th October, 2009, 5pm, Singapore time.

Grant application form is available at http://web.mit.edu/smart/explorer

For inquiries about the grant program, contact Howard Califano at howard.califano@smart.mit.edu or visit our website at http://web.mit.edu/smart/innovationcentre for more information.

Xbox LIVE Community Games comes to Singapore

Yes! Singaporean game developers can now make games and release them on the Xbox LIVE Community Games Channel.

A group of year 3 students and myself were invited to attend the press release this morning.

There's a S$50,000 grant up for grabs for each successful application to MDA under the MDA-Microsoft XNA Development Initiative.

Check out the official release at MDA's site.

How to write Game Concept and Proposal Documents

Q: Game development competitions, assignments, Final Year Projects - what do they have in common?

A: Requirement(s) to submit proper documentation.

Proper planning is crucial to success in any project, more so for creative projects such as game development projects, where a good mix of personalities including artists, programmers and designers are involved.

If you can't even put down to paper and articulate what you have in mind, how are you going to be able to implement and deliver a solid game product? Those angel investors you're looking for will need a lot more than "it's cool!" to be convinced.

Look over to Tim Ryan's article on The Anatomy of a Design Document, Part 1:Documentation Guidelines for the Game Concept and Proposal at Gamasutra. It's an older document, but still a goldie.

Note: You'll need a Gamasutra account to login and read. If you haven't got one yet, get one. It's an account you'll use for a long time (if you want to last in the GD business).