Gay Gaming Professionals, a nonprofit that cultivates emerging top performers in the video games industry, has created the Collegiate Games Competition to surface new gaming talent.
In partnership with Raw Thrills, the arcade entertainment company, this competition will offer $90,000 in prizes, celebrate video games, and encourage the bright creative future of the industry in the hands of the next generation, said Gordon Bellamy, CEO of GGP and a professor USC’s Interactive Media & Games Division, in an interview with GamesBeat.
To highlight the interactive, business, and cinematic facets of video games, prestigious university game programs across the United States – such as USC Games, USC Marshall School of Business and DePaul’s Jarvis College of Computing and Digital Media – will nominate two video game projects to compete, and other student competitors will develop creative video game trailers and go-to market strategies for cash prizes.
Bellamy said, “The great talent is everywhere, and now in this role as a professor, I’m seeing great talent every day.”
The talent is in the development and production of games, monetization, sentiment and the distribution of games, he said.
“Each of these pillars is critical to growing our space in a meaningful way,” Bellamy said. “The sustainable business models in the future are going to be grounded in all four of those working together, and the top performers of the future are going to fluidly move between understanding not just gameplay, but of how it’s being experienced by people, how it’s being distributed, with healthy optimization models for those experiences.”
Student competitors develop their submissions through the spring – gaining real-world experience and industry exposure by presenting to industry veterans from companies such as the Ayzenberg Group. The competition will be capped off by a livestreamed awards ceremony in July. To get the latest information and updates about the 2025 Collegiate Games Challenge, sign up here.
The students will make games that will be judged by game developers for their quality, go-to-market strategies, and media around the games like trailers. One of the prizes will also be a Raw Thrills arcade machine.
“Great talent is everywhere, and we’re building bridges to the rising generation of industry leaders. We do it through our four programs: GGP Scholars, CYSTEM, GGP Honors and now the Collegiate Games Challenge, that emphasize leadership, compassion and collaborative competition,” said Bellamy. “With the Collegiate Games Challenge, participants will go through all the experiences video game industry veterans do, from developing a game to marketing and launching it.”
With 20 years of supporting and empowering video game development through GGP Scholars and the CYSTEM scholarship programs, GGP will bring its expansive network and expertise to support the thoughtful and innovative video game developers and publishers of tomorrow.
“The future of video games is all about empowering the new wave of creators, developers, and entrepreneurs pushing the industry to what’s next, NOW! That’s why Raw Thrills is so excited to support the Collegiate Games Challenge,” said Eugene Jarvis, cofounder and creative director of Raw Thrills, in a statement. “GGP’s work encouraging and developing the next generation of video game developers and business leaders has always been seen with their programs: GGP Scholars and CYSTEM. We’re thrilled to expand their work and kick off CGC.”
In addition to launching this exciting new initiative at GDC, GGP will have a week-long showcase of event programming, including anchoring the new GDC Nights — with an open networking mixer for GGP Scholars, CYSTEM scholars and GDC attendees on Monday, and a fireside chat featuring Amir Satvat and additional games industry HR veterans on Thursday — as well as hosting events such as the second annual Zero Proof Tabletop Games Night on Tuesday and the 16th annual Kiki at DNA Lounge on Wednesday. For more details on GGP at GDC (and to RSVP), see the group’s instagram.
In addition to this new competition, GGP has a scholars programs, where it is bringing 50 scholars to GDC.
“We have a host of scholars who do community service in underestimated communities,” Bellamy said. “We also have leadership. We have a program where we have the leaders from schools, and this is the new thing that we are launching.”
Since 2006, Gay Gaming Professionals (GGP) has cultivated the next generation of top performers in the video game industry — through education, expertise, employment and entrepreneurship. Recognizing that great talent is everywhere, GGP outreaches to everyone, including underestimated groups, in order to bridge the rising generation of industry leaders into video games.
Bellamy, former executive director of the IGDA, connected with Raw Thrills’ Eugene Jarvis while at the IGDA. Jarvis is interested in education and gifted a huge sum to DePaul University for its computer science school. They talked about investing more in schools and students and it let to support and collaboration on the project.
Bellamy asked how we can build a bridge between these young people who devote their lives to these parts of the craft to the people in our industry who are doing the work now. Those young people can apply for jobs, internships, scholar programs and more.
“This project is competitive, but also collaborative,” he said.
Bellamy hopes it can expand to more schools in the future. Bellamy said he further hopes to establish mentorship programs that could also help the students.
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