download: Game on

Sometimes the best thing to do after a hard day of heckling Fringe comics and squeezing past street jugglers is to kick back with a video game and let your button-mashing do the talking. It’s a good job the Fringe has an event for that, too – and you won’t be playing the same old Halo re-runs all your mates are. Dundee’s Abertay University is hosting the Dare to be Digital: ProtoPlay competition at the Edinburgh Fringe, showcasing 14 new games developed by an international squad of wunderkinds.

Watched by industry experts and slacker gamers alike, Dare to be Different is a multinational competition to design innovative, home-brewed games in teams of 5, over a reality-show-style 10 week period. All comers at the final show in Edinburgh need your vote to compete for the prize, a much-coveted BAFTA Video Games Award One to Watch prize. They had to invest all their ingenuity, coding prowess and design mastery into this project, and all you have to do is avoid a thumb cramp.

The teams are already posting early previews of their games over at the website, www.daretobedigital.com, as well as tweeting about their experience in the industry pressure-cooker (likely a very caffeinated one). Experts will also be on hand teaching workshops in Football Manager 2008, using a graphics tablet to make music, and how you can actually get a job doing this kind of thing. For those who were there for the original NES Super Mario Bros, this is a sobering reminder that a few clever friends can far outpace what an entire company could do just a few years ago.

The Dare ProtoPlay will be at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (Venue 150) from Friday 14 August through Sunday 16, 10:00-18:00. Admission is free, so there’s no need to sneak in like Solid Snake. [Alex Cole]