It has been an eventful year for DigiPen (Singapore). As our community of graduates expand outwards beyond the games industry, we have also seen tremendous growth with the arrival of the Nintendo Switch™ — a hugely successful console that is creating new opportunities for many DigiPen alumni.
Our DigiPen (Singapore) graduates have been working on meaningful work such as data protection and 3D visualization in the tech industry at large. At the same time, the DigiPen (Singapore) community has been collecting awards and nominations in major gaming events.
Award-Winning Games
This year has been a big win for Singapore’s indie studios. Gattai Games and The Gentlebros, both comprised of DigiPen (Singapore) alumni, launched their new games Stifled and Cat Quest, respectively. Both games have been picking up awards, and Cat Quest was recently featured in Famitsu’s Golden Hall of Game. Graduates have also been working on big things at small indie studios like Springloaded, which was the first Singaporean indie studio to launch a game on the Switch in 2017.
Our student game, Meaning by Hariz Yet, was also nominated in the new student category at The Game Awards 2017, an awards show that generated more than 11.5 million livestream views from around the world this December.
DigiPen Game Studios (DGS), our publishing arm, organized a second DigiPen Game Conference and a Media Dialogue for indie studios to announce their plans to develop on the Switch. The team have also exhibited and organized local events for the Singaporean games community, and TurtlePop: Journey to Freedom, by Zengami, won the Best in Show Runner-Up Award when DGS exhibited at the Singapore Toy, Games, and Comic Convention.
Meaningful Work
We were fortunate to highlight several alumni and groups of alumni who have been working in the Singapore digital economy this past year — each of them applying their DigiPen (Singapore) education to a variety of innovative projects and software products.
They included:
Alumni creating 3D visualization solutions for Singapore Changi Airport at Aviation Virtual.
A game design graduate working on architectural design simulations at Vouse.
Two graduates developing cloud data protection software at Acronis.
Another group of alumni working on a wide range of new applications — from 3D visualization to human resource management tools — at AP Origin.
A group of former interns (now full-time employees) at ST Electronics (Training & Simulation Systems) designing interactive training simulations for Singapore clients.
Changes at DigiPen (Singapore)
While our graduates have been going out to do impactful work, DigiPen (Singapore) campus has been fortunate to bring more new people to campus in 2017, including our new Dean of Faculty Dr. Xin Li, who journeyed here this summer from the Redmond, Washington, campus. He already hit the ground running this year by being the chair of the education symposium at SIGGRAPH Asia 2017, Bangkok, this November.
There will be more exciting things to come as DigiPen (Singapore) anticipates the launch of a new department in 2018, and also as DGS gets set for the launch of three new Switch games. So keep your eyes peeled, and follow our Facebook page for any immediate announcements.