Schools compete in ‘Oz World Challenge’

Local online game publisher Level-Up! is holding the first community-based interactive gaming competition where representatives of different college and university organizations are encouraged to build the best and the most creative cyber-communities via the Internet.

Oz World, the country’s first massively multi-player online game (MMOG), will play host when "Bring it Online," the first ever "Inter-Collegiate Oz World Challenge," kicks off with a series of contests to be held online in April.

After getting a cult following as an interactive, community-based online game that focuses on the youth market, Oz World seeks to gather collegiate and university organizations in Metro Manila to sign up the most players online and use their creative juices through an inter-school competition that also features categories such as an Online Dance competition, Online Trivia contest and Best Online Business, among others.

Ben Colayco, "game boss" and general manager of Level Up!, says "Bring it Online" is a perfect venue to establish the game’s objectives, one of which is to meet and interact with lots of people online and express one’s creativity through the characters and communities they make online. The competition will help foster interaction among the participants and raise funds for the winning organization.

"The concept of Oz World is an interactive game where players make real, long-lasting friendships through this special community. This, while exploring a beautifully rendered 3D environment of towns, lakes, parks and scenic locations. Players also express their creativity and themselves through the characters that they personally create and customize," Colayco says.

"Playing Oz World is like living in a virtual world where you can personally create a virtual character or an ‘avatar’ that you want, build a stylish house and all the infrastructure that you want and wear the trendiest clothes you could possibly imagine. It really is your new life online," he adds.

Colayco stresses that Oz World, which is localized to suit the Filipino gamer’s culture and taste, is accessible to a bigger number of local players because it works on dial-up Internet and high-bandwidth connections.

He says students can easily play the game by going to an Internet café or using any Internet connection from anywhere in the country.

Under the guidelines set by Level-Up!, any college or university organization is tasked to register at least 15 founding members and the main contact person of their group. Each organization is entitled to 15 free accounts until April 30 with a free online outfit for their avatars.

In the first phase, a school group is challenged to sign up the most number of players online and register them with the Level Up! website until March 31.

After the cut-off date, Level Up! will look at the player list under the specific organizations on a per school basis. It will later choose the top organization per school.

Colayco says the winning organizations in the preliminaries will win a sponsored Level Up! party, Internet prepaid cards and online prizes before competing in the final round.

Bank funds worth P40,000, P20,000 and P10,000 will be given as first, second and third prizes, respectively, to the top three school organizations when the final results are announced on April 30.

Link TV is the media partner of "Bring it Online," which will be shown on Link TV’s Channels 44 and 47 at Home Cable and Sky Cable, respectively.