EVERYONE wants to make a difference in the world, but the overwhelming, ?how?? often gets in the way of turning it into reality. But Xavier Batch 2006 members?Philip Cheang (22), Wilhansen Li (21), Rodrick Tan (22), Levi Tan-Ong (21), and Kenneth Yu (21, mentor)?proved we can make a difference through the things we love to do.

They bagged the grand prize of US$25,000 in the Game Design category at Microsoft?s Imagine Cup, in Warsaw, Poland, last July 3 to 8.

The entries were showcased at the Palace of Culture and Science, the eight tallest building in the European Union. The finalists presented at the second-largest auditorium in Europe, Warsaw Opera House.

The Imagine Cup is the world?s premier technology competition for students, with over 400 participants from 70 countries. It is now on its eighth year. The challenge was to ?imagine a world where technology help solve the world?s toughest problems.?

The theme for this year is ?United Nations Development Goals.? The teams had to address social issues. Hence, By Implications? ?Wildfire? entry was born. It is a 3-D simulation of a city faced with problems, such as rampant poverty, gender inequality and environmental degradation. The problems were to be fought off by volunteer players.

Aside from its realistic methods of saving the world through acts of volunteerism and positive social action, Wildfire was lauded by the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDG) for its striking visual style, and effective integration of the year?s theme.

Poland

Three of the team members had actually joined the contest before. ?Rodrick and Wil made it to the world finals in France in 2008. Philip joined them in Egypt in 2009,? said Yu, who came on board to offer writing and presentation advice to the other members. He also served as project manager. ?Levi and I are newbies to the Imagine Cup.?

The By Implication team describes the Polish experience as ?humbling? and ?amazing.?

?We saw the entries for the other categories, and we were thoroughly impressed by what the other guys had to show,? said Tan. ?A lot of them presented very unique and creative solutions to problems that were simply amazing in their approach and scope.?

For Li, it was thrilling to stand in front of everyone for the presentation.

?Going to the Imagine Cup and seeing everyone?s work made us realize that that kind of ?just a kid? mentality is fallacious,? said Cheang.

By Implication were exposed to other nationalities. ?You learn so much just by talking to them,? said Tan-Ong. ?And you learn to discover what problems they are set out to solve, why those problems, and how they intend to solve them.?

Wildly successful

Cheang said he personally witnessed Filipinos quickly and selflessly responding through volunteerism during Typhoon ?Ketsana? in 2009. ?This serves as the inspiration for the basis of out game,? he said.

?Wildfire revolves around the idea that volunteerism is a concrete way of solving huge problems, and that the first step in doing so is raising awareness of the need for action. It got its name with the reference to the phrase ?spreading like wildfire.??

Conceptualizing, planning, and putting it together took one year of hard work. The actual development of game took five months. The team said they believed that the games could be an effective medium of conveying ideas, stories and experiences.

?The five of us are really massive video game nerds,? said Yu. ?We?ve been playing video games for as long as we remember! Somewhere along the line, we started thinking: ?Why doesn?t anyone try this kind of idea for a game? Or maybe this? Or this?? And that?s pretty much where our desire to develop games started. It?s sort of like how a person who lives, breathes and eats movies and film sometimes will be more likely to want to grow up to be a director, or a scriptwriter!?

?We saw the Imagine Cup as a possible method of making a splash in the game design scene, and thus used it as our first chance to take a game development project all the way to completion,? Yu added.

?I think winning is a good sign we?re on the right path,? said Cheng.