THREE teenage friends from Northumberland are in the running for a national award for their idea for a video game.
William Garman, Red Freeman, and David Cuthbertson, all 16 and pupils at Morpeth’s King Edward VI High School, have reached the finals of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (Bafta) Young Game Designers competition with their proposal, Cube Wars.
The trio are on a shortlist of three in their category in the 11-16-year-old contest, already bettering their achievement of last year when they reached the final 10.
They are travelling to London on Sunday for a star-studded awards ceremony.
If they are successful, they will get to work on their game with experts from the University of Abertay in Dundee, and visit SCE London Studio, makers of the Bafta award-winning EyeToy and SingStar franchises.
William, from Thropton, Red, from Harbottle and David, from Longframlington, have been friends since they were pupils at Rothbury’s Dr Thomlinson Middle School.
They are all fans of video games and last year decided to enter the game concept category of the competition, for which entrants must give an idea for a new game, including a description of the characters, the world in which the game is set, and how it will be played.
The boys, working under the team name Pleasant Peasants, were delighted when their idea, Scrap, made the final 10. However, the year 12 students have gone one better this year with Cube Wars, a turn-based strategy game based on a cube which they spent around a month working on.
