March 9^th, 2005 (10:38am) - Electronic Arts and Criterion Software have made a ground-breaking move towards bolstering the scholarly study of interactive entertainment by donating a special academic version of the award-winning RenderWare software development kit to any accredited institution that would like to use the software to create graphic and game design curriculum. Institutions that are interested in participating need only send a letter describing their intended use for the software to renderwaredeployment@ea.com.

Developed by Criterion Software, RenderWare is the most widely adopted middleware solution in the interactive entertainment industry with over 500 games to its credit. RenderWare is a portfolio of game development tools, which include RenderWare Platform and RenderWare Studio for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, Gamecube, PC and the Nokia N-Gage game deck. The technology suite is used extensively within the game development community worldwide and is regarded as the premier development solution. The game authoring software assists publishers and developers in managing the complexities of next generation game production. Criterion also licenses the software technology to other developers.

“This gift is a shot in the arm for academic institutions that are looking to accelerate their graphic and game design programs,” said Steve Seabolt, VP at EA. “Academic institutions throughout the world are building programs to help students achieve their dream of a career in interactive entertainment. By providing this tool, students and teachers can get first hand experience with the game development platform used by the world’s top designers and leading game companies. We’re sharing one of our most important tools with the hope it will further inspire and better inform students about real world game development.”

Dr. John Buchanan, University Research Liaison dude at EA states, “This is a great opportunity for researchers who are working in real time interactive graphics since they will have access to a state of the art real time graphics engine.”

This gift is the latest in a series of long-term investments EA is making to interactive entertainment education which includes a robust internship program, an aggressive on-campus lecture series and the creation of the EA Interactive Entertainment Program at the University of Southern California.