In a recent game design challenge, you had to create a concept for an iPhone game, something that would appeal to people who might own an iPhone or might consider buying one in the near future, but who weren’t necessarily “gamers.”

Observations
There were a lot of great submissions for this challenge. A number of you aspiring game designers decided to make use of the phone’s special capabilities, among them:

• touch screen
• QWERTY keypad
• internet connectivity
• music player
• accelerometer (which detects tilting)

Others tried to create a game that could double as an advertising campaign, not a bad idea when you consider the popularity of advertisements in everyday media (magalogues, for example).

The creative head behind this challenge was Gamastura.com features editor Christian Nutt, whom we asked to be a judge in determining the winners. Now, on to the top three games!

Best Entries
Luca Breda, enTrée (see page 2)
Luca Breda’s enTrée is part Tamagotchi, part social networking device, and part business tracking and networking device. This game idea really honed in on the concept of making a game for a massive audience, especially people who might own iPhones. We loved it.

Nikola Shekerev, student of computer science at Sofia University, Bulgaria, Artie (see page 3)
If we weren’t sold on the idea for called Artie based on the description (which we were), Nikola Shekerev gave us the most charming images to go along with the entry. This is a game we want to play, and we can imagine our friends, siblings, and co-workers wanting to try it, too.

Sina Jafarzadeh, media and computer science student at the Technical University of Dresden, Germany, Magnetic Touch (see page 4)
Though this game idea didn’t sell as hard to the iPhone crowd as the other two, it does seem like it would make a great playable game. Jafarzadeh has a clear handle on to do with that touch screen, too!

Honorable Mention
Chris Appelgren (general manager and marketing, Noise Pop Industries, Make-A-Face (see page 5)
Chris Appelgren delivered an idea that is fun, whimsical, and that comes with a fairly clean UI. This game would work equally well -- if not better -- on the Nintendo DS.