If one out of every $1,000 spent on gaming went to charity, the world would be a better place. That’s the concept behind Game It Forward, which is raising funds to build up its organization with an Indiegogo campaign.
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“Games are $68 billion industry,” Game It Forward founder Brandon Bozzi told GamesBeat. “What if we could take even a small fraction of that and point it toward people in need?”
Bozzi put together the Game It Forward summit on July 22 in Seattle. He gathered together participants from developers Valve, Zynga, PopCap, Big Fish Games, Amazon Game Studio, and Hasbro’s Wizards of the Coast (the folks who publish Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons) and nonprofits Seattle Children’s Hospital and PATH. Together, the summit members designed a game called Tringo that’s the first Game It Forward product to turn play into charitable giving. Tringo is a competitive trivia-meets-bingo game.
“Players come to the game, they choose a charity, they play the game, and money gets donated to that charity,” Bozzi said. “It’s like they’re a celebrity contestant on a game show.”
The donated money will come from in-app transactions as well as sponsors who”ll donate on behalf of the winners.
Right now, the only confirmed charity is Seattle Children’s Hospital, but Bozzi is in talks to add more organizations that work in the areas of environmental protection, animal welfare, social justice, and children’s health.
The Indiegogo campaign has about a month left to reach its $125,000 goal. It’s nearing $3,000 in funding. Bozzi says the money will mainly go toward hiring people to bring Tringo to realization.