By Michael Lee

The young have such super-duper handphones. And they sure do a lot with them.

Chua Khim Teck, 19, a Ngee Ann Polytechnic (NP) IT student, deftly flicked a Nokia 6600 into game mode, and began a Scrabble game.

When asked how many hours he clocked daily on such phone games, the spiky-haired youngster's deadpan answer was: "Zero".

The third year student never plays handphone games - he makes them.

Well, at least he and classmate Hoon Thien Rong, also 19, programmed one.

Their handphone adaptation of the popular family word game earned them first prize at this year's Wireless Java Jam, a yearly IT student competition.

Said Khim Teck: "I don't enjoy playing games. Programming them is more my kind of stuff."

If his first attempt is anything to go by, it's the "kind of stuff" most computer game designer gurus would be proud of.

Bright graphics and user-friendly functions such as zoom-in-and-out keys make the duo's version of Scrabble just as addictive as the board game.

Want to challenge a word? Nothing has been left to chance. "It can even link up to an on-line dictionary," said Khim Teck.

BLUETOOTH AND GPRS

The game can be played by up to four players using Bluetooth or GPRS technology.

The winning pair were among the 20 NP students who took part in the Java application contest organised by Java Wireless Competency Centre (JWCC).

They were up against 88 other teams from other institutes of higher learning, including the National University of Singapore, as well as secondary schools.

Khim Teck and Thien Rong won a cash prize of $1,000 and a Sony Ericsson T6100 mobile phone for the Best Creative Idea, one of six categories in the contest.

But Scrabble is not exactly a new creation, is it?

Mrs Pamela Loy, 43, their Programming Wireless Applications (PWA) lecturer, explained: "No, it's not, but it's a new handphone game and credit must be given to those young boys for having thought it up."

Now, can handphone game fans add Scrabble to their usual fare of Snake or Arkanoid soon?

"We are looking at commercialising the winning products," said Mrs Loy.

Game downloads can cost $1 to $5 depending on popularity.

"A copyright deal with a handphone maker could rake in as much as $150,000," said Mr Neo Teck Hoe, 36, of mobile content distributor Zonessy, which hopes to launch the products in March.

Mr Neo said the quality of the games have risen compared with last year's, but it still lagged behind what was available in countries like South Korea and China.

So, who takes the spoils? The school or the kids?

"The students of course! They deserved it, they're the brains behind it," said Mrs Loy.

FIVE OUT OF NINE

NP also swept five of the other nine awards.

Oh Chin Hock and Loong Wai Hoong, both 20, were runners-up in the same category with Red Dragon, a Digimon lookalike.

Ong Zhi Yuan and Zhang Tian Tian - the only girl among the NP winners - both 19, won two honours, merit prize for Best User Interface (Racer Mon) and top prize for Best Presentation (Fist Of Furry).

They all won various cash prizes given out on Jan 8 at the Victoria Concert Hall.

NP also won the Best Booth prize, but the most impressive effort had to come from Jason Wang, 19, who snared top prize for Best User Interface, including $1,000 and a handphone, with his Wheel Of Fortune, an adaptation of the TV game show.

Jason is the only multimedia student among the winners. The others are all IT students.

Mrs Loy said her students were not very keen on taking part in the challenge. "They were worried it would clash with their year-end exams, but I told them they could work on their submission during the holidays."

She never expected such a windfall for NP. They could muster only one merit prize last year.

"The competition was based on an open-door format last year. Participants could see each other during a three-day presentation," said Mrs Loy.

So NP students may have been a little in awe of those from the universities.

"But this year's closed-door submission made our adversaries faceless. My guys' confidence level definately went up," she said.