Hundreds of video game fanatics got their first look at what’s brewing at the University of Utah’s EAE Play! event, the annual showcase of student-produced games from the Entertainment Arts & Engineering development program.

The event, which also allowed the public to playtest the games to provide critical feedback to student developers, was held Friday, Dec. 9, in EAE’s new studio in the U’s former law library.

Five new VR games and educational apps along with more than 30 other games were on display, from high-octane shooting games to medical apps that help sufferers with conditions such as diabetes and autism.

Some of the virtual reality games on display included:

Autism Choreographic Experience – This VR app helps young adults with autism understand spacial reasoning by allowing the user to conduct a school of fish in an underwater dance.

Augmented Reality Body Image – An app to help diagnose those who suffer from body-image disorder in which they use the Microsoft HoloLens augmented reality helmet to describe the size and shape of their body. This can help raise awareness of their true body shape.

Virtual Records – A VR app for sufferers of Type 2 Diabetes to help them visualize their data, for example, a graph of their blood glucose readings that is transformed into the peaks of a mountain.

After School – A first-person VR educational game for the Google Cardboard that strengthens vocabulary by helping kids learn to associate words with images.

Wrecked: Get Your Ship Together A living room party game for VR that integrates the VR player with other players on their mobile phones.

At the beginning of this school year, EAE moved into its new 13,000-square-foot studio, which has a lecture area and an open space for student developers to work and brainstorm.