GameRecruiter, the premier recruitment agency for the interactive entertainment industry, today announced the debut of their Level Up Charity Games competition, to be held in Austin, Texas on Wednesday, September 17. The Level Up Charity Games are being held to celebrate the 20th anniversary of GameRecruiter and benefit the ESA Foundation Scholarship Program.

The event will take place during the Austin Game Developer Conference (Austin GDC), and is open to gamers of all ages and types, including serious gamers, kids and families. This debut games competition will consist of two gaming themes, music and sports, and will feature four popular game titles: Guitar Hero, Madden, FIFA08 and I-play Bowling. Competitors are invited to come and play for great prizes, including cash, video games, T-shirts and more.

The $20 per competitor entry fee, collected at the door, will benefit the ESA Foundation Scholarship Program, an extensionof the Entertainment Software Association. The ESA Foundation Scholarship Program, administered by the ESA Foundation, provides tuition assistance to women and minority students who plan to continue their education in fields supporting video game development, graphic design, computer science, animation or programming, digital entertainment or software engineering.

In addition to the competitive games, Level Up Charity Games offers free games that event attendees can play while waiting for their competition slot, including Dance Dance Revolution. Attendees will also be entertained by a celebrity MC, who will be announced in August.

Jenny Lai, Founder and Executive Director of the ESA Foundation, offers "The ESA Foundation is honored to have been chosen to participate in this event. The scholarship program is an important part of our programming and we hope to be able to expand it in the near future."

The Level Up Charity Games are scheduled from 6 pm to 10 pm on Wednesday, September 17 and will be staged in the ballroom at the Four Seasons Hotel in downtown Austin. The Four Seasons is located at 98 San Jacinto Boulevard, directly across the street from the Austin Convention Center, the site of the Austin GDC.

The competition co-sponsors include McDonald's, Southwest Airlines, 1Up Network and Monkeysphere Games, with game competition elements sponsored by Midnight Gaming Championships. To learn more, visit www.gamerecruiter.com/levelup.