The Sims 2 — a popular computer game where players control every aspect of their computer characters’ lives, from their jobs to their relationships — is partnering with the University of Southern California film school to sponsor a movie-making contest directed specifically toward students.

The contest calls for people to create a movie based on the theme of “A Day in the Life of a Student” using The Sims 2 movie-making technology. Anyone over the age of 13 is eligible to participate.

“The great thing about The Sims 2 moviemaking technology is that it’s very user-friendly,” said Desiree Baldwin, the public relations coordinator for Electronic Arts, the company who manufactures The Sims 2. “You don’t need any prior experience with movie making or any technology know-how. It does take a little bit of training, but it’s very easy to use and you can log onto The Sims 2 Web site for help.”

The Sims 2 includes a camera feature embedded in the game that players can use to make and edit movies.

“You just press the filming button that lets you capture game play footage and save it as a movie file,” said Julie Kanarowski, product manager for The Sims 2. “Since the game has a three-dimensional environment, you can put the camera at any position and you have complete control of the camera. The movie footage is then saved into a folder on your computer and you can edit the footage to create a movie.”

The entries will be judged by a panel from the USC film school based on the plot, character development, level of originality and use of music. The contest will also award a couple of genre awards including best comedy, best drama and best documentary.

According to Kanarowski, the idea for the theme of “A Day in the Life of a Student” came from a Sims 2 expansion pack called “The Sims 2: University,” which offers new content for the game, such as professors, fraternity houses, libraries, a student union and dorm rooms, which lends itself well for this kind of story line.

“The concept of the day in the life of student ruminates most with college students, but it is not exclusively targeted toward college students,” Kanarowski said. “A lot of older people have gone to college, and younger people may have an idea of what the life of a student is life from pop culture.”

The Sims 2 sponsored two previous movie-making contests, with participants submitting movies from all over the world.

“By partnering with the USC film school, we hope to open up the field for better movies,” Baldwin said. “Hopefully university students that already have an idea about movie making will combine that knowledge with The Sims 2 software to improve quality of movies and raise the bar for the contest.”

The winner of the contest will be able to choose either a prize of $5,000 or a one-month internship working along side The Sims 2 development team in Redwood City. The second-place winner will receive a computer and third-place winner will receive a video card.

“It’s nearly impossible to get an internship here, so the stakes are really high,” Baldwin said.

At Stanford, students said they are excited about the contest, but recognize that making a good movie takes time — even with advanced software.

“I took a class last quarter on computer game culture, business, and design and in the class we talked about how performance has always been a part of gaming,” said sophomore Jeremy Hoffman. “Newer technology, such as The Sims, makes this easier and more fun.”

Hoffman, however, said that college life does not leave him with much time to enter such contests.

“I see people spend hours and hours developing their online personas in games like that,” he said. “But personally, I pretty much stopped playing time-intensive online games since coming to college. There’s so much going on at Stanford that I don’t feel the need for it.”

All contest entries must be submitted by 11:59 on May 30.