The Cards believe an engineering major prepares students for “whatever they can dream of.”

The U.S. video game industry grew more than 40 percent in 2007 to a record-setting $17.9 billion, and a S.C.-based firm with Carolina connections, Void Star Creations, carved out its own piece of the pie.

The independent, up-and-coming video game development company is located in Lexington, S.C., and its two principals are the husband and wife team of Drew, ’98, and Rachel Peters Card, ’00, both mechanical engineering graduates who met at Carolina.

“I didn’t have a plan to go into the video game industry when I first went to USC,” said Drew, Void Star’s creative director and co-founder with Ryan Ellis. “But by my senior year I realized it was what I wanted to do.”

Rachel, the company’s business manager, joined the firm after it was started in early 2006. “We both love technology so the pursuit of this business is something we naturally became passionate about,” she said.

This past February Void Star launched Poker Smash, its worldwide debut video game, to glowing reviews that helped vault the firm to profitability.

The game, which features music by David Sease, is available in nine languages via digital distribution through Xbox LIVE Arcade on Microscoft’s Xbox 360. The Cards describe the game as an “action-packed 3-D puzzler with a poker twist” that is rated E for Everyone by the Entertainment Software Rating Board. It can be played by individuals or up to five people anywhere in the world.

“Drew and I feel very fortunate to be pursuing our dreams of building our own business and creating great video games,” said Rachel, who serves on the College of Engineering and Computing Partnership Board, the Council of Alumni Societies, and the Carolina Alumni Association Board of Governors. “It wouldn’t be possible if we both didn’t have a great education that started at Carolina.”

The Cards lived in five different states during the past 10 years while Rachel pursued a master’s degree in engineering at MIT and Drew worked at several video game-related companies.

But they returned to Lexington, Rachel’s hometown, to launch Void Star Creations because they were looking for familiarity and “a friendly business climate,” Rachel said.

The future looks promising. “We are extremely proud of Poker Smash and excited about Void Star’s next steps,” Rachel said. “Drew and Ryan have a lot of creative ideas for different kinds of games.”