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GDC07: Game Studies
Kurt Squire , UW-Madison, discussed video game studies as an increasingly accepted field of study. For working groups, he posed questions such as: What are the best practices for studying games? What effective pedagogical models are emerging? How do teachers balance the needs for understanding the technical aspects of the medium with the demands of scholarship?
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Beth A. Dillon
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Beth A. Dillon
4 Comments:
Undergraduate Game Design
Same challenges of film, drama school: creates lots of people who wait tables while they wait for their “big break”. We don’t prepare you for your first job, we prepare you for your last job.
Mismatch between student, parent and faculty expectations.
It is our obligation as faculty to get students as prepared to get a job in industry as possible.
Possibility: all students get broad education (including a background in programming and/or art), but with one extremely strong specialty that gives them an “in”.
Be clear with students that a lead design position is not what they’ll do right out of college. (But: dedicated career placement services help.)
Possible issue: lots of new programs with lots of students graduating, are we flooding the industry?
What to do if your school isn’t anywhere near a game dev company?
• Teach core, generic skills that can apply to other industries. For game design, train designers to work with other industries (e.g. serious games, simulations).
• Prepare students that they will move as soon as they graduate (or start their own studio).
In some cases, the concept of “games” attracts students, and then they find other industries and jobs they enjoy as well. Find students doing what they’re doing, then point them in the right direction. Many students think they want to make games until they start making games.
Don’t teach tools (studios will do that anyway) – teach the ability to learn other people’s tools.
Include a “Game 101” class that shows students the reality that game development is not “playing games all day”. It doesn’t have to be a “weed out” class, but students will weed out themselves as they realize they don’t really want to do this. Make this a gateway class: all students have to take this first.
For prospective students, be brutally honest with them: if the program isn’t right for a student, tell them.
Make room for student hobbyists who want to take game development classes for fun even if they don’t want to work in industry, if they’re passionate about it. Encourage students to create/maintain a “game development club”.
Creating a curriculum, different approaches:
• Industry-driven. Come up with something, ask game companies, revise.
• IGDA curriculum framework.
• Try to use/tweak existing courses.
• Eight game-specific courses seems like a standard number to start with.
• Hire industry professionals to help build the curriculum.
• Start small, build over time.
Offer online classes. Makes it easy to recruit industry professionals to teach courses if they don’t live near you. Encourage faculty to make industry contacts, in general.
Challenge: how to balance difficulty? Graduate lots of students and let the industry sort them out, or make the program incredibly selective but you lose lots of students along the way?
• Grades aren’t necessarily the best way to measure high school students for such an odd industry.
• Depends in part on your school. A more vocational-based program lives or dies by the quality of its graduates, so the kid gloves come off.
• Game industry is extremely skeptical of Game Design degrees from universities that haven’t established themselves already. (“Tighten up the graphics on level 3” is an industry-wide joke.) It’s in all of our best interests to graduate quality students only – if we have one really bad student, that may be the one that all of us are judged on at a particular game company.
Undergraduate Computer Science
Core Experiences
Team experiences
When can it start?
Pairs programming during first two years
Interdisciplinary experience is desirable
Gender differences (positive and negative)
Courses outside of CS (art, film, psychology, sociology)
Team Evaluation
Peer evaluations
Anonymous
Firing team mates
Portfolios for interview purposes
Role of Framework
Good to show academics outside of games what is in game design
The framework does not say a lot about courses, but have guidance of topics
CS programs tend to look down on skills courses
Cleaver use of elective courses (graphics, AI, animation)
Interdisciplinary Courses
How do you sequence things so that things are so that skills are ready in time to deliver a game in one semester?
Coordinate courses to build on student background strengths
Easy to blame one another for late work or missed deadlines
Time Lines
Need one semester to learn tools and one semester to produce a game
Where is the time to do multi-sequence courses?
Professional/Trade School
Mission
Mission statement
Must be an authentic statement
Student buy-in and understanding
Faculty understanding and implementation
Road-map
Bootcamp to Game Design
Summer workshops (high school students)
Month-long intensive course
Intro courses in design
Goals:
Identify appropriate program
Demonstrate level of work required
Understand breadth of knowledge required
Projects
Portfolio
Understandings
Different jobs in game design
Games start with design
Storyboarding and Marketing important
Not a 9-5 job! You gotta love it!
Working on a team
Materials
Evidence of completed games (entire process!)
Big plus – submitted game to festival/competition
Focus
MASTERY of a skill (or skills)
Evidence of work in the rest of the field
Big picture – their place in the system
Networking!
Community College
Where we are today?
Jackson Comm College, Michigan
Michigan State has a Game Degree for transferability
Art and Computer Information Degrees
Central Ohio Technical College, Ohio
Digital Media Design Degree – 5 years
Feeding into Ohio University Game Degree
Kent State Univ – 3D Character Design
And many others
Johnson County Comm College, KS
Game Design AAS Degree
5 or 6 years CS heavy track
Also Animation track start in Fall 07 an ex-Pixar talent
Riverside City College, CA
6 courses for a game track
Edmonds Comm College, WA
Game degrees for 12-15 years
New River Comm College, VA
5 core game courses, cross-curriculum
IT Degree Game Design Specialization
CAD Degree Game Specialization
Started Fall 06
Degree Purpose
Student get a job in the industry
May work for California and Washington
Students are willing to learn higher level math and physics classes because they want to create games
Use to recruit students to your college and degree programs
Give students a good foundation so they can transfer to a university
Local universities do not have a game degree so what do we transfer to?
Students need to upgrade their skills
May just take a few courses
Mini-certificates or certificate
Problems
Should you create an art, design, CS or game degree?
Who teaches the classes? Which department? War of the departments?
The answer depends on the faculty talent pool at your college
Have physics, arts etc. departments create specialized classes for a game curriculum
Students need better math skills
Students need scripting skills
Some parts of the country do not have any local game companies
Expectations of our students upon graduation in two years
Jack of all trades, master of known
Other ideas
Jerry Rosenberg - Contract with a company to teach online courses for upper level courses. Not recommended for lower level courses.
Need help with finding good textbooks. Too many to read at this point.
Academic alliance with Autodesk and Adobe. Autodesk Developer’s Network may be available.
Contributors
Carlotta Eaton, New River Community College, Dublin, VA nreatoc@nr.edu
Gerald Rosenberg, Edmonds Comm College, Lynnwood, WA jrosenbe@edcc.edu
Amy Chaaban, Waubonsee Comm College, Sugar Grove, IL achaaban@waubonsee.edu
Amer Yassine, Autodesk amer.yassine@autodesk.com
Matthew Fast, Riverside Comm College, Morento Valley, CA matt.fast@rcc.edu
Dianne Hill, Jackson Comm College, Jackson, MI dianne_hill@jccmi.edu
William Sattelmeyer, Central Ohio Technical College, Newark, OH wsattlem@cotc.edu
Russ Hann, Johnson County Comm College, Overland Park, KS rhanna@yccc.net
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