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Nobody Gets a Tan at Video Game Camp
theodp writes "Kids at NYU's Intensive Video Game Creation are trading open lakes, green mountains and plentiful daylight for air-conditioned classrooms in the city. Those attending the $5,125, five-week camp - all guys aged 15 to 20 - will use the Center for Advanced Digital Application's facilities to learn the techniques behind Doom, Quake and Madden. It's the first summer camp for game builders on the East Coast. Last year, WA-based Digipen held its first video game creation camp in California, and the University of Illinois hosted one for girls."
Perhaps some of the best mod developers should be invited/sponsored by the games companies, that way the mods and games can be greatly enhaced... just think about it, some mods are even better than the original game... complete with your favorite mod (cs, strike force for UT, jailbreak for UT, etc.)
my $2c
Putting a windows cd backwards, plays evil messages, but it gets worse, putting it right, installs windows.
But Dov Jacobson, an instructor at the camp and founder of Big Fun Development Corp., wants to shoot down the misconceptions of itchy-thumbed gamesters who don't realize that building a game is often much less enjoyable than playing it.
Less enjoyable? Yes. But, I find building games to be very satisfying from a technical standpoint. I'm also the type of guy who oogles tightly written code rather than flashy graphics, but that's just me.
As an aside, what kind of advanced techniques can you learn in five weeks? Or for that matter, implement? And what constitutes "advanced"? Somehow, I don't think they're talking John Carmack tweaking code advanced, more like here's opengl use it advanced. Or maybe DirectX, but you'll spend your five weeks learning COM programming.
I could see it now:
Students, today we're going to learn an A* path finding algorithm, finite state machines, and I'll teach you linear algebra so you can understand how to shear, rotate, and translate in 3d. We'll break for lunch, and then we'll implement all that in C. Shall we start?
Perhaps programming should be turned into a game! Give the programmers a specific task, and then give ranks based on least code, fastest running, most clear, etc etc... I have tried programming games. I can vouch that playing the end result (which, oddly, I've never produced) is much more entertaining than programming it for most people. People who program games don't usually say "well, I've programmed it. That's enough for me, I'm not going to play it." I think part of the attraction is playing the game that you coded/helped code and seeing what you actually did.
"Some things have to be believed to be seen." - Ralph Hodgson
If they play Counter-strike it'll suck... ... because the only ones that will play it in a video-game camp are campers.
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Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
If you take a room full of 15 to 20 year old guys and throw women into the mix... games are not being developed.
Nerd 1: Okay, so today we're going to work on vertex lighting.
Nerd 2: Oh this is very exciting...
*Girl walks into room*
*Nerd boys adjust collars in unison*
Nerd 3: Adjusting Penis Size to Maximum Density!
Nerd 2: Careful Captain... any more and she's going to blow!
Nerd 1: Froy laven!
Girl Nerd: All your base are belong to Me!
Seriously though, $5k game development camp... no wonder the gaming industry is suffering from lack of creative thought. Teach 'em trends -- and how to develop within the confines of those same trends and watch the endless train of rip-off game design make it's way to a Best Buy near you.
#SickNotWeak
the camp at Michigan State University.
Honestly, there are easier, cheaper ways to get experience at actually making games. While sometimes they lack the urgency or the structure of commercial projects, open-source projects can be a good way to gain experience. They don't cost five grand to work on, and you can experience some of the structuring of how tasks are assigned.
There are many better alternatives. Theres a lot of hardware, software and books you could buy for 5k. You could probably even go to industry events and make contacts if you were that keen. Hell, a half dozen of them could invest their 5k and get there first failed start-up behind them early.
I'm a little confused as to why the camps are either all boys or all girls.
How the hell are you supposed to group up, sneak into the girls' camp, late at night, beneath the gaze of camp counselors, and capture the flag if you're at the same camp?
Mo-mo-mo-monster kill!
But I always thought that highschool kids were innocent and didn't cause any problems!