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Majoring in Video Game Design
valdean writes "The New York Times has an article on how video game design is slowly but surely finding its way into mainstream academia. Whereas fewer than a dozen North American universities offered majors in game design five years ago, now that number is more than 100. From the article: 'Traditionalists in both education and the video game industry pooh-pooh the trend, calling it a bald bid by colleges to cash in on a fad. But others believe that video games - which already rival movie tickets in sales - are poised to become one of the dominant media of the new century.' Are video game design majors just slackers, or are they pursuing a lucrative and legitimate career?"
I'd have a hard time suggesting that working in the game industry is a good way to make money. There's far more money to be made other places, except for a handful of lucky developers and designers.
Plus, I'm not certain gaming companies are looking for game-related degrees. Instead, things like computer science, English, and business are often more desirable, depending on the position people are looking for.
Most important is the ability to demonstrate your talent. After my Neverwinter Nights mods were released, I got three job offers, one from Bioware themselves. My background is in biology education, of all things. Still, I'd be foolish to take a job in the gaming industry. Working as a developer in the healthcare industry has less stress and pays better. I prefer keeping my developer tendencies as a hobby.
...I hope it's okay if I dupe myself! I actually started my major in game design (Bachelors of Entertainment Software Development) at the University of Michigan almost 4 years ago now. Because it was not offered in the regular curriculum, I had to make it up. I included english, film, animation, programming, media violence, and other classes in my custom concentration. I was supported and endorsed by the chair of the CompSci dept and noted AI researcher John Laird. Even if your school is not one of the 100 that do offer these classes now, chances are you can come up with something to suit your educational needs!
The good news is that there are starting to be opportunities in the industry for "smaller" developers and designers. With digital distribution methods, the widening audience for games, and the failure of the large publishing houses cranking out endless sequels, there are ways for a handful of people with good ideas to make a difference.
Don't aim for making the next Unreal Tournament game or the next big RPG. Instead, consider making something like Bedazzled, getting a contract with Bioware making a module for thier Digital Download project, or signing up for a new development group.
You'll end up working long hours, have little job security, and paid a minimum wage. If you love that sort of thing, that's great. Before you get too gung-ho, you might consider working on a game for the fun of it. Few people have the sort of maniacal focus to debug day after day, work around the personality quirks of teammates, and the willingness to cut features to meet a shipping date.
I decided to take the safer route, working a steady job and having game development be my after hours hobby. It's fun and challenging, and I love having the creative freedom to do whatever I want. The world needs more wacky creative game designers, despite the challenges it takes to succeed.
I have just started taking a bachelor's program in Game and Simulation Programming, and where I am taking classes I have been fortunate enough to be instructed by an industry veteran who has been with the industry from the beginning and teaching skills related to it from the beginning.
I haven't been at it long enough to determine whether the skills I'm learning are different enough from a less specific degree, but it is clear that the school isn't fooling around.
The same cannot be said of most of my classmates, roughly half of whom signed up thinking that it would be a cakewalk and they'd get to play video games all day. I'm counting the weeks until they drop out and the rest of us can learn something. I can't imagine how much worse it must be in, say, a community college.
Game design does require a degree of creativity that many people simply do not have. The professor knows this, and so instead of trying to teach creativity, he has focused on teaching students how to turn that creativity into a full design document, and then how to turn that design document into a finished product.
You can't overlook the importance of modelers and animators - which is where the real demand is - and, noticing this, a number of institutions have begun "Game Art" programs, focusing on creating practical computer models. The game industry is becoming a highly-employing field for talented artists.
Ultimately, yes, I believe there are more people than normal who started taking programs like these because they thought they'd be easy and cool. But you can't overlook the people who joined them expecting to work - and found their expectations fulfilled.
...but is it art?