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A Master's In CS or a Master's In Game Programming?
Rustcycle asks: "I'm attending the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, which has just announced that they are offering a Master's Degree in their Games and Media Integration (GMI) program. There is a fair amount of overlap between the GMI curriculum and the CS courses, so I'm considering a switch in degrees. If you were hiring MS grads outside the game industry for visualization work, am I worth more to you with the more specialized program or would you be more interested in me if I had more exposure? Within the gaming industry, how much does a specialized degree compel a company to hire a recent grad?"
You might be different. Maybe you're great. I've worked with one guy from Full Sail, and he's painted a bleak picture of what they let through as graduates.
Since then, I haven't had a single candidate make it past phone screens from gaming universities. Maybe you're the exception.
Education is a tool, but it's pretty much the only thing I have to go on for recent graduates.
Best of luck!
I currently have no clever signature witicism to add here.
Lets see. Video games have been out for a while. Most of the programmers are Comp Sci degree holders. So you can do Game Programming with a CS degree, but can you do Comp Sci with a Game Programming degree?
Most people have multiple careers. Choose wisely.
As someone in the game industry, I care absolutely zero for what degree you have. Seriously. It makes no difference to me if you have a MS in game development or a PhD in agriculture. I simply don't care. If you wanted me to hire you, you'd have to have some proof of your skills - a game you worked on, a significant amount of code you'd done (or art, if you were an artist). Something that can prove you actually know what you're doing, and not simply that you have a piece of paper.
The "game degree" path may push you through making an actual game. Or it might not. I really don't know, and I honestly don't care. Pick your classes based on what you'll learn from them, not what your diploma will say.
This assumes you want to get a job at one of the smaller more personal companies, not a code-monkey job at a behemoth company.
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.