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Old 02-18-2010, 11:48 AM
 
809 posts, read 2,402,386 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Hopes View Post
I just asked him about this.

It is his understanding that the programmers and the graphisc environment people work as a team with more experienced people as leaders of the concept.

It's less the programmers telling the graphics people what graphics to make. It's more the graphics people telling the programmers what they need it to do.

That said, he knows that programmers are kept on a project longer. They need to stay around to fix glitches, etc., long after the graphics people are done with the project.

He thinks both jobs are equally important in game design and having knowledge in both areas would be ideal. There just doesn't seem to be a degree that blends both together.
Well, he could always go to a big university (like, say the university of Cincinnati) and double major in art and computer science. Ultimately he'd have to chose one path over the other, but at least at that point he'd be able to do both.
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Old 02-18-2010, 01:08 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh area
9,912 posts, read 24,565,351 times
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The only thing that going for both really rules out is I think the Art Institute, which really isn't going to have a focus on programming.

I mean, just because the degree is in comp science, say, doesn't preclude getting a lot of art coursework, even if it's not a double major. Sounds like you're on the right track though.
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Old 02-18-2010, 07:42 PM
 
125 posts, read 280,920 times
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I don't know if this helps you any but, I know a girl in New Zealand that is a CS major and she had a contract job doing video game testing. She was always an avid gamer so I guess the job fit her well.
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Old 03-01-2010, 08:19 AM
 
Location: Pittsburgh
1,776 posts, read 2,688,707 times
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Sorry to dig up an old thread, but my roommate of the past two years just graduated from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh and was immediately plucked off by Digital Extremes in Canada. They've been responsible for a lot of the parts of the Unreal games as well as Bioshock.

With that said, he was one of the best in his class. I am a design graduate from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh and after four years in the field I've made it pretty far at respectable design firms as well. The for-profit status really seems to give AIP a bad rap around here in PGH. Strange considering it seems to be respected much more outside of Pittsburgh (that's what lured me to PGH originally). Don't get me wrong, they definitely have some issues, but through my three years getting my bachelors there, I DID see them making legitimate efforts to fix those issues. Lots of underqualified teachers were being replaced with people actually working in the industry, admittance standards were raised, they are now accredited at the same level as pitt, cmu, etc.

The college is what you make of it. If your teen goes in there and slacks, then yes, it will be a waste. If he focuses on it and really pushes hard then he'll come out of there with a killer portfolio –*which is ultimately more important than even the degree....at least in this type of industry.

But like someone said, if he/she is more interested in the programming aspect of game design, I'd look elsewhere.
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Old 03-02-2010, 02:13 PM
 
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The one guy I know that works in video game design actually did his Masters at the Guildhall in Texas (Game Design & Video Game Development at The Guildhall at SMU). I forget the name of the company he works for right now, but he basically designs the "skeletons" of all of the creatures/characters.

He might be better off focusing on graphic design to start with, so he can get some examples of normal design, 3D modeling, Flash animation, etc. With that in mind, AIP is not a bad idea. Cal U has a decent graphic design program in that respect also.

Keep this in mind though. With a lot of these fields, the bachelors is where you START. What really matters is your internships, portfolio, work experience, and what you pursue after your bachelors. If you have none of these other fields built up, you have a long road in front of you.

See if he can "shadow" a designer from somewhere through his schools guidance program. It may be a different lifestyle from what he expects. You need to make sure he doesn't want to design games just because he likes to play them. For the same reason you wouldn't necessarily want to be a mechanic just because you like to drive cars...
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Old 03-04-2010, 09:03 PM
 
Location: In the heights
36,949 posts, read 38,947,889 times
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If you go out to the west coast, there's the digipen institute in the Seattle area that has a really good track record as it's basically focused on making video games. It basically shares its campus with Nintendo of America and is close to Microsoft as well as a bevy of other video game companies. They do both computer science and art.

Of course, it's in Washington state and not Pittsburgh which is a bit of a downer for you, I suppose.
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Old 03-04-2010, 09:23 PM
 
892 posts, read 2,385,664 times
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If you and your son are really serious about this, you're going to do a lot of networking and find out a lot about various schools and the value or lack thereof of various degrees with or without this particular forum, so I won't bore you with a long response.

What your son should do in the short term, however, besides keeping up with his self-education through messing around with level editors and machinima tools, is talk to designers. Game level design, in terms of the realities of office life, business culture, and job security is very analogous to all other forms of digital design from website production to PR and marketing.

It's important, if your son wants to become one of these rare folks (the job market is intense, the applicant to position ratio is a bit like popping out of law school and ending up slinging burgers) that he understand what the job itself will actually be like. It's not 1995 anymore, and the gaming industry has become completely commoditized. Yes, he will find cool teammates and hopefully cool project managers, but the daily grind is much more "The Office" than "G4" and the workload is no joke. Expect seven day weeks whenever releases are approaching, and lifelong commitment to learning as platforms change constantly and all the software you're learned becomes moot.

Games are a billions-of-dollars industry that have eclipsed Hollywood at this point, and I just want to make sure you both understand what it's really like out there, that's all. I don't want to scare you off, quite the contrary...if your son has what it takes then gamers everywhere want him, instead of someone else less committed, in that chair...believe me! Good luck.
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Old 08-16-2010, 08:26 AM
 
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We recently visited Digipen in Seattle Washington and it is highly impressive.
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Old 08-16-2010, 12:17 PM
 
Location: S.W.PA
1,360 posts, read 2,941,850 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fleetiebelle View Post
He could look into CMU--the Entertainment Technology Center is very well respected. Carnegie Mellon's Entertainment Technology Center

It's a graduate program, but they do provide a list to Bachelor's programs as well: Bachelor's Programs (http://www.etc.cmu.edu/Global/resources/bachelorsprograms.html - broken link)
Thats what I was going to suggest. There are a lot of respected programs that are a little less focused on video games. I think Syracuse has something like this in their Visual and Performing Arts college.
We're having a similar conversation at home with my daughter too. She wants to go into photography. What I've picked up about AI and other "Schools of Art" is that there isn't much financial aid available, and the opportunity to minor in something a little more practical, like say business, is not there.
I worry that the training at these schools is at the expense of the education.
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Old 08-17-2010, 09:28 AM
 
408 posts, read 989,041 times
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I work as a software developer. I also enjoy playing games. My research in moving towards video game development has led me to believe that it really takes an extraordinary amount of passion to work in the field.

First of all, it is very competitive. Designing video games is the new "I want to be an astronaut". Usually, companies prefer some level of experience in the development process.. this usually means minimum wage internships as a tester, while going to school for software development or art design. Because it is competitive, the pay is poor and the hours are long. If a company knows they have a line of people wanting the job, they are going to press down as hard as they can on the employees.

2nd, you have to live where the jobs are. There's a few very small companies sprouting out of CMU now, but Hunt Valley, MD is probably the closest hot spot for game development, having a good number of companies which were started by Microprose employees when it split up. Of course, a lot of these companies are making casual flash games, not the big budget 3d shooters your son probably wants to make.

3rd, job stability is poor. As I mentioned before, with a long line of people interested in the job, you have to really perform to stick around. Beyond that, video game publishers tend to control the studios and they don't want to take a lot of chances. Creating a video game is expensive and the chance of poor sales is high. Publishers like to minimize their risk so if a studio isn't performing or if a game isn't coming along as expected, it gets axed. Individual studios tend to have trouble raising capital to create a game on their own, and even then they may have trouble distributing it.

As far as software development in general goes, as others have said, the average developer's work environment is going to be very corporate. Most companies find their success these days based on marketing, partnerships, and ability to raise capital. They are looking for someone who can go to meetings, talk to customers when needed, deal with tech folks as partner companies, fill in the gaps in business analysis, support the existing products, etc. Development platforms have become much more advanced so there is usually a lot less actual "development" that needs to be done. There's times when a project is starting up that I spend a lot of time programming, but there's weeks when I don't write a single line of code because I am doing other things, or times when I spend a day to make a one line change. I enjoy this because I get to do a lot of different things throughout the week, but the pocket protector nerd or the teenage basement hacker coming up with the next best thing is quickly becoming extinct.
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