The good, bad and ugly of attending game schools

by Ross Miller { Sep 10th 2007 at 2:25PM }

"Want to play the world's greatest game? Well, you can't, because you haven't made it yet!"

Every time one of those commercials come on, tempting impressionable youth into delusions of game design grandeur and luring them into less-than-stellar colleges focused on game development skills, we cringe. Badly. To the point where our significant others wonder if we're developing some kind of chemical imbalance. Are these game-centric universities worth the money?

The experts over at GameCareerGuide lay out the various advantages and disadvantages of attending a game school (as opposed to a more traditional university). While leaving their final opinion ambiguous, the article does a great job of preparing up-and-coming bright minds about the ramifications of their educational decision. We're not going to give any sagacious advice, either, but we will recommend anyone considering a game development school to attend one near a cluster of development studios so that you can benefit from a co-op work program and do some beneficial networking.

Tags: development, education, jobs

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Fernando Rocker (NDF - Water Ring) @ Sep 10th 2007 2:29PM

Sound a little bit like a paid commercial

Shagittarius @ Sep 10th 2007 2:32PM

We need to tighten up the graphics on level 2.

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 2:34PM

'Can we add that sound we used earlier to this part here?' ...'can you believe this is our job?'

OMG - seriously, this kind of degree seems like a bad idea for so many reasons. People should get a regular college degree and then look to specialize.

Charron @ Sep 10th 2007 2:35PM

I'm pretty content with the route I'm taking. Going to a technical college, majoring at software engineering, but with a focus on game development. That way, if games don't work out that well for me, I should still have the skills for other industries. Sure, I may not have the focused learning that some of these schools would offer, but everyone keeps telling me 80% of learning programming languages and styles is done on your own anyway.

ScreamingSkull @ Sep 10th 2007 2:40PM

Everything I've learned about game design, I learned from Grandma's Boy.

SoulBlade @ Sep 10th 2007 2:45PM

it's more aggravating that the commercials give people the idea that creating games is sitting and playing them while talking about how to improve it... or even that coding them up is going to be all crazy bells and whistles fun.

Bucket @ Sep 10th 2007 2:47PM

Good: If you're VERY lucky, you may just manage to land yourself a girl who likes videogames AND isn't a dog.

Bad: After taking 6 months of C++, you start to think you know everything there is to know about programming. You suddenly get the notion that you don't have to innovate anymore unless it's in your job description.

Ugly: You, after a 90-hour work week. Not that they come right out and TELL you to stay till 11PM, but you have to anyway. Hey, at least you don't have it as bad as the level designers...

ScreamingSkull @ Sep 10th 2007 2:52PM

"a 90-hour work week"

and that right there is why I prefer to mod every now and then and just avoid actually making games.

Word of the street. @ Sep 10th 2007 2:48PM

Seriously I haven't heard on anyone that had started a company after they attended to those game schools, normally is about a bunch of guys that met in college and started to develop videogames as a hobby.

It sounds like if you go to one of those schools and you are very you might end working for EA or 2K maybe Activision.

Word of the street. @ Sep 10th 2007 10:58PM

What is with the spellcheck? it keeps eating words,I meant "If you are very good at it"

FrankTheCrank @ Sep 10th 2007 2:48PM

"Anderson, can you stay late and work on the textures for the monsters in Level 8? It's about 40 different characters."

"What? No, no overtime pay. What? you've put in 80 hours this week? Sorry Anderson, it's CRUNCH TIME"

All that for $30K a year. No thanks!

Phillip @ Sep 10th 2007 4:08PM

I don't know where you got that figure. We make a good deal more than that. :)

Konny @ Sep 10th 2007 3:00PM

Newsflash ... a lot of the programming, artwork, engine development, etc.. are going to be off-shored to our friends in India and China for 1/10 of the cost of paying USA guys.

The only work to be had in the USA et al.. will be art director, project manager types, sound and audio.. that kind of stuff that cant be offshored easily.

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 3:18PM

Konny - not really a newsflash when people are hyped up on fear of outsoursing every day already.

Anyway, go into law - there you can work 80-90 hours a week until that heart attack comes to save you.

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 3:19PM

*Sourcing

Steve @ Sep 10th 2007 3:48PM

Still can't believe I heard this, but while at PAX, I was taking to one of the developers of Drawn to Life and he was pretty much bragging about how they outsourced the artwork to an Asian country at a fraction of the cost for that game. I was pretty disgusted by that, but I bet it happens more than we think it does.

Nima Nikzad @ Sep 10th 2007 8:26PM

Newsflash... You are wrong. The truth is, all the stuff is getting out sourced because there aren't enough skilled developers here. All the news stories of outsourcing have scared away thousands of students from getting computer science degrees, and development studios are having a hard time finding enough people to fill the growing industry. There are dozens of publications every year that discuss this. There is a complete shortage of developers in the United States.

Artwork does often get outsourced, but only because major development studios are always on tight deadlines and don't have the man power to create all of the textures and models they need in house. If you can do that type of work, developers will gladly hire you! Everyone I have talked to hates the garbage they get back from China and spend countless hours making fixes and getting things proper.

For people considering computer science degrees: THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A BETTER TIME TO STUDY COMPUTER SCIENCE. There. I said it. You will enter a job market where you are GUARANTEED a job, if not in gaming, then at some other software development.

modified @ Sep 10th 2007 3:51PM

The problem is a lot of schools are just starting up these things to cash in on the industries growth. You'll end up being a guinea pig as they iron out the programs details.

I highly recommend avoiding any school that doesn't have their program set up for specific jobs. If they say come be a "game designer" that usually means you'll be a jack of all trades and a master of none.

sicsided @ Sep 10th 2007 3:52PM

I attend one of these schools, and I will say a lot of it is learning stuff on the side. The teachers just tell us the main basics, give us examples, and let us go about it however we want. Really it all depends on your demo reel whether or not your going to get a job, and if you can come up with something cool. Its great to have their industry knowledge to, as some of our teachers were just grunts while some own a business, and some have some major roles in the company they work/ed for.

And to those who think there isn't other industries to fall back on if you can't get a job, bullshit.
We learn art both digital and traditional, programming, management and design, marketing, and plenty of other stuff in technological related areas.

Its great stuff, and we all know it depends on our own work to show for it rather than some degree. Sadly commercials for our schools dumb down what is actual there to learn and see.

tjlenz @ Sep 10th 2007 4:06PM

Has anyone here actually attended one of these schools other than sicsided? I would just like to know how many actually have a idea of what these schools are actually like. I attend one of these schools and it is great. Getting the connections with industry professionals is better than knowing any piece of software inside and out. I really doubt, from the comments people leave on any post, that they really know what goes into making a game. Maybe knowing the software is good, but knowing how the industry works is better. I would challenge any of you to try to create and complete the different projects that we must do for classes without the help of instructors. Also this industry is not about the money, few industries are, its about enjoying what you do and getting your ideas out.

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 4:12PM

"Also this industry is not about the money, few industries are, its about enjoying what you do and getting your ideas out."

Few industries are about the money? What?! You may want to research market economy a bit.

Almost all industries are about the money.

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 4:14PM

NATO_Duke @ Sep 10th 2007 4:15PM

Damn it, see the post vanished and then came back. OMG thats annoying.

This third post brought to you by me, the maker of such posts as the ones above. Enjoy.

tjlenz @ Sep 10th 2007 4:17PM

The industry wants to make money, no doubt. But people don't go into making video games to be millionaires. They make games because they like making them.

Ska Oreo @ Sep 10th 2007 4:07PM

Oh god I hate those commercials.

They are filled with lies and deceit.

shamgar @ Sep 10th 2007 4:40PM

I am curious how deeply into programming does the coursework get? Normal CS majors hit C, C++, Java some basic graphics stuff (if they choose it), and most importantly THREADING. Do these classes teach finding race conditions, locks, semaphores etc? Without these basics its hard to believe you can ever write an entire game from scratch that runs fast and efficient.

shamgar @ Sep 10th 2007 4:42PM

**If not I would advise students to do the research on their own, because they are a requirement for writing something like an engine...

Dustin @ Sep 10th 2007 4:55PM

I went to one of those schools, one of the orginals, not the college campus add-on that all these commericals are for.

Oh, and you'd be surprised how many games are single threaded. Almost all. Only now with the newest nex-gen are we getting to multithreaded games.

Not all schools are the same people. Do your research. This is general info for any type of education, not just game design.

TJ0331 @ Sep 10th 2007 6:14PM

Anyone reading this think that the person who wrote it, english was their 3rd or 4th language? There were more grammar errors in there that a kindergardner could point them out. So chances are that lady was either A.) Retarded, or B.) Someone with no idea what she was talking about.

Anyway, I attend UAT and absolutely love it. I am going for Game Art and Animation. The choices they give you and places they allow you to go such as GDC, are a huge plus compared to most other schools I've seen. With an 80% job placement once you're done with companies like NCSoft and EA and SCEA, I'd say you've got a good chance at landing what you want. I mean my buddy attended Canisius College (big name in private colleges) and they were sitting pretty at something like 32% he said.

Thanks joystiq, I will put this article up in our forums and see what they all have to say about it.

uglyteeth @ Sep 10th 2007 6:17PM

Just make sure what kind of accreditation the school has. If it is regionally accredited (sp), you can transfer your credits to a traditional university. If they are Nationally accredited, you probably can't.

I worked for DeVry University for a bit as an admissions rep. They have regional accreditation so you can transfer the credits to a public university and vice versa. Schools like ITT and Westwood probably have limited transfer of credits as they are nationally accredited. (I also worked at ITT)

Just an FYI. Be careful, do your research, and do not be pressured by the admissions reps. They just want you to spend your money and will tell you anything. Regional may sound smaller than National when it comes to that accreditation but it's not. Please just look for that.

Whenever I see these topics come up I go nuts. I hate to see people waste up to 80,000 dollars for basically nothing.

Mike @ Sep 10th 2007 6:42PM

I'm starting at University of California: Santa Cruz with a major in Computer Science: Computer Game Design. It's a full university, so I know that my general education will be good and that if I want to change my major later on I can.

Uncomfortably Lukewarm @ Sep 10th 2007 6:43PM

I'm a game design major at a traditional school that offers both an art and a programming game degree. I would enjoy it a whole lot more if my professor wasn't such a complete dick who thinks he knows it all, when, in reality, he knows very little.

Here's my list of pros and cons for going this route, as far as I can tell:

Pros:
-Get a more well-rounded education
-Actually get a bachelors degree, rather than a certificate like some schools out there
-Get to see the world from a different perspective than game school students
-Get a similar degree to game school degrees, with experience in other fields, due to the general education classes

Cons:
-Less networking
-Further away from game companies(at least in my case)
-Not enough emphasis on your field (I don't feel that I've got enough 3d classes)
-Teachers that have no real game creating experience (this may be true with game schools, I don't know, but I'd assume that the odds of that are lower)

Overall, I have no idea whether or not going to a traditional college will help or hinder me later in life.

Mighty Shockwave @ Sep 10th 2007 8:25PM

Whenever I see one of these commercials, I always have dreams of making my own game. I actually work on designing one when I'm bored. It's called Wizerd, and its a fantasy/satire game (why aren't there any satire games?). I pretty much have designed the main character and all the other NPC's, monsters, and levels on notebook paper, and all the dialogue and plot on several Word documents. It's about 78% done from my final idea, and I always dream of releasing it and it being praised by magazines and sites.

But then I come back to reality and realize that I don't want to give up my bright future on a hobby. I can always dream, though.

alberta @ Sep 10th 2007 9:06PM

Definitly hit up a school that has a good relationship with a gaming company, Bioware basically recruits out of NAIT in Edmonton.

cybereality @ Sep 10th 2007 11:06PM

If you know you want to make games, I say go for it. I took a year of computer science, hated it, and switched to art school. Luckily they had a video game minor (more like new media) so I took that and learned a lot. Don't let your parents try to trick you into being a doctor or a lawyer. Senior positions in the game industry could net you $100K+ salaries. But you will never get there unless you really love games (and you have have skills too of course).

The thing to remember is that the college degree itself really isn't all that important. Its not like you go to an interview and they ask to see the diploma. They will want to see your portfolio or demo reel and relevant work experience (internships, etc). They could care less where you graduated or if you even graduated at all. Especially in the fields of art and sound (technical positions might require specific experience of course). Its really only about how good you are, nothing else matters. You could have a graduate degree, but if your work sucks then you're not getting the job.

TegDagNe20o7onthebackhandside @ Sep 11th 2007 2:07AM

Are there any sites and or books that do in-depth reviews, and rating's about these type of special school's.

Elpr0duct0r @ Sep 14th 2007 11:42PM

hey guys. after reading through the comments i felt a little obligated to throw in my own $.02 :)

i currently attend a school which is more or less completely focused on game development. i did spend some time researching the various available programs when it came to game development and, after weeks of looking into it, found the one that best suits me.

alot of readers who have left posts seem to have similar concerns to one another, and i do admit that it is really hard to find a school that isnt offering the ability to 'create video games' as anything more than a gimic. the school i attend actually offers an accredited curriculum with a true computer science degree being the end goal. if anyone is going to dive into one of these schools, i would certainly recommend spending the time to look deeply into the curriculum and the backgrounds of the professors teaching the courses. take the time to look into the school itself. i chose mine because they have a fairly prestigous name and do have many success stories. as an example, valve recently hired an entire group of students from my school to turn their class project into the game we're soon going to know quite well - portal.

there certainly seems to be alot of concern about working alot of hours to not make much money. but i honestly think that at this point that all of the people still enrolled at my school (i'm currently in my second year) are in it for the love of the game, so to speak. the ones that have decided to keep working are the ones that dont care how long it takes, we're already at school taking an obscene amount of credits in addition to the requirement of developing our own games each year. we're required to go through each step of the development process, which includes learning various technologies simply from our own motivation. at school, meeting all the requirements gets you a C... and no one wants to be that guy. i do believe that game careers has entry level programmers listed at around 50,000 a year to start. here's a link to that info:

http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/266/are_you_in_demand_2006_game_.php?page=2

and there is room for increase over a 5 - 10 year period. i mean, its not a terrible thing to do if you absolutely love it, right? and the pay isnt completely aweful.

to me it all comes down to personal drive and ambition. you really have to spend the time it takes to find the right school. certainly some companies might not prefer to take in a student from a game school, but not all feel that way. and i do like to think that given the chance of an interview that i will be able to show i have the skill required to do the job i'm going for, once i graduate that is.

anyway, good luck to those searching, and to everyone else, please remember that not all video game schools are created equal.