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News.com.au has an article on how popular game development courses are at Uni. We've reported on the record applications that institutions such as Qantm and the Academy of Interactive Entertainment have had in past years, and the trend doesn't seem to be subsiding. News.com.au reports that Monash University has recorded a huge increase in interest for their game development courses for next year...
More than a quarter of Monash University's 300 IT applications are for multimedia games development, a 25 per cent increase on last year.Monash lecturer in 3D and game theory Derrick Martin said students were aware Australia's $1 billion games industry was growing...
"Students are getting into it because they see it as a field where they can be creative, and also where they can develop technical skills."
1. Bryn Mon, 26 Nov 2007
Thanks for the plug Souri - yes lots of unis are seeing 'Games' as a saviour for their IT Faculties. It is unfortunate that only a few are actually taking it seriuosly and producing graduates that are able to work affectively in industry without major retraining by the companies they work for.
The main problem the universities face ( I am speaking generically here - as noted above some are doing a good job) is lack of true 'industry knowledge' - this is the same reason why IT has gone off the boil as graduates are not industry ready, so dont get work, so no job = IT is bad. The seniority of academic staff means the people running the courses may have been in the instituion for many years while building up academic experience at the expense of industry exposure.
Just look at the games entered into the 'Indie' game comp at GCAP - where is the RMIT game or the QUT game - thats right Unreal Tournament mods wont cut it? It is the private providers with close industry links like Qantm (my college) or AIE that are leading the way in Games education with little or no government support. And are the uni's actually supporting the industry or just feeding off it? With the competitive nature of student recruitment students are being lured away for courses that will actually give them industry knowledge and get them a job into government supported places in cobbled together 'Games Degrees' which will benefit the Games industry about as much as the IT industries have benefited from the million and one IT degrees offered by most unis - skills shortage anyone!
I think the hardest part of all of this will be actually getting people with relevant games industry knowledge and experience to teach all of these courses. As Bryn mentioned, quite frequently academic experience comes at the cost of industry exposure. Think it's hard to find staff to fill those senior positions at a games company? How much harder would it be to find someone both with relevant experience AND a willingness combined with qualifications to teach?
Though I suppose you could probably lure away a few industry people with promises of good paychecks and regular working hours and hopefully a less stressful lifestyle.
....Though considering the fact that they'd have to deal with University students and piles of assignments to evaluate, maybe not. :)
Having seen behind the scenes of a Queensland university of technology that I won't name, I can say for sure that these "game" courses and multimedia in general are just a selection of existing units already on offer which have been duct-taped together and renamed as a new degree. The staff turnover at those places is staggeringly high so there's very little consistency with what's being taught, who's teaching it, how they're teaching it and (scariest of all) how relevant it actually is to the associated industry.
A fraction of the money a student spends on uni courses could be invested in a couple of short courses or Gnomon DVDs (or acquire it through other means). With less time as a uni course spent self-teaching (provided the person has dedication and a thirst for knowledge) they could easily produce a folio that surpasses 99% of uni graduates. The only thing uni offers is official acreditation. And as any employer will say: Skills are what counts.
Email your local developers. Ask what software they use, and learn it. Ask what skills they want, and develop them. Because chances are your local university hasn't actually checked.
Something to think about.
Just mention Universities and Training Providers in the same sentence and watch the BS fly! People with vested interests hiding behind anonymity and dropping names like there is no tomorrow. Well, im an anonymous poster that also happens to run a University games programming degree, so get ready for it to fly again...
Well, actually - to give some advice to potential students: It's your money, you have every right to find out what you will get for it. Before choosing a school make sure you know what your getting - talk to the people teaching the course rather than marketers. Visit their labs and see what equipment they are running rather than what pictures they have on the brochures. Most importantly, try and talk to former and existing students of the course to see what they think.