Earn a Master of Arts Degree in Video Game Design (What?!) in the UK

UCCA LogoWhen people play a word association game between “video gaming” and “college” they think (a) students playing video games when they should be studying and/or (b) a video game design course. When people play a word association game between “video gaming” and “graduate school” (the one that hands out masteral degrees) they’re bound to think “What student in his right mind will have the time for video games while he’s in graduate school?”

Trust me. I attended graduate school. Between the heavy classroom work and the heavy outside-of-classroom work and thesis research and thesis writing and thesis editing and even more thesis writing and more classroom work and out-of-classroom work… (phew! Gotta catch my breath) it was nigh difficult – nay, impossible – to squeeze in a couple of hours for a video game. Any video game. Even Pong.

Well, what if the video game was your masteral degree? The UK-based University College for the Creative Arts is now offering an MA in Digital Games Design for this coming academic year. Call it the result of two converging forces: the undeniable impact of video games in global culture today, and the game industry’s quest to have its output recognized as an important and serious cultural work – you know, like classic novels and opera and such.

UCCA LogoWhen people play a word association game between “video gaming” and “college” they think (a) students playing video games when they should be studying and/or (b) a video game design course. When people play a word association game between “video gaming” and “graduate school” (the one that hands out masteral degrees) they’re bound to think “What student in his right mind will have the time for video games while he’s in graduate school?”

Trust me. I attended graduate school. Between the heavy classroom work and the heavy outside-of-classroom work and thesis research and thesis writing and thesis editing and even more thesis writing and more classroom work and out-of-classroom work… (phew! Gotta catch my breath) it was nigh difficult – nay, impossible – to squeeze in a couple of hours for a video game. Any video game. Even Pong.

Well, what if the video game was your masteral degree? The UK-based University College for the Creative Arts is now offering an MA in Digital Games Design for this coming academic year. Call it the result of two converging forces: the undeniable impact of video games in global culture today, and the game industry’s quest to have its output recognized as an important and serious cultural work – you know, like classic novels and opera and such.

Offered at its Farnham campus, the MA course schools students in the fine art of video game design, from story and character development, to the necessary encoding, structuring, and scripting of game data, imagery and scenery, gameplay and events, level design and so forth. Express courses in computer visualisation, 3D modelling and animation, as well as an introduction to game programming and scripting languages, are on offer. That’s in addition to the usual courses an MA has to offer – like those research methods courses I suffered though but a year ago.

And because there’s a real world beyond the virtual one existing in game consoles and PC gaming rigs, the course also encourages its students to think of the social and cultural implications of their work. Pretty heady stuff: they’ll be exposed to analysis of industry trends, and the historical and social contexts of video games in society. Not because you’re going to create a game where you’ll literally save the world – or for those political figures who’ve decried the social force that video gaming has become – but because let’s admit it: video games really do have a deep impact on people beyond mere entertainment.

The final test of all enrolled students is the production of an advanced playable prototype. That’s right: you’re not here in this graduate school to learn how to make games. You’re here to make a game. And be judged and graded by it. And be hooded for it.

Maybe education doesn’t get any better than that. Interested? This is being reported from a received press release, but the source link below will direct you to the course website.

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