College

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    • From what I have gathered from the guys in the industry on this site, a degree really doesn't show anything, instead companies will want to see your skills in action, ie. a profile of your work completed, samples of source code to demonstrate your coding style.

      I am currently in College for video game design and development on the programming side of my class, and I can honestly say that for 2/3 of the guys in my class, they will not likely come out with the skills required to produce there own profile, which is their own faults. I think whether you learn as a hobby, go to college, or get lucky and move into a learning position somehow, it really comes down to whether you are dedicated enough to push on and learn what it takes to make games. I think for a company, someone who is dedicated and has worked hard on there hobbies will be the one to hire over someone who scrapes through on a college degree.
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    • This is a hard question to answer. How important is a degree in computer science? Not very, as long as you have the necessary skills. How important is a college degree of any kind? That's a bit tougher. If I saw a resume where the candidate only had a high school diploma, it would take some impressive demos to win me over.

      Why? Because High school in the US is a complete joke. The two high schools I went to were more like half-way houses than halls of learning. We spent an entire school year on the Pythagorean theorem and basic trig. That same information is slammed into you over a single semester (or less) at any reasonable college.

      But that aside, there is another more tangible reason. I don't see 90% of the resumes that come through for my team. Most of them are culled out by HR looking for keywords and if they don't see ANY college at all, they usually pass. I'm a self-taught programmer, but I still have a degree is Electronics/Computer Technology.

      In the end, college is really about what you put into it. Mholly is dead on. I teach a class at The Academy of Art in programming for Unity and can already tell you who has a chance to make it and who probably doesn't. The degree doesn't guarantee a job, but the experience is something everyone should have. It's an incredible time where you're working with others who share your passion and have people you can go to for questions. It's a time for learning and a time to be curious.

      So my question for you is, why are you considering not going to college?

      -Rez

    • A similar sort of question: Does the calibre of a university have an effect on job prospects?, i.e. In the UK we have the Russell group of 24 universities who are considered the top universities. Would the people hiring distinguish that much between a degree from Cambridge (the top UK university) and a degree from another Russell group university?

    • Not to me, no. It's all about what you can do and the projects you have to show.

      Top-notch schools tend to have better programs that you can draw more out of, but you can't necessarily choose a school based on prestige. The prestige and the degree at the end are really just the cherry on top. It's the whole cake that people want to buy.

      -Rez

    • Really the only thing that worries me about college is one the money to go, and two English ( I am a very bad writer when it comes to English papers ). Money being the really big one as in high school I did not get much in the way of money to help me out, and had to have brain surgery when has me very far in the hole as it is.

      But by all means if it will be better in the long run then I will find a way to make it work.

    • I'd just like to share some relevant responses I got years ago ( 2007/2008 ) from some game companies when I asked them what do they look for in developers. (I've cut/edited parts for brevity).

      Day 1 Studios (now Wargaming West)
      In answering your questions, our Engineering Director really likes to see people get solid computer science fundamentals that are sometimes lost in the game development programs. We dont hire out of any specific program. For us having strong fundamentals, C++ skills and math skills are areas that we look for along with the specific area of programming that individual is focused upon.

      Bungie
      Our best advice is to practice with any tools at your disposal. Keep creating things and build a portfolio. School is very important, but if you ever interview for a video game company, employers will want to see what you can do. If you have a HUGE list of things to show them, the more likely that you will be chosen for the job.

      Bethesda Softworks
      Generally speaking, we look for people who are good at what they do (ie, programming or art or design) and have some combination of educational background and work experience, along with examples of work they've done in gaming. So, not only do we want good programmers/artists/designers, but we want programmers/artists/designers that have examples of mods or plugins or game-related things they've done on their own that show us they "get" what it is we do here.

      There's no magic degree, or school, or number of years of experience that we're necessarily looking for or need.

      BreakAway Games
      I have been in the game industry for fifteen years and I am currently the Technical Director at Breakaway. I am also the first person who will look at your resume in detail and see if you have the potential to be a game programmer or work with us in some other capacity. Above all, remember this, the educational system is only very recently adapting to the game industry and trying to find ways to educate students for the interactive game and simulations field. The field is much larger than they surmised and they are very unsure if their programs work and all schools are in their infancy in this subject. What is still most reliable is a stock BS or higher degree in Computer Science for programmers (for art and design it is much more chaotic).

      But to answer your question directly and shortly I can only, honestly, recommend one school. The Guildhall at SMU (Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX) is the only program that puts extreme effort into game programming and every student that survives that program is fought over by a number of studios. This is more of a graduate program in that they prefer a Comp Sci degree already but they have been known to accept juniors and in rare cases freshman. I wont say that other programs from other schools are bad because I dont really know or see what the students are learning is valuable. Other schools that are interesting and should be looked into are Univ of North Carolina, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy, and your classic Comp Sci schools (MIT, Caltech, USC, and our local Towson State). Very questionable schools are DeVry, DigiPen, and Full Sail (these are all programs that are only a two years long and try to teach you everything with no previous experience) and of these only DigiPen has produced a couple of interesting cadidates. I have to say the best Comp Sci school is UNC and any student that comes out of there with a BS is almost a direct hire; Towson State is the best local state college and we have about five or more programmers who came from there in the past few years.

      What we look for as far as skills go are skills that show you can manipulate and bend the computer to your will. I cant name any specific classes or courses that you take as being good or bad. I can only name categories where you need thorough knowledge and will be able to demonstrate your abilities to complete tasks in related areas. Note, what you show on your resume (ie: took programming course 491 Ultimate Computer Graphics) will pique my interest but also lead me to ask technical questions specifically targeting those areas (ie: how do I calculate the specular light component on a normal mapped NURB based tessaleted terrain? [just kidding with that example])

      Luckily, there are so many programming areas that you can pick a specialty and not have to know every area of game/sim programming. If you are interested in rendering and graphics then you need to study things like: HDR lighting, terrain modeling, geometry/vertex/pixel shaders, stencil volumes, shadows, polygon reduction, dynamic LOD. In a school setting this would probably all get categorized under computer graphics and you would be lucky to hit on a couple of those topics. A majority of game programmers learned skills on their own or during a job and found a great way to apply them to interactive content. We still do not *require* a degree but completing a degree (especially a BS in Comp Sci) does show that you can stick through a very difficult set of requirements and complete it.

      Stock and standard classes you need to have for any programming purposes are:
      "Math up and through Linear Algebra
      "C/C++ more than any other language and a good solid grasp of its anomalies and benefits
      "Very good knowledge of Object-oriented design and programming
      "Demonstrations of programs or code that is interactive (or at the very least some turn-based state to state changeable program)
      "Good English and writing skills (enough to write up technical descriptions or documentation without spelling and few grammatical errors)
      "Wide knowledge of algorithms and programming design patterns (you should be able to show many solutions to any problem and point out why one solution is better than others)

      For advanced classes you will no doubt need some and not all of these (depends on the specialty you tend towards):
      "Flash or other User Interface graphics knowledge and programming languages
      "Advanced computer graphics (for rendering engines, lighting, shadows, projective textures, decals, stencil volumes, LOD)
      "Shaders (even more advanced graphics here for: skeletal animation, deformable/tearable meshes, real-time raytracing, HDR lighting, per-pixel lighting)
      "Calculus or higher math (especially for graphics or AI)
      "Physics
      "AI (note, for games Genetic Algorithms and Neural Networks are more academic than usable in the real world. We look for more creative and less sophisticated algorithms here).
      "Networking (almost all games are multiplayer these days and networking more than one pc is always difficult and there is no ideal or perfect solution)

      Ultimately, no one is going to teach you this stuff better than yourself or the guy who wrote the code. The reference to booting your computer comes from the phrase picking yourself up by your bootstraps. The person who boots himself into these areas of study with or without a schools resources will become the most valuable employee. We will be evaluating your skills and abilities beyond any recognized school or course of study. So scavenge any game knowledge you can and program, program, program (hint, make many small programs before you embark on anything of significant size). Also, never be afraid to ask questions (John Carmack became great because he did and still does this so much) and the fact that you inquired here has given you greater knowledge that few others have because they did not ask. From here on out build a portfolio of samples that you can show in the future and dont be caught applying for a job and realizing you have nothing to show!

      If you have any more questions feel free to ask anytime. Also, never be afraid to apply for a job. The worst that can happen is that you will learn what you need to do to get the job in the future.


      I think these just reinforce what everyone else has been saying. Being able to prove that you have the skills they're looking for is more important than showing them a degree, but a degree will prevent your resume from being overlooked by HR/search engines.

      Based on my own experiences, if you do decide to go into college, I would suggest you go with a community college first. You can get your pre-reqs out of the way without being massively in debt (something I'm still fighting with). If you don't want to do community college, then plan out your entire four years: communicate with an advisor in the degree you're going into, figure out what classes you'll need to get into the degree, plan out each semester, and always keep up on that schedule.

      Again with my own experiences, once you've worked in the field, you'll find that interviewers won't spend much time on your education. My last interview was almost entirely about what I did on my previous job, with barely any time on my education.

      Hope that helps! :)

    • I agree 100% with Rez and MHolley. I'll try to add something though. My upper level education is in physics, not computer science. This means all the programming I know is self taught. While it is certainly possible to teach yourself to program and all the relevant knowledge, it can be a bit frustrating. For example, I've been spending a lot of time lately just learning about B-Trees, BSTs, hash tables, and all kinds of other data structures. While I've learned a lot in a short amount of time, I'm wishing I had a better background in computer science. If I were taking courses, I would have my learning in a more structured manner. Instead, I'm forced to motivate myself to learn this stuff. College will help you with the underlying fundamentals, but it won't get you a job outright.

      Being bad at writing really shouldn't dissuade you from college. You'll get better at writing, and you'll make it through. Also remember that usually your "English" requirements can be fulfilled by a wider array of classes than your high school English requirements. For example, creative writing often fulfills that requirement. You don't have to write "research" papers in there like you did in high school English.

    • The money is pretty difficult. I know people who are pushing 40 and STILL in debt to their school. I got really lucky and was able to go for free since my father was a professor.

      As for writing, this is a great example of an important skill you probably won't teach yourself. When people learn things on their own, they tend to focus on the interesting stuff and ignore the stuff that's too difficult or not as fun. Writing is extremely important to an engineer because you have to write technical design documents and be able to communicate technical issues to non-technical people. Advanced math, data structures, and algorithms are other areas people tend to skip. They assume that they know about data structures because they know the STL API, but they don't understand how it works under the covers. When I interview people, my first several questions are usually data structure questions. Then I get into some algorithm questions, like the purpose of different sorting functions or what scenarios call for breadth-first vs depth-first search (or even what the difference is between them).

      Another important thing is that most people don't actually know how to learn. It's not just about repetition, though that's an important aspect. When you're exercising a skill, there are two basic things you can do. You can practice, or you can play. I first learned of this concept when I was teaching myself music. Playing involves doing what you know, enjoy, and are comfortable with. Practicing involves consistently doing things that are outside of your comfort zone and repeating them until they come into your zone.

      I'll use theater as an example because of a situation that happened to me recently. For those of you who don't know, I'm very active in the improvisational theater scene here in SF. I have regular stage performances and just got a part in an independent movie. A common note I would get from directors and instructors was that my age range was pretty narrow. I had trouble player characters that were much older or younger than myself. I muddled through scenes where I had to play someone of a different age, but most of the time, I just came out as someone close my own age. I worked with an acting coach at one point and decided to just concentrate on the age thing. For eight weeks, I played a character who was 86 years old. I was forced to show a large emotional range and move around as if I was actually that old. By the end, I was very comfortable playing that character. Fast-foward to a couple weeks later, I was in a show where I decided to come out as an old man. I nailed it. Playing an old man went from being practice to being play.

      Another example is when I was learning data structures about a decade or so ago. I completely re-implemented the core STL to force myself to learn how it worked under the covers. Then I used those data structures instead of the STL for about half a dozen projects just to shake out all the bugs. That was practice. I was forcing myself to act outside of my comfort zone.

      College forces you to learn all those things you don't learn on your own; things you aren't sure you need or may not even be aware of at all. It teaches HOW to learn. If you choose to walk a path without higher-level education, it will likely be a very difficult one.

      -Rez

    • I get asked this question often. I studied at the University of Houston where I received a degree in Computer Science. It took five long years, and to this day was the most difficult "project" I ever worked on.

      The program I was in had a high drop out rate - something like 90%. My senior classes all had just a handful of students. This isn't ideal of course, but the program wasn't a "show up and get A's" kind of thing either. You really had to work hard.

      Did it teach me what I needed to know to get into games? Not especially. Most of that I did on my own.

      Did it give me the confidence to tackle anything? Absolutely.

      Did it show others that I could set out on a difficult, long term project that required personal sacrifice? Definitely.

      Some of these goals you can certainly do on your own, but you tend to short circuit a lot of conversation with a degree from an accredited college. Also, games aren't only job out there - and many jobs use the degree as a method to cull out applicants even though they might be great candidates.

      Some schools out there just take your money and pop you out into the job market a couple of years later - with little or no extra skills to show for it. Student loans sure, but nothing that really helps. Be cautious when choosing a school - the easier it is to get in the more likely it is it won't help you down the road.
      Mr.Mike
      Author, Programmer, Brewer, Patriot

    • A good strategy is to go to a community college for the first year or two, then transfer credits to a big university. Make sure you choose a community college with a program that will transfer, because some don't. You'll have smaller classes, save some money, and get most of your required classes outside of your major out of the way.
      Mr.Mike
      Author, Programmer, Brewer, Patriot