Possibility of game dev jobs without a degree very slim?

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    • Possibility of game dev jobs without a degree very slim?

      Hey,

      I'm currently 19 and I dream of one day working in the gaming industry, I have pretty much since the first time I played a game.

      I've been learning C++ along with a mixture of OpenGL and DirectX for the last year, well actually I've been messing with C++ for 3 years, but only started learning seriously in the last year. I love programming, I love games and I love Maths!

      Unfortunately due to illness going to university for a degree isn't an option (I'm going to be stuck inside for the next 3 years, minimum). Does this pretty much dash my hopes of ever working in the game industry? I'm obviously willing to self-teach myself everything possible over the next 3, 4 maybe even 5 years but if even at the end of that I'd have no chance getting a job because I don't have an official degree that would be quite a waste.

      I'd be interested in hearing any opinions,

      Thanks!

      edit: Just finished reading the game coding complete 2nd edition after I finally got hold of a copy in the re-print, great book!
    • RE: Possibility of game dev jobs without a degree very slim?

      I'm still a college student myself, but I think it also depends on how good you're at programming. If you're exceptional good at it, they might overlook it. Don't quote me on that though.

      An alternate route might be trying to obtain a degree online. I think the institute that I'm going to right now has online program for game programmers. It's called University of Advancing Technology (UAT), located in Tempe, AZ. In my opinion, UAT is only good for getting your paper (degree) or at least for programming students; our current game programming program is pathetic, we don't go beyond 2D programming, also there's only one instructor for it and he's much worse than my high school math teacher who taught me basic C++.
    • My university is something of a joke, as well. I think any place is going to be just for the paper. Except DigiPen. DigiPen will be about the CS200 class and, other than that, the paper.

      Unfortunately, I can't say what it takes to get a job, since I've yet to land one. Well, I guess I can say I have, sort of...

      I got informally offered a position at a local dev through a friend of a friend, but he got fired before there was anything definite!

      All he saw was my CV and my portfolio, though, and that I had a senior at our university who happens to be local president of the IGDA vouching for me...

      So now I'm back in the same boat, and it was painful to actually turn in my first game as a portfolio piece, but it's the most complete thing I've got.

      It's very embarrassing, though... Plain C, bad form, and full of hackery and memory leaks.

      This entire post was kind of self-centered, but I hope you see what I'm trying to get across: If you have something to show for your efforts, people will take notice even if you haven't completed your degree. Whether or not you're working on one might be another thing, though...

      The post was edited 2 times, last by kibiz0r ().

    • Kib, don't forget CS250, the second class with Ghali. Truly an amazing class.
      Feel you safe and secure in the protection of your pants . . . but one day, one day there shall be a No Pants Day and that shall be the harbinger of your undoing . . .
    • Who do you know? I most likely know them, seeing as it's a small school.
      Feel you safe and secure in the protection of your pants . . . but one day, one day there shall be a No Pants Day and that shall be the harbinger of your undoing . . .
    • Adam Villalobos. He's a Mexican dude, going into his sophomore year. His group for the first game project made a game called Ascension that was essentially a primitive roguelike. I had some fun when I played it, though.

      He's got a lot of strange ideas that often went either way when he was back in town here. Sometimes I would think he was insane and he'd turn out to be brilliant, but often he just turned out to be insane. :D

      Always fun to have someone who's not afraid to think way, way outside the box, though, even if it turns out to be a bad idea. Plus he drove me to our AP Computer Science class while my car was broken down. :)
      Of course, he also tried to set me up for Senior Assassination...

      We tried to work together a few times, but it was really hard to, uh... compromise on code, I guess you would say. He came to C from ASM, whereas I came to it (and then to C++ shortly after) from VB, so I embrace the OOP a lot more than he does.

      He's a funny guy, and he's smart. But he's got kind of an anti-social personality, or at least it seems that way at first glance. If you don't get it right away, you probably never will.


      Btw, here's a little demo of what he was doing in our junior year of high school, and what he spent 4th hour math class debugging.

      ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/354/35469.html
    • RE: Possibility of game dev jobs without a degree very slim?

      Hey Marcus -

      I don't know what constraints you may be under, but just because you can't hit the college scene now doesn't mean you can't do it later.

      The one thing that a college degree tells me as a hiring manager is that a graduate set out to accomplish a very difficult and long term goal. It tells me about their persistence in the face of trouble, and their ability to finish something they start.

      That's a lot.

      But, as most people know, it doesn't prove to me that they are smart.

      My advice - use the lockup time to learn something - at least it will keep you from going crazy. Maybe in that time you'll hone a skill and impress someone.

      When you tell them that you did it on your own during your illness, they'll be even more impressed.

      I would.
      Mr.Mike
      Author, Programmer, Brewer, Patriot
    • Kib, yeah, I know Adam, though I don't know if he knows me. My name's Corbin, and I was a TA for the GAM100/150 classes, which is the class in which he made Ascension. In fact, I believe that I have the code for the game somewhere. They left it up on the pub drive at one point.
      Feel you safe and secure in the protection of your pants . . . but one day, one day there shall be a No Pants Day and that shall be the harbinger of your undoing . . .
    • I don't know about the US, but in the UK we have the Open University, which lets you study for degrees without having to go away to study.

      It's designed for part time study, but you can do the equivalent of full time study if you want - a lot of younger people are nowdays, because it's cheaper than going away to Uni.

      Might be something similar available in the US.

      (Only problem with the OU is they don't do CS, for some reason - they do what they call "Computing" but they seem to have a fixation with Java)
      hikari
    • The OU Computing courses are all on the Information Technology and Computing page. I've looked through most of them and they seem to be weighted in favour of Java development, enterprise software and web development. Although there is a module on AI.

      Oxford also does its own courses under the "Continuing Education" banner, there's a 2 year Diploma in Computing and a 1 year Diploma in Advanced Computing. Might be worth looking at, they look quite interesting, seem to be closer to what I remember of Computer Science from A-Level (I don't have a degree either).

      Quite a few of the UK universities do distance learning I think. A brute force method of finding them would be to feed '"Computer Science" distance learning +site:.ac.uk' into Google :)
      hikari
    • Markus,

      I'm a programmer working at Super-Ego Games. Like you, I had the very same dream of joining the gaming industry. If you never lose sight of your dream and work everyday towards accomplishing it, you'll succeed.

      I don't have any formal training in Computer Science but I've been programming for the better half of a decade. A college degree certainly does help, but it's not 100% required. People in the industry are looking for passion, drive, intelligence, and ability. If you can demonstrate those things, you should be good.

      The one thing a degree *will* help you with is your first job. Once you get past that hurdle and have a couple of shipped titles under your belt, you're probably home free.

      Oh, and make a demo. i can't stress that enough.

      -Rez
    • Thanks rezination + others, that defiantly gives me hope that one day I will be able to archive my dream even though I'm unable to go Uni at the moment.

      Hopefully it's a plus that I have 2 years experience of character modeling in 3Ds Max too so while I'm focusing on learning / (and, as you said) when I feel I know enough starting a demo I'll have some decent(..ish) characters made for it.

      The post was edited 1 time, last by Markus123 ().