Curriculum for Game Design Degree

Game History is an integrated, cross-disciplinary hands-on history class where students actively research the evolution and history of games through the lenses of design, art, technology, business, society and culture. Working with resources from the Game History Teaching Collection, students will play, study and research historical to contemporary games. In this way, students will discover the nexus of relationships driving game development. This course fulfills the requirement for FRM-118 Knowledge Making in the Creative Arts, Media and Humanities.

In this course, students will examine how historical forces have influenced the emergence of creative technologies and cultural production. They will learn to apply critical frameworks, including theories, to explore how power structures have intersected with popular appeal to alternately foster and limit creative innovation and expression. Students will also explore the dynamic nature of global culture, investigating how aesthetic ideas and creative practices have developed, spread, and influenced artists and creative production over time.

The course provides students with opportunities to develop specialized projects in art, humanities, and media production. Students will apply critical frameworks, including theories, and use interdisciplinary methods to explore how culture is shaped by popular appeal, innovation, and mechanisms of power. Students will work individually and collaboratively to bring creative work-narratives, images, multimedia forms-and rigorous scholarship to complex challenges in varied contexts.

Communication is at the center of success for a Game Designer. Visual Communication for Game Designers takes an integrated approach exploring technology, visual design aesthetics and principles, and visual design communication forms most often used by game designers to successfully communicate their ideas to their teams and build and test good user interaction models.

What's the difference between an FPS and an RPG? Are discovery and exploration important in every style of game, or can they detract from a cool game concept? We answer these questions by examining genres in games and analyzing some of the gameplay styles associated with them. Then, once we've discovered strengths and weaknesses inherent to particular game styles, we'll develop skills necessary to formulate and evauluate our own original gameplay ideas.

In this course, students will learn how to exercise, practice and cultivate creativity. Students will learn the value of the creative process, the role of creativity in play and culture and how to develop their ideas through iterative processes. Students will employ a variety of creative tools and techniques to develop a lasting creative practice.

Game designers need an essential skill set that allows them to realize their concepts through working prototypes. In Game Technology I students learn how to develop and manipulate game mechanics and environments through visual and traditional scripting tools. This class is the first in a series that supports skills needed for level editing and design, prototyping, and working in game engines.

Acquire the integration skills needed to successfully build a 3D game. In Game Engine I we explore both the technical construction and practical design of games in a 3D game engine. The technical skills required to use the game engine software are combined with knowing how and when to use spaces in a level, construct an interface, establish moods, and direct a player's attention through sound effects, lighting, camera angles, and text to create a complete working game.

The Principles of Game Design focuses on preparing the game designer to lead in the development of a game. The course covers the full spectrum of a game designer's role and responsibilities including conceptualization, documentation, team management, and defining all aspects of the design from target market to the world and gameplay.

A level designer controls moment by moment what a player sees, hears and feels during the game experience. Following the broader direction of the game designer, the level designer creates the setting and crafts the challenges for each individual level. The style and content of individual game levels must establish the right mood, support the anticipated functionality, advance the storyline, and satisfy the idiosyncratic requirements of the players. Building on the design foundation of Conceptual Design, this course teaches students how to successfully design, draft, document, and implement successful game levels.

Students learn to apply methodologies of modern ludic theory in both the deconstruction and analysis of games and their systems, as well as the generation of innovative gameplay solutions. We will cover an array of topics that range from understanding forms of logic and reasoning to evaluating gameplay analytics in an effort to develop a comprehensive framework for game design problem-solving.

Looking to land a job as a game designer? In today's fast changing industry, you'll need to demonstrate top-notch skills, get attention, and stand out from the crowd. This class allows you to define, refine, and develop an individual body of work that will capture the attention of hiring managers. Emphasis is on presentation, editing, and organization of a personal portfolio, under the guidance of faculty to ensure a professional product.

In EGD 420, Game Studio III, seniors successful in pitching their games during the college capstone in the Fall semester continue into full production. Forming large production teams, games are taken to the perfect polished state of gold master, ready for publication. Academic emphasis for the class is focused on working successfully in a professional studio environment, preparing for entrance into the job market, and taking personal craft to the next level.