Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Of course, game developers have all sorts of motives for why they choose
to make yet another zombie game with exploding heads. I think it may be
more productive to study the developers as much as our games. But, as I said, I
have never been asked any questions about my morals, my parentage, or
my motives.
Another reason why I combined the two is so I could bring myself up to speed
on the field of game studies that has been growing so rapidly over the past two
decades. I wanted to see through the eyes of those who studied games, rather
than those who made them. So by committing to teaching game studies, I gave
myself a pretty good reason to learn something about them.
A third reason was far more immediate and practical. Instructors qualified to
teach anything about video games were thin on the ground at Indiana
University. Apart from a few hardy pioneers, university-wide there was mild
curiosity, but more overt skepticism about the need for video game classes. To
many, they felt inconsequential, best left to trade schools, and not worthy of
serious study. This was in large part due to the ideological struggle between
professors who felt their mission was pure research, regardless of practical
application, and those who thought teaching students the skills necessary to
obtain jobs building things might be a valid pursuit as well. It is a tug-of-war
playing out in universities all over the country.
Whatever the reason, we had far more students clamoring to learn about
video games than we had instructors to teach them. It was necessary to take
material that could be covered more reasonably in two courses and combine it
into one.
At Rensselaer in
all I had to teach was one side
of the coin. Practical knowledge about how to make video games would be
enough.
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Introduction to Game Design,
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The 2010 Fall Syllabus
Here is the syllabus in Figure 7.1 to
“
Introduction to Game Design.
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As you can see, the description reflects the narrower focus of the course:
game
design and development.
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