Game Design - Technological U

This four-year course provides a comprehensive education in game creation, covering design, development, and industry skills. Students create games from year one through four, develop teamwork skills, and gain practical experience through internships or study abroad options. Graduates pursue careers as game designers, developers, artists, programmers, and other roles in the gaming industry.

Program Outline

Degree Overview:

This four-year course focuses on the creation and study of games. It covers the design and development of digital and analogue games, including PC, mobile, Web, card and board games. Topics include in-depth analysis of games, practical hands-on development experience and theoretical game studies. Along the way, you’ll also learn important industry skills such as programming, game design, digital media asset creation, project management and game publishing. You will develop an in-depth understanding of the concepts, theories and models of game design and how they can be applied to both commercial and serious game development. You will be able to analyse and determine multiple approaches to game design, gameplay mechanics, UI controls and the context within which they’re used. You’ll use advanced skills from specialist areas to achieve goals, including the design and implementation of complex game systems, documentation of the design process, testing and publishing games. In Year 3, this is a focus on gaining real-world experience. Students will have the opportunity to get experience working with an external serious game partner, industry work experience or study abroad through an Erasmus exchange. During the course, you will be continuously making games, from Year 1 to Year 4. You will work on both individual and team projects. Teamwork is an essential skill in the games industry and you will work in different teams to develop important soft skills such as communications and group decision making. In your final year, you will complete a major game project demonstrating your full range of design and development skills.

Outline:

Year One

Semester 1
Design Practice [Mandatory]
Game Design 1 [Mandatory]
Game Production 1 [Mandatory]
Gameplay and Ludology [Mandatory]
Games Programming 1 [Mandatory]
Semester 2
Game Design 1 [Mandatory]
Games Programming 1 [Mandatory]
Game Tools 1 [Mandatory]
Game Story and Character Design [Mandatory]
Critical Play [Mandatory]

Year Two

Semester 1
Game Design 2 [Mandatory]
Game Programming 2 [Mandatory]
Game Tools 2 [Mandatory]
Digital Storytelling [Mandatory]
Introduction to Academic Writing [Mandatory]
Semester 2
Game Design 2 [Mandatory]
Games in Society, Culture and Context [Mandatory]
Game Programming 2 [Mandatory]
Production Studio [Mandatory]
Digital Storytelling [Mandatory]
Media Ethics [Mandatory]

Year Three

Semester 1
Game Asset Design [Elective]
Games Engines 1 [Elective]
Internship [Elective]
Introduction to Media Theory [Elective]
Prototyping Studio [Elective]
Semester Away [Elective]
Work Placement [Elective]
Semester 2
Dissertation Research and Preparation [Mandatory]
Group Project [Mandatory]
Games Engines 2 [Elective]
Game Asset Implementation [Elective]

Year Four

Semester 1
Dissertation [Mandatory]
Business & Distribution of Games [Mandatory]
Individual Major Project [Mandatory]
Narrative Design [Elective]
Sound and Audio Design [Elective]
Semester 2
Business & Distribution of Games [Mandatory]

Careers:

Animator
Audio and Video Programmer
Audio Designer
Entrepreneur/Business Set-up
Game Artist
Game Designer
Game Manager
Game Programmer
Game Researcher
Game Software Development
Game Tester
Games Analyst
Games Quality Assurance
Indie Game Developer
Level Designer
Game Producer
Media Content Developer
Product Manager
Production Manager
Project Manager
Realtime Visualisation Artist
Technical Artist
Unity Game Developer
Virtual Reality/Augmented Reality Developer
3D Modeller
2D Game Artist

Other:

A personal laptop of sufficient specifications for game development is highly recommended.