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[Pabro]

USC's film program is apparently no better, although I personally haven't had any experience with their game design program.

This is true, the USC School of Cinema maintains the rights to the student films made there. However, the students can go forward with the story and characters made from their student films and re-make them. George Lucas did this with his characters from one of his student films when he went on to make THX-1138.

However, the Interactive Media Program (which Game Design is a division of) within the School of Cinematic Arts has a different policy. The Interactive Media students can get their IP back from the school as was the case with thatgamecompany and their game Flow.

On speaking about Game Design Education, it all depends on what you want. If you want to be a game designer you don't have to go to one of these programs. If you do want to go to one of these programs a potential benefit is being with like minded students, and having the opportunity to work with other people to make games. Just be wary of the many "game schools" that are popping up that are really just 'for profit' instiutitions. If you're seriously looking at Game Schools, look up who their faculty is and see if they got people who have actually made games on their staff. And then ask yourself, are these people I think I can learn something from. If not, look elsewhere.

Of course, you don't have to go to school to do that. Basically, if you want to be a game designer you need to make games and hone that craft whether its digital or paper or board games.

I agree with Paul Eres about going and majoring in something else. Education should be about learning about the world and gaining knowledge and insight from scholars and from your fellow students in subjects that interest you the most. The things you learn in other subjects could help color your approach to game design.

Your decision on school should depend on what you want to get out of it. You can make games while majoring in anything. You could also make games without going to school. It all depends on what you want to learn and what use you put that knowledge to.

 

[nihilocrat]

The best way to learn to make games is to make games. There's no way around it.

Quoth for truth.

ps. what Glaiel said about "teaching game design = stupid," I whole-heartedly agree with. Learn a craft (art or programming) that's vital to completing a game and use it to make games. If you wanted to collab with me and all you wanted to do was design I wouldn't want any part of it.

First of all, Farbs definitely has it. Even in a class, you are going to end up making a game.

Second of all, I thought I would sound like an asshole when I was about to say "heh... game design... heh... don't embarass yourself, learn how to make games, learn programming / art", but I appreciate that others agree.

As I haven't attended a traditional college, I would appreciate it if someone posted some of the game dev. related things they have learned in their CS degrees.

My CS cirriculum wasn't the greatest, because I went to a small private hippie college since I felt like I would just be bitter if I wasn't surrounded by weirdos. Anyways...

The only specifically game-related stuff I learned was OpenGL, which is obviously pretty useful. It was technically an OpenGL class, but the professor (maker of Snood, if you've ever heard of it) had us make a game as a final project. That was probably one of the most useful courses of my whole degree.

The rest of the classes didn't really have anything to do with games, more with web apps, or more often, with theoretical programming topics which only occasionally have applications in the real world, or which someone has already implemented better than you (hashing algorithms, etc.).

Didn't really cover anything else, like I said, the cirriculum was lacking. I think CS is great if you genuinely like programming, but if you are super-super focused on JUST coding games you will probably get bored.

[seifip]

I finally decided to try to get to the SILS (School of International Liberal Studies) program at Waseda University in Tokyo (Japan) and afterwards try to get to and master at the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University in Tokyo. I know how hard it is to get to these unis but I'll try my best

What do you think? Is this a good choice?

[Brandorf]

Plus, at my school they're not very focused on building specific strengths but rather stretching you thin across a medley of courses, some of which are probably ultimately useless to most people. I mean, if you're trying to focus on becoming a 3D modeler, there's no need for you to know scripting languages.

...

A lot of people have told me that the degree itself is irrelevant to this industry. It's really more about your portfolio and who you know.

You can never have too many technical skills, even as an artist.  This is especially true when you consider how amazingly powerful things like MEL Scripting actually are as a game development tool. 

I've been spending quite a bit of my time post-graduation looking for a job.  There is some truth to the saying that the degree is irrelevant.  90% of the jobs I have applied for simply want a "relevant" BS degree, what they really use as a metric is years of experience at a job and how many games you have shipped.  Thus, the first job is the hardest to land.

[Titch]

Most game design graduates are pretty useless, unfortunately. In my experience we found that degree to be more of a warning than a recommendation. We generally recommend people go for Compsci for programming, and 3D art for artists. Game designers in theory should get the most out of game design courses, but I've yet to meet one that has been able to make a game on their own steam.

*cautiously raises his hand*

I did a game design degree. I think about half my class are now working in the industry, although a great deal of those jobs where landed through a combination of luck and networking through the school instructors. I can't say it's done a whole bunch for me aside from the give me some great memories, peers and added to the mountain of cynicism that drives me and I call on when I need to get something finished. Oh and debt, but thats what happens when you go to school.

[c-foo peng]

I finally decided to try to get to the SILS (School of International Liberal Studies) program at Waseda University in Tokyo (Japan) and afterwards try to get to and master at the Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University in Tokyo. I know how hard it is to get to these unis but I'll try my best

What do you think? Is this a good choice?

Japanese schools eh? Interesting. I think my university was sister schools with Keio... but other than that I don't know much about it. Didn't Itagaki go to Waseda or something?

If you're looking to enter the Japanese games industry, I suppose those are pretty good choices. Good luck!