This week’s question comes courtesy of Imbroglio on the GCG forums. He asks:

How do I prepare for a Computer Games Design course?

As with last time I’ve paraphrased the original poster’s questions for easier reading. I’ve provided any updated comments in blue after my original response. My thanks to Imbroglio for allowing me to repost this on my blog.

Question

This September I will be starting my Computer Games Design course at Uni and I need to know how I should prepare and what I ought to expect. I know these courses are pretty diverse among each place of study, but to YOU personally what did you find most important or wished you had known before enrolling: Art (drawing ability) , Digital Art, Music, Animation (Software based, 2D animation (Flash lets say) or Programming.

I seem to be a bit mixed on all this. I have some knowledge in programming and I do art and graphics. I also know enough Flash8 to make small animations; nothing amazing.

So am I all set? Do I need some 3D software? Is drawing that important, and is there much programming involved?

Answer

The definition and responsibilities of a ‘game designer’ differ from studio to studio. And unfortunately many of these college courses entitle the course ‘Game Design’ when in reality it should be titled ‘Game Development’, but I digress. There are a few types of game designer, but the standard game designer is what [above poster] said. A lot of documentation goes into the job, and a game designer really has to know something about every department to be able to communicate their ideas for implementation. And actually, there -are- entry level positions in game design, generally called junior designers, but it’s a very rare opportunity.

It does sound like you want to be an artist, though. You need to figure out what kind of artist, however. Concept, texture, environment, technical, 3D…? I assume you’re better with digital art than traditional, in which case texture, technical, and 3D art might appeal to you, and don’t forget about animation, which is a diverse category unto itself. Sometimes storyboard artists get their own positions, often-times it’s just lumped into the concept art or 2D art category.

As for your questions, I’m afraid no one can really give you a definite answer unless they’ve specifically been in your program. I have never seen two ‘game development’ courses that are exactly the same. You should post what the course catalog says, and maybe we can decipher it. Or perhaps speak with a program adviser to get some insight.

The two ‘game design’ courses I have taken thus far have been analytical. One was about the playability of games and determining what makes a game successful. In this class our final project involved playing games that did not hold up well under review and proposing a re-design and re-launch to make them more successful. I created the project page for my team which can be viewed here.

The other class was basically an introduction to game design. Over the duration of the course we created a game concept document, a budget proposal, market analysis, and a staffing plan. We were also expected to analyze the design components of current games.

However, here’s what I’d assume, and take this with a grain of salt because you know what they say about assumptions. I imagine it’s a project-based course, meaning the entire curriculum of the course is based around the completion of your final project. For example, I just had a 3D project-based class centered around the creation of a bipedal character. Week 1 was concept sketches and research, week 2 and 3 were modeling the body, week 4 was modeling the head, week 5 was texturing, etc. By the end of the course, each student had fully modeled, textured, rigged, skinned, and animated a walk cycle for a bipedal character. I suspect your course may be something like this. If it actually is a ‘game design’ course you will likely be making a fully-functional game level, probably in Unreal or some other common game engine. With that in mind, if I were you I would find out exactly what engine you’ll be using (again, ask the program director/adviser), buy it if you’re required to do so (if it’s Unreal you can buy UT4 with the Unreal Editor for $50USD, but I recommend buying the collector’s edition which comes with 7gigs of tutorials for the engine. Not sure how much extra that costs, I think only an extra $10.) and start the tutorials. You’ll be grateful you got a headstart.

The other thing I would do is decide what kind of level you want to build. Do some research, play through games with great level design. Bioshock is an excellent example of this, as is Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Both games contain very atmospheric areas. When you decide what you want to build, start documenting it. If you like, shoot me an email at SinnedAria at hotmail dot com and I can give you some area design documents I’ve created.

The template I’m referring to here is the one I created for the Lot’s Lane Hub Design Doc after receiving a briefing from the Lead Designer on what it needed to include. You have five sections here:

Description Just a basic, paragraph-long description of the level.

Level Design The layout of the level including interiors within an exterior map, linked areas, and any special notes regarding the actual implementation of the level.

Story Events Quests, cutscenes, and/or puzzles that occur in the level. Categorized as A or B priority. A priority will be seen by every player, B priority is optional.

Characters All NPCs within the level including a description, notes on character model, textures, inventory, dialogue, etc, and any stat sheets, as needed. Categorized as A or B priority. A priority characters will be interacted with by every player, B priority are optional.

Assets A list of any and all assets needed to create the level including models, textures, audio, writing, code, etc.

To Imbroglio or anyone else reading this, I welcome you to post additional questions or comments by typing them into the Comments field at the bottom of this post. Once again I would like to thank Imbroglio for allowing me to repost this and also the wonderful staff at GameCareerGuide.com for offering such a service.