Tips for a budding Game-Developing student

[Archwrath]

Hey i've just finished my first year as an IT-student, and i was wondering what kind of topics i should be looking for when choosing courses? 1½ years from now i'll be looking to get an internship, preferably with a game studio, so what would make an intern most useful in terms of the more specific theoretical knowledge?

[J.Burke]

What discipline are you looking to get an internship in? Programming? Design? Art? Production? QA? 

[Prosper]

Study the areas of game development you won't be responsible for. This way you know better where you stand and also have improved odds of understanding where your coworkers are coming from when they ask you something or describe something to you.

 

gamedev.net

[Archwrath]

What discipline are you looking to get an internship in? Programming? Design? Art? Production? QA? 

Well programming is probably the one im looking for, as i wont be studying design before i start the masters-part of my study, after the internship is over.. currently i've had 2 courses in programming in java, and do as much c++ as i can in my spare-time, as i understand it is the language most studios use. but anything that could get me in the direction of design or a few hints as to what i might face as a designer would be nice.

[Orogun01]

Since this thread is already I open I thought I would try my luck asking a question here.

What is expected and what are you looking for in a 3D character/modeller?

[Walsingham]

I'm not involved in games development. But taking a rough bearing from the nature of most devs I know I'd recommend courses in:

 

- exotic dancing

- firearms maintenance

- project accounting

- baking

[Orogun01]

That's a very talented stripper

[Luridis]

Did you say... "IT" student? Did you mean that, or are you confusing Information Technology with Computer Science? The former doesn't do much programming, what programming it does in mainly top down, toolmaking or interfacing systems. i.e. it's the practical application and management of computer systems, where as the latter focuses on the invention of software for and as part of computer systems and their applications (including entertainment).

[Archwrath]

Did you say... "IT" student? Did you mean that, or are you confusing Information Technology with Computer Science? The former doesn't do much programming, what programming it does in mainly top down, toolmaking or interfacing systems. i.e. it's the practical application and management of computer systems, where as the latter focuses on the invention of software for and as part of computer systems and their applications (including entertainment).

I am an IT student, except that the IT study at my university is very broad in that it covers both the tool-making and the software invention. the last ½year semester before internship is meant for specialization in what you feel like is relevant for your continued study or your internship. so i could take more courses in programming, design and maybe algorithms, AI or stuff like hardware and digital electronics if i wanted to go that route.

[anubite]

From what I understand, there are a couple of degree programs and it's all very confusing when it comes to Computer Science graduates... though the first thing I would do is make sure I'm in the right program, what you're describing sounds right, but if you're going to program **** for games, make sure to learn c++ very well, though it really depends where you end up working, I think. A lot of studios don't make low level code anymore, they use pre-made engines like Unreal. I think you can modify these engines to some degree, so programming expertise is still necessary... But I'd say, the best suggestion I could give is... make ****ing games. When you go to apply for a job, you should at least have one game you wrote from scratch. Even if it's very primitive, showing that you understand the basic structure of game programming (ie you build a Main, an event manager, interface with graphics) is important. I think it might not be a bad idea to build a "tool program" - since I think a lot of game programmers end up making tools for the designers. Programs that handle models/animations for models/shaders/particles and programs that organize/can edit stuff like spells, unit data, etc are important. Of course, I'm not in the industry, so I don't know for sure.

 

No one here knows what your university offers in terms of courses, but you'll obviously want to learn DirectX or OpenGL - at least to some small degree. You'll probably want to familiarize yourself with Linux (mostly because I think there's going to be a trend of more developers needing people to port their games to Linux; look at Valve alone). You'll probably want to familiarize yourself with mobile / console platforms as well. I think you'll want a strong foundation in the basics of computing, since the thing you need to understand is - some programs just need to work most of the time. But other programs always need to work. Games are kind of in the middle - games need to run smoothly and consistently, you can't afford even slight deviations or hiccups. Most games are very demanding on the system and stretch its limits, so you need to know how to optimize code well. There's always a trade off of clean code vs effeicent code - relaly effecient code tends to be hard to read. But you need to know when to write either or find a happy balance of the two.

 

You basically need to know everything, too. For instance, CCP hires Python programmers (I honestly don't know why; EVE doesn't run on Python does it? It must, apparently, yet it's suuuuch a slow language I can hardly believe it). Riot hires Java programmers (I don't know why, honestly). The smaller companies hire for iphone/tablet development (Objective C, which isn't c++). I doubt any university is well-equipped to offer all of these languages equally well, so you basically need to learn everything on your own, or at least, that's from my experience. c++ is popular and important, but you should probably broaden your experience to... everything.

Edited July 15, 2013 by anubite