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<p>I can just tell you that when my daughter and I visted UCSC, we absolutely loved it. The campus is unlike any other. That’s going to be too far for my son as we are east coast and he isn’t going to want to travel that far (and expensive if you are out of state, although my D was offered a reasonable merit scholarship). My D ended up at USC but if she hadn’t been admitted there she would have happily attended UCSC.</p>
<p>We visited UCSC too, and I agree with @Snowdog. Gorgeous! My S would LOVE to go there, he even got a Regents Scholarship, but even with that and the “Dean’s Award” that they give to OOSers, it’s still WAY too expensive for us. Regents and Deans amount to $8,000 the first year, and with OOS tuitiion, the COA is over $50K.</p>
<p>The game programming program looks good, though, if you can afford it. I understand it’s somewhat of a stoner school, but with S’ s other choices in CO and WA, he’ll probably have to deal with that anyway! And honestly, what college student doesn’t? I’d rather that than a pervasive drinking culture, at least pot doesn’t kill as many kids as alcohol poisoning.</p>
<p>Just signed up for Explore USC, is there a specific way to visit the Interactive Media Department?</p>
<p>Just saw this so hopefully you haven’t already visited. Maybe I’m used to it, but visiting IMD isn’t really impressive unless there’s students working on games. I don’t know what schedules they have, but most weekdays you can find teams working in SAL 103. If you’re lucky you might be able to demo the Oculus. For IMGD, contact Sam Roberts for more info: <a href=“USC Cinematic Arts | Interactive Media & Games Division”>https://cinema.usc.edu/interactive/index.cfm</a>
Also, look into stuff going on when you visit: <a href=“http://interactive.usc.edu/”>http://interactive.usc.edu/</a></p>
<p>thanks, just fired off an email, and will call him while on campus tomorrow.</p>
<p>Just dropped my kid at USC today! He is checking in early to participate in Band Camp. Hope to meet all in this thread someday.</p>
<p>rgosula, I’ve followed your son’s journey and I really hope he has a fabulous college experience like mine did/do. So many opportunities–just sit back and enjoy! And congratulations for surviving last year’s application season. :)</p>
When is this year’s ranking coming out?
USC #1 undergraduate, Drops to #4 Graduate
http://www2.princetonreview.com/press/game-design-press-release
Hello!
I am a current student in the Interactive Media program. If anyone this year has any questions or anything feel free to ask me!
Checked out the new rankings and not sure how to evaluate as we can’t visit all these schools. My son is choosing between Case Western, RPI, WPI, RIT, Drexel, DePaul, Baylor, Becker, Hampshire, North Carolina State-Raleigh. Any comments or insights on the rankings of the schools my son is choosing between would sure be helpful on this thread I just started:
Top 3 on your list, in order, for Game Design or Game Programming: RIT, WPI, RPI, followed by Drexel and DePaul. I don’t care what the rankings say about Becker- run as fast as you can away from that school. We visited it and they bought these old homes in a terrible neighborhood and that’s where they hold their classes for Game Design. If they can’t even fix up the outside of the building how can they afford the latest hardware and software for the major?
Thank you GamerGal27; you are always a wealth of knowledge and insight. Looking back I saw your son had previously preferred RPI over RIT. Did you visit RIT, RPI and WPI? I see RPI is ranked higher on the National University List but RIT is ranked higher on the game design list. How do RPI and RIT compare? Also, Case Western is offering a very generous scholarship and is a higher nationally ranked university, but it only offers a minor in game design. My son has gotten into several other schools as well but because they only offer straight computer science he is leaning towards the stronger video design curriculum. Any insights on Case Western for game design?
@sewingdeedles We did visit all three schools and he did prefer RPI over RIT but it was more because RPI had a more prestigious name and was harder to get into than RIT. RIT actually has a higher Game Design ranking as well as a closer relationship with Microsoft. RPI was interesting because one could take an additional four cases and actually get a double major in Game Design and CS. If it had come down to these three and was my decision I would have selected WPI because I thought a small nerdy school was the best fit for him. And I really liked the depth of the program at WPI and how you could go on the straight GD track or programming or animation track.
At the end if the day he is at USC for Computer Science (Games).
How would you rank the new NYU Tisch program as against the others?
@sewingdeedles I know nothing about it. What’s nice about some of the other programs you’ve asked about is they have established relationships with publishers which helps get internships. Isn’t NYU really expensive?
@GamerGal27 Your right on point; that’s what I have to evaluate. He just got the NYU Tisch acceptance, and I hadn’t looked at is yet but now I see their housing cost is really high; guess that is to be expected in NYC. Without aid all of these schools are crazy expensive:
Cost of attendances (tuition, room and board and fees is approximately:
$68k @ Drexel, $66 @ RPI, $65 k@ NYU, $61k @ WPI, and $60k for CWR. DePaul and RIT are about $45K. BTW I see USC’s coa is right up there at $61k next year as well.
I’m not a techy but as I look at the course offerings for TISCH they look more similar to USC’s interactive media or WPI; than to RPI’s, RIT’s or other school’s computer science department more technological offerings. My son wants to be a lead game designer but he knows he needs a strong programming base. Is there as much opportunity in internships and jobs for undergrads and grads with experience in courses for creative directing, game development and management, as there is for straight computer science majors that want to go into the gaming industry? Would one garner higher salaries upon graduation over another? 10 years down the road?
Game Design may be more sexy but it’s a tougher career. Here are some salaries for comparison; http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/221533/Game_Developer_Salary_Survey_2014_The_results_are_in.php?elq=e09fbec054394e05af8441156e8d2f4a&elqCampaignId=6450
Tisch has Eric Zimmerman - it’s good: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Zimmerman However, I don’t know what technical opportunities, such as required courses, electives, clubs, etc. are available. The BFA seems weak in technical skills, which segues into GamerGal27’s salient point…
GamerGal27’s link addresses “Would one garner higher salaries upon graduation over another? 10 years down the road?”
Game designers are paid less and have less available positions. Designers with more technical skills will have an easier time getting their foot in the door. After years of being in industry then experience and shipped titles will be the pathway to improved opportunities, such as promotions or going to a new company for a better role/title/pay.
“Is there as much opportunity in internships and jobs for undergrads and grads with experience in courses for creative directing, game development and management, as there is for straight computer science majors that want to go into the gaming industry?”
No. A computer science major can go into any kind of internship or job they have experience in, which is very broad and there are many available. The fundamentals of CS are generally applicable in all technical roles. A game design major can go into game related roles, but that’s not as broad and there are way less available. A counterpoint could be a game designer with production experience could go into a producer role outside of games, which certainly happens, but it’s much less likely because why would another industry hire a games producer when there’s plenty of producers trained in that specific industry. The fundamentals of game design are not as generally applicable in other industries.
I realize that might not be clear, so here’s an example. A student wants to be a game journalist (Kotaku, Polygon, etc.). Should they major in game design and minor in journalism or major in journalism and minor in game design?
Obviously, there are more journalism positions than game journalism positions and specifically more non-game journalism positions than game journalism positions. Therefore it’s more likely to be able to get a non-game journalism position than a game journalism position. Therefore, it make more sense to major in journalism to have that education for the field this student is going into and minoring in games gives knowledge specific to a preferred type of journalism. Majoring in games and minoring in journalism would lead to a student that knows more about game design and development, but when they try to get journalism roles they will not be as strong of a candidate next to applicants with a major in journalism and portfolio to match. Unfortunately, the game major student with a cool game project portfolio will not be looked at as favorably except for game journalism positions, which there are not nearly as many to apply to and even harder to get. Of course the games major student could go into game development, but now they’re in another field of games that’s hard to get your foot in the door and they’re a weaker candidate than other games majors that knew they wanted to make games so have more skills and experience because they didn’t bother with journalism.
TL;DR: Major in journalism so the fundamentals of that study, which are more general, provide more opportunities than majoring in games, where the fundamentals are more specific.
TL;DR 2:
Major in CS - Have tens of thousands of entry level job opportunities ( http://cdn.geekwire.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/more-jobs-than-students-620x366.png )
Major in Game Design - Have maybe 5000 entry level job opportunities or go Indie ( http://learn.org/articles/What_is_the_Job_Outlook_for_a_Career_in_Game_Designing.html )
Major in Game Design and have strong technical skills - Have more than 5000 entry level job opportunities AND your resume is on the top of the stack for most game design roles.
@ GamerGal27, @ Psydent So given this you project that coming out of USC with CS(Games) is more marketable than IMGD even with some extra coding courses? Reading your discussion on the thread regarding transfers into IMGD, are there many transfers into IMGD internally? @ Chalonverse. Externally under USC TTP or otherwise?
