I think it's pretty poor of these industry professionals to be saying things like this. It depends on the course, and you can't lump them all into one trash can because they have the same name. You have to examine previous students, results and where the pupils ended up.

Just to really point out my frustration and amusement; I did a brilliant "BSc Games Development" course at UCLAN and within 2.5 years in the industry I've had offers from Lionhead, Rare, Crytek to name a few and oh yes, Blitz. I had my first job there agreed before I even finished my exams, and I was far from the only one!

Really poor show on their part to generalise like that.Do some research on the course and there are some *great* ones out there.

There are a few problems with his comments. Firstly, he assumes everyone who does a game course at uni wants to do programming which is certainly not the case. There are lots of courses which concentrate on aspects of design and production which are just as important as programming.

Secondly, how can a games programming course be any worse than a computer science degree? At least in a games programming degree you'll learn more specifically about stuff you'll find in games like AI and graphics. He can't possibly know what every course is like either.

I wish the 2nd point was true I know from my course which was a games programming course the only AI I encountered was thrown together with Physics programming in a second year module yet we had to do 3 modules of 3d modelling

This is a very old guard view of the industry. I'm personally sick of the false barrier of entry of a computer science degree. Its this attitude that has left creatives out in the cold and it's shocking how little importance is put on other talent compared to having great technical staff. This is one of the reasons that we've been treading the same water for years. What I'm basically getting at is most Film directors can't light a set or shoot without their crew. It's ridiculous to let a gaffer or camera operator write and direct just because they have seniority. Less focus on advanced programming skills and more on tools and creativity. We're making entertainment not I.T solutions!

Most people applying for jobs at Codemasters probably don't want some slog of a job coding some nondescript part of some game engine anyway, so they'd probably quit after a week if the didn't have the skills.

It's not that difficult to program a video game, and good programmers are ten a penny. Finding someone with a decent game idea is harder.

What's the point in 200 geniuses working on yet another FPS like Bodycount?

Wwhat do you do with your games degree if you don't get a job in the Games industry?

I have a Software Engineering degree from a good uni. I applied for and got interviews at various games companies (Codemasters, Kuju, Creative Assembly to name a few). Unfortunately I failed to land a job as a games programmer... So I took a job in the Defence industry, and then later Financial work. My degree was still seen as useful elsewhere.

Lots of people are signing up to Games related Courses, and with Degrees being such a huge investment in time and money a job in games is obviously the end goal. I wonder what the actual percentage is for grads with games degrees landing jobs in the industry...

While its good to have understanding of the codebase its not necessary for 2/3rd of development to know about coding the whole statement;

“In the console world – maybe I’m old fashioned – I like people to have really good first degrees from good universities in computer science, then they can do a gaming course."

This is bloody nonsense, go do a coding course then study games design? I agree he is old fashioned.

Its a completely different set of skills in programming a game than designing one, especially now where there are key expectations that rely on a certain way of thinking. Its almost like saying to study being a joiner then become an architect.

In general they have a point about the courses, but most university courses are useless by definition they are meant to be run to give you some education and some life skills and not to make you the best at what you do by turning up.

If you want to improve yourself you have to spend time outside lectures and do your own study.

I am seeing a lot of old men who are sold on the name of a course rather than a course being any good. basically they are saying if you have software development on your CV your more useful to them than someone with Game Designer which is a bit insulting frankly.

Either way I did a more mixed skill course and this is the one thing I can agree on, its almost worthless having courses that are too specific as they become useless when jobs in that field dry up or do not exist in anything more that teaching.

@kurt&Andy;:
Actually nearly everyone in the game industry has 10-100 ideas. People who are purely about ideas haven't got a chance at all to get a job. If you talk to anyone in the mainstream or even indie dev community, there are millions of "creative" people out there saying I have this great idea and expecting other people to do the work. And then the creative people expect to be paid 20-50% of the proceeds and its patently ridiculous.
As for programming a game, it depends on what kind of game. I can make a javascript RPG with as many features as I want in about a week of 8 hour days. But an SRPG ala Skyrim or an RTS like WBC3? Definitely not.

Lol - one of the other hot topics is Codies crunch worker wants his day in court! Maybe if our creative industries treated staff as well as other (software) industries we'd have an industry worth fighting for. The problems are partly to do with the talent piepline but are exasberated by lack of on the job training, CPD, skills improvement etc., combined with an attitude from an old guard that don't necessarily understand what has changed technically in the past 25 years. I don't doubt these people are smart but are they moving with the times. If I'm going to spend £27k on my Uni education I'm going to want it to be relevant, employable but also something that I will enjoy.

As I see it; if certain, highly specific, skills are required by the Industry, then the Industry should be provide the training - not the tax payer.
All of this has come about because corporations have scrapped their graduate induction training programs. Largely because they were expensive. And now they expect the public sector to pay for an undergrad to study for a BSc in Autodesk products, with a minor in Adobe Photoshop.
A Bachelors degree is not supposed to be specifically tailored to any particular industrial niche.

Jamie is right that it is scandalous when students are mis-sold courses, but these blanket statements tend to erode and demotivate the great teaching going on in the good games courses. And those good courses are willing to work with industry to get even better, but so often only get these assertions that they are not fit for purpose. One of the criteria to be a Skillset accredited course is to show students get employed in the games industry, so some courses are obviously pleasing some employers!
Incidentally when Skillset visited a course in Abertay to assess it, our industry assessor (from Blitz Games) said the Maths coursework the students were set were the hardest he'd come across. I've no reason to doubt him....

First, this guy is like 60, so he doesn't hire young developers or know their potential. In the US Full Sail, Digipen and Guildhall students are just about everywhere.

Jamie makes some very valid points and attacking him is unfair. Just having guys like him raise his head up helps keep the debate hot and allows us to force change. But just to add some balance I'd like to throw a genuine fact in. A minimum of 40 Graduates finished "Games degrees" (programming focused) last year and headed straight into the UK games industry - including some into Codemasters. The % of those making it in is pretty low - but its possible for the high quality grads - with passion for games and some hands on experience/coding projects to show off. We work heavily on graduate recruitment (and run Search For a Star - the graduate programming competition.) So we know the market better than most.

Just for information. Codemasters took on 78 people from July 2010 to June 2011 in permanent job roles all of which were under 30. This demonstrates their ongoing commitment to bringing in fresh talent into the UK industry.

If there were more grads with maths and CS they probably would have hired even more. How many of those 78 came from "mainland" Europe vs the UK?

@Matt SS
Erm no. The other guys have a point. This 'everyone has 100 ideas' is bull. In most cases 99% are usually crap. Which is why you need a creative designer. What you say completely undermines the value of the designer. You can have all the elegant code you want, players don't care. They want creative GAME PLAY. Look at all those games in the app store 90% are pretty terrible, or clones of clones.

An illustrative microcosm of part of the problem is how most applicants for art discipline jobs want to be concept artists, while competent and speedy 3D modellers are much harder to find. 18-year-olds who are filling in their UCAS forms are attracted to the jobs they imagine they'll like best. Most of them don't know that to be a stellar gameplay designer it's essential to have a grasp of programming (how much is a matter of ongoing debate) just as most of those artists haven't had a good hard think over the fact that there's maybe one concept artist job for every fifteen modeller or texture artist roles.

BTEC Media Production students get an "understanding the industry" module where they do their career research and can (hopefully) find this stuff out. Most A-level students doing eg. Art, English and History wanting to be a game designer, if they do extra research besides visiting the one careers service person per college, may find out they've already limited their choices by shirking Maths after GCSE.

Getting CS into schools to evangelise the younger generation about programming and being creative with software is really exciting, though!

I find this extremely unfounded and maybe pertaining to the games courses that were set up badly where the programming students can't program themselves out of a paper bag.

Codemasters themselves employ atleast 2 graduates from the University I attended. Yet are willing to throw out these accusations that are damaging to the good courses e.g. Abertay (As everyone has seen them because of Dare2beDigital).

I am proving that I am quite capable of being a CS student by doing a masters in a field of artificial intelligence but I had to go to this length because I couldn't get an interview most likely because I was brushed asside because I have poor A levels. Hopefully achieving a masters degree will still mean something when im finished it.

Macdonald's right, to an extent.
[Also a quick note he is talking about programming, so stop it with the design remarks!]
I'm fortunately a good student on a good Games Programming Course, with industry experience. However there's many students on the course who won't cut it and make it in to industry, as he said they would be far better off in a more general degree so they could move straight into a software engineering job instead of being stuck with niche skills. There needs to be an emphasis on getting people in the right degrees and teaching the right stuff.
However, dedicated games courses should clearly exist. It's unrealistic for someone to do a comp sci degree then another degree to get a junior programmer job. A large part of the skillset and knowledge set is unique to games and will not be covered in a comp sci course, yet every job posting requires such skills.

I completed a Games Programming course last year and am now employed by Blitz Games but I completely see where they are coming from. If you have a good grounding in maths and computer science you will make a much better programmer in the long run no matter what kind of programming you are doing. However I also think that if you have a good grounding in math you will make a much better anything. However, I am very thankful I was able to land a job in the computer games industry from the degree I did and I feel I only got there because I worked hard, but not a day goes by I don't wish I was better at maths and physics......

Maybe the title should have [programming] inserted, in the full interview MacDonald supports design degrees.

MacDonald: I take your point, but I’d also say over the last ten years the biggest skill problem is in the design discipline just because there wasn’t anywhere you could actually train to be a game designer.

I graduated from a top games course in the UK, have had several good industry jobs, and I still agree with him.

Uni is a good opportunity to learn the fundamentals of programming and CS. If you're passionate about making games, you'll be making them on your own and don't need everything in your education to be games themed.

I did one of the early game courses and I actually moved to it from a "good" university (Russel grounp one) because after two years (my grades where well over a 1st) I found the course to be far too much geared towards theory and research with nothing relevent for working in games. Contrast that with the games course which I found excellent and because of that and the course work/projects I did I got a job.

Now things have changed and that university has a games course which we've actually had placement students from and going from what they say it's the games course that takes the best students only as it's more difficult plus the modules and work that they do is very relevent.

Regarding not being able to find work outside the industry. I got a 1st and I had no problems when I took my brief break. It all depends on the student, the course and the individual circumstances.

To make a statement like this is just prejudicial although as most recruiters probably have the same prejudices understandable.

I wonder when was the last time any of these gents actually hired someone for an entry role position.

Given they are all top execs, I strongly doubt they are in touch with what people can gain from doing these courses.

I do believe that if the course is the right one, and the student puts in the work, then its not about what University you want to, it's about what knowledge you have. Some of these courses are good at introducing a lot of the concepts you find in games programming.

Like CukyDoh, I studied the BSc Computer Games Development at UCLan. This course follows the route of the generic Computing degree, with 2 modules (out of 6) a year looking specificly at games.

When will Games Journalists - who themselves get heavily criticised by proper journalists - cease reprinting this crap, or at least try to redress the balance. I'd happily sit down with any Industry Vet and publicly argue the value of games degrees. In open debate only can this trite prejudice be opposed.

And if you didn't find the phrase "proper journalists" very fair, now you know what we academics feel like…

Most BScs I have been involved with as external, etc, make a point of emphasising core skills while using relevant topics for assessment and portfolio building. CS is already not meeting the massive IT skills gap. Good games courses get excellent graduate recruitment in all areas of the IT profession, not just Games.

It was that it showed you are deeply clueless on the matter.

"I wonder when was the last time any of these gents actually hired someone for an entry role position."

Well, I can't speak for Frontier or Codemasters, but at Blitz they have work placements for university students as part of their degree, and have a few graduates joining as juniors each year.

I think there's a couple of issues that the industry is facing:

* There's some terrible courses that don't benefit either the student or the industry they're aiming to join - these unfortunately cast a shadow on the very good universities that run courses of the same name. I've seen a game design course that primarily taught 3d modelling and animation, with no level or game design until the third year. The course desciption on the prospectus actually said,"Most students will go on to be 3d modellers or animators". I've heard conversations with lecturers complaining about the suggestion that their students should learn C++ if they wanted to get into console game development. One muttered, "What's wrong with Java?"

Any fair employee will look at the graduate's portfolio rather than just taking the degree at face value, regardless of where it was obtained, but when there are so many applicants I guess some companies might be a bit more quick to dismiss.

* Competition is fierce - so many studios have gone under that graduates aren't just competing with each other, but also with experienced dev staff who might be willing to take a pay cut just to get another job quickly. Sometimes you need a backup plan, and although we might know that games coding can be massively complex, companies in other industries looking for coders will often look down on game-specific degrees, assuming it's a bit of a doss course with no real value.

As a youngish industry veteran who has seen most of it before, I am currently working with two different UK universities. With one the focus is on games development, with the other it is related to professional practice.
My experience is that the universities are very open to change and to improving the courses they offer if they are given the correct industry advice and guidance. I have experienced virtually no resistance in my suggestions to update curriculum to more accurately reflect the needs of the industry.
I have been lucky enough to work directly with students and to modify syllabuses to the end of trying to prepare students for the World of working in games.
The more you study the issues the more you see the problems that have been facing the education establishments in accommodating the quirky demands of our industry.
1. Games are a mixture of Art and Science
(Mixing these two areas is totally counter intuitive to the way that most universities are set up on many levels)
2. Teamwork is utterly essential and games need to be made by groups of people with different talents.
(Group assessment is much harder than individual assessment, even harder if you are mixing the arts and science halves of the universities)
3. Unless you finish a game it is a waste of time.
(Demos, Modded levels, Bits of code, half finished games, these all show potential but no ability to finish. The biggest step up to the real world is to make finished products that are error free in presentation (no matter how small or unambitious they are)
4. Students working with high tech too early
(Too many universities have fallen for the good looking demo that is usually more to do with modding than making a game. This is like teaching someone to run before they can walk. We have many good commercial smaller platforms now and it is these that students should be cutting their teeth on making WHOLE games. Modding is only good for Level designers).
5. Careers advice does not have enough emphasis on the real opportunities out there.
(9,000 UK jobs and shrinking, huge competition with people with experience, setting up small teams not addressed enough from a practical point of view.)
6. Learning the various roles in the industry properly, understanding and appreciating the roles of every single team member
(Programming, Art, Sound, Design, Production, QA. We all know the drill and it is never going to change. All Games students need to leave university with a firm grasp of all of these roles and how they inter-relate. Often when they start the course they are not sure which if these 6 tracks they are best suited to.)
7. Many of the things learned in making games can be applied to different industries.
(Teamwork, Creative management, technical issues, lateral thinking, testing, computer art in general, design in general, programming, project management. These are all valuable skills in many other industries. It is time to get real, not everyone on a games course is going to get a games related job, like the students of pretty much every other degree course out there. So Let's big up a bit more the other skill that are being learned along the way.)

What Jamie says addresses one specific issue that the industry currently has with games degree students. However the solution is not to go back to what we had before but to redefine what is needed.
In my opinion we should focus the degrees on more group based practical application of actually making games with all the types of people needed. Designers, Producers, Programmers, Artist, Sound guys and testers. Focus on the smaller machines and demand more from the programmers on these machines.
It is also possible that programmers may need to be a little more advanced in their skills before they can truly operate equally with artist and designers (these are the two other biggest groups of students), this is not because the programmers are worse but because the skills are more difficult to master.
Finally the courses desperately need to be more modular. Professional Practice and Game making can be shared across all disciplines but after that the groups should ideally be separated. Games Art, Programming, production and QA, sound and games design should all be large modules within the course. This allows for specialization and teamwork to be learned in tandem (especially important for 2nd and 3rd year students)
There is a lot more to be written on this subject, but the age of setting up a popular games course just to take easy money from students has got to be put behind us. The students demand more and the industry itself demands more.

Ive reviewed all the recent "games courses are crap" stories on this site. None have had quotes from academics. Few even reference Skillset, who's sole existence is to help improve links with and quality of games courses. So, who's clueless about what? Keep the insults to twitter please.