Even better, UD graduates are already building successful (and lucrative) futures in a field once laughed off as folly.
Now, in a shift that might have seemed inconceivable 10 or 20 years
ago, the University of Delaware has decided to get even more serious
about so-called “fun and games.”
This digitized wave in higher education gathered momentum last year,
when UD established its first “eSports” teams, plunging headfirst into
this distinctly 21st century take on athleticism. Soon, that tide will
also touch the classroom, as UD kicks off its first undergraduate degree
program in “Game Studies,” an innovative new effort to prepare students
— techies and creative-types alike — for careers in this high-rolling
industry.
“It’s going to give our
University a big advantage, taking the leap into this industry,” says
Gary Chang, a UD art professor who will teach the program’s course on
the art and design of games. “The students will actually be sharing and
merging their knowledge from different perspectives, from the style and
art to the computer science perspective, which gives them hands-on
skills of programming.’’
UD’s new effort isn’t the first “gaming” degree in the country, but
by all indications, it is among the most holistic and inclusive. While
other universities focus more on technical aspects of game studies, UD
is aiming to make it a major that embraces all abilities, tapping the
potential of aspiring writers, artists, musicians and engineers alike.
“You don’t have to be a particular kind of student to benefit from
this program,” says Rachael Hutchinson, a professor of Japanese studies
who has done extensive research on game culture in Japan. “Whatever
interests you have, we want to be able to build on those.”
Hutchinson spearheaded the program’s conception with Phillip
Penix-Tadsen, a professor who has studied game culture in Latin America.
They’re now recruiting for the 2022-23 freshman class and have lined up
a curriculum of core courses, ranging from art and design, to writing
game narratives, to coding the game program itself. Students will also
gain a uniquely “meta” perspective on gaming, through courses that
examine gaming’s broader impacts on society.
“Those are things that you’ll
seldom see included in other programs,” Penix-Tadsen says. “We have
courses on diversity in gaming, sex/violence in the media, ethnic and
cultural studies. We’re also one of the only programs that offers a
concentration in eSports management.”
As students from across the interest spectrum gravitate toward the
new major, so will UD’s professors, who are being enlisted from nine
departments within three UD colleges. Building off UD’s existing minor
in Game Studies, the program lets students choose from three primary
pathways: Games, Culture and Society; Game Design and Development; Game
Industry and eSport Management.
“For an interdisciplinary major to go across three colleges is pretty unique,” Hutchinson says.
Part of the major’s appeal lies in gaming technology’s increasing
relevance to a variety of “nongaming” endeavors. More businesses are
turning to gaming technologies to train employees and help shape
workplace environments, and game-derived “virtual reality” technology is
already helping patients in rehabilitation therapy.
Meanwhile, postgraduation opportunities abound in the Mid-Atlantic:
Nintendo’s U.S. headquarters is in Washington, D.C.; there are dozens of
independent game studios in Philadelphia and Baltimore; and major
industry players like Bethesda Softworks and Rockstar Games are within a
couple hours’ drive from Newark.
At UD, organizers hope to hire six or seven new professors for the
major and aim to have internships in game-related industries in place
within four years. A capstone seminar will allow students to work on
individual and collaborative game-development projects. Strong student
interest in UD’s existing game courses hints at future success for the
program, and early momentum should be energized by more than a decade of
interdisciplinary faculty scholarship that has already been done on
game-related topics.
“It was a long time coming, but there was a lot of work done in
previous years that led up to this,” Hutchinson says. “We had to put
aside our academic differences and ask, ‘What does a student want to get
out of this?’ We really tried to take away some of the obstacles that
kept students out of the minor. We didn’t want people looking at it and
thinking, ‘This major’s not for me.’”
