After completing a Degree in Software Engineering at the University of Newcastle, including jointly developing a game in his final year, Paul Baker began to look for work in the games development arena.
-When we actually proposed to do a game for our final year project the academics were not really keen on the idea," Baker says. -I don't think they realised that the game industry is so big. Just as I was leaving they began to implement courses which were more relevant to games design, but it still isn't very widespread."
Despite having worked on a game for his final year project, Baker found himself repeatedly knocked back in the job market due to a lack of industry experience, and wound-up fast-tracked into second year at the AIE thanks to his previous studies.
-I started looking around for work, but companies were really looking for people with more industry experience," Baker says, adding that the AIE integrated real world experience into the course, through regular talks from people who already work for games developers, or who run their own workshops.
AIE student Adam Rattur says the very structure of the course is as much about working with people as it is about the technology itself.
-There is more politics involved in designing a game than I thought there would be," says Rattur. -We are learning on industry standard tools, but the people interaction is probably just as important."
Having cut his teeth on Wonder Boy in Monster Land on a Sega Master System when he was about five, Rattur is one of a generation of late-teen-early-twenties who spent more time defeating the age check on Leisure Suit Larry than trying to get fake ID for the local bar, and he is keen to be a part of the next wave of games development.
-With the success of things like the Sims, you can see that there is room for more than just action and killing-orientated games," Rattur says.
Baker agrees, and says he is learning a lot about the psychology, strategy, and politics that go into games development.
-We focus on the game play in the early stages far more than the graphics," Baker says. -We may have to ditch an idea which includes a God-like being, because most of the publishing companies are US-based, and they tend not to like religious things."
While Baker can see the changing demographic of games players forcing a shift in the level of sophistication and the thematic focus of most games, he believes the core market will always be the under 15s.
-Even though a generation have now grown up playing games, and many of them are continuing to play games, they biggest demographic will always be kids," Baker says. -Part of the course is to think of things like that - it's about more than just what is cool for us."
I've been in the Building Industry all my life, but there is one passion that I have had since the PC was invented, PC Games. Playstation, anything really. Since online games began, I was trying to get onto their beta tester list. I have only succeeded in testing Ultima Online & I think that was only because they wanted to see if anywhere in Australia was marketable with the server equipment they had set up. In the end, it wasn't, their main market was Europe and the lag was incredible, so bad if fact that it eventually became impossible to play. Anyhow, getting back to this topic. Because I run my own business, I don't have much time to attend classes, what I've been looking for, is a programers course that I can do by correspondence. I don't belive I have what it takes to create games yet, but I would like to know what I need to know, to be able to create a game. Not just the ideas and basic ingrediants for a good game, I have them in my head already, I need to know how to technically build, create & produce a PC game. Could you outline the skills needed to actually write,create a game. It would help me out heaps, I would also save a lot of time. I like the idea of the school for game makers too. Keep it up.