Thinking with games: exploring digital gaming imaginaries and values in higher education

Industry, education and workforce development
Within digital gaming there are concerted efforts to bring education and
industry together. Situated and contextualized accounts of categories of
education and industry will be offered from empirical research. This
article draws on research emerging out of a mixed method, multi-sited
research investigation into the United Kingdom digital games industry,
higher education and the creative industries. George Marcus (1995: 105)
describes how multi-sited research is designed around ‘chains, paths,
threads, conjunctions or juxtapositions of locations in which the ethnographer
establishes some form of literal, physical presence’. Initially, the
research explored here was framed by focus groups with games design students
across various years of study. From these initial encounters, the
research study followed the ‘chains, paths, threads’ touched on by students
to extend the research to interviews with course tutors, professional
designers, industry representatives and attendance at games career events
and industry conferences and festivals. Attending to these broader contexts
has been vital for gaining a hold on the perceptions, tensions and
aspirations shaping students’ development and the connections between
industry and higher education.
A tension around games design being taught within higher education
has already been hinted at in Matthew Jeffrey’s comments. Similarly, the
Computer Games and Animation Manager for Skillset states:
A lot of games industry people that we consulted with were unsure whether
it is even a subject that you can teach at university or whether it is something
you should learn at a company; you should progress into it from other
areas (interview with the author).
Skillset, the sector skills council for creative media, is one of the leading
brokers of industry and education engagement and collaboration. For
instance, Skillset’s Computer Games Skills Forum brings together representatives
from industry and academia to set ‘the agenda for skills development
in the Games Industry’ (Skillet, n.d. a). Further to this, the Skillset
Course Accreditation scheme was established with the involvement of
notable industry companies including EA and Microsoft Game Studios.
The scheme helps ‘identify courses throughout the UK that provide the
skills, knowledge and experience needed for individuals to confidently
enter the industry’ (Skillset, n.d. b). The Education Liaison for Blitz Games,
Kim Blake, offered the following comments on the accreditation scheme:
It is industry people who say ‘this is what we want’ and I think that is its
great strength because at the end of the day we are, as game developers, the
people whom students will be, graduates will be coming with their CVs and
their portfolios and saying ‘we would, I would like a job with you’ (interview
with the author).
One of the important nuances to note here is that Skillset course accreditation
does not extend to games design and for some of those involved in
the Computer Games Skills Forum there are serious concerns about games
design in higher education. As Matthew Jeffrey of EA stated:
We have been very critical about some of the games degrees that have been
out in the marketplace and I’ve been speaking over at Skills Week just across
the way and now it is interesting that we have seen a trend in the UK that a
lot of academics have been seduced into writing and producing game-specific
degrees (author transcribed speech, 2007).
A fascinating perspective is offered on the ‘marketplace’ of education and the
motivations of academics designing, validating and offering courses in
higher education. Jeffrey’s comments are concerned with a tension around
the ability of university courses to ‘equip’ students with the necessary skills
of the industry. Whilst games design is an industry role identified within
higher education as suitable for being taught as a degree course, it is less
willingly accepted as such by some in industry. This is an issue of ongoing
tension and for the purposes of this article, ‘obviously there are a lot of
people who think you can teach it, and they have very strong views on how’
(Computer Games and Animation Manager, interview with the author).
Regardless of the controversial status of games design, the aims of the
course tutors who I spoke with about how games design should be taught,
were firmly in line with the broader emphasis on collaboration with industry
and stressing the importance of preparing students as industry ready.
In this respect, all five of the games design courses I conducted research
with had arrangements with games development companies for guest
speakers and/or work placements. The comment ‘we try to cover the production
pipeline in a games development’ (interview) from a course tutor
indicates the extent to which higher education games design courses are
orientated towards industry. Similarly, their colleague stated:
We focus specifically on one role within that course, so like games art you
will become a games artist not a games designer. And that focus, and narrowing
that focus means it’s a lot easier to know where you will end up
(interview with the author).
Useful comparisons on on-the-job training and the role of higher education
may be drawn with other industries. In terms of journalism, for example,
Susan Greenberg in this journal notes:
During the last decade, a period of intense technological development and
economic change, industry training has withered away and employers now
expect trainees to come to their first job with the rough edges already
smoothed by someone else.
(Greenberg 2007: 291)
Whilst the specific comment on training ‘withering away’ is not comparable
with the games industry, the emphasis on having the ‘rough edges
already smoothed’ is clearly something described by games tutors if not
demanded by employers. This is a crucial and subtle distinction to make,
in that some industry developers regard on-the-job training as the only
suitable method and most will have in-house training. Beyond these
factors though and despite comments from industry, the course tutors
who I spoke with were committed to preparing students as best as they
could. Again, this preparation may be favoured by some in industry,
generally at least in terms of ‘transferable skills’. To summarize with
regard to this research but suggesting wider applicability to the whole
sector, higher education games design courses are industry orientated and
seek to prepare students as industry ready. The expansion of students’
engagement with games or gaming imaginaries is a specific aspect of this
preparation.