A6 CARD
INFOGRAPHIC
ROLES IN THE INDUSTRY
PROGRAMMER
Programmer is responsible of designing and writing the code that will run the game. It often incorporates creating custom code or using entire libraries prepared by others.
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Programmer can work for a studio or be independent. Often they specialise in one sector, like tool programming or AI programming.
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DESIGNER
Designers are responsible of creating their concepts, ideas for the game and present them to others. It is a very important role, as it what will make a game, a game depends on the designers. Concept artists create ideas of art or methods to use in the game by other co-workers. Their main job is to define what the game will be, what it will do and what a player could do within it.
They must plan what the game will be about, what platform and devices will it use; some games will need special controllers like some Wii games, and it is a designer's job to think about it.
It depends on designers, whether a game will be about luck or strategy, whether it will be for one or more players and what the story will be about.
After everything is decided artists, programmers and engineers can start working on the game, according to the concepts and designs.
You need to pass Physics, Maths and Computer Science. You will need to learn multiple programming languages and know multiple devices and platforms; how they work and how to create code for them.
You do not need any specific qualification to become a designer, however it would be useful to pass Computer Games Technology, Computer Games Design and Games Art and Design.
You might be asked for demo of your work and skills and then present it to others and teach others how it works, and how they can do it themselves.
Earns £19,843 - £54,287.
Bill Gates
American business magnate with net worth of $81.2 billion.
Earns $34,374 - $108,273.
Shigeru Miyamoto
Japanese Game Designer with a $1.4 million salary.
Designs games for Nintendo since 1889. His games are well known world-wide even among people not interested in the gaming industry or games itself. He made top games such as Super Mario, Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda and Wii series.
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He is so successful thanks to his simple, friendly designs and very good ideas and style.
RESEARCH ON COMPANIES
Valve Corporation is an American video game developer responsible of producing many globally known games such as Half-Life, Team Fortress, Defenders of the Ancient, Portal, Left 4 Dead or Counter Strike.
Valve has enormous influences in the industry, as they have created and distributed most popular gaming platform - Steam, where players can play, trade and socialise with others. Valve has also created multiple techniques now copied by other companies, even those as enormous as Valve; like chest-system, where players can pay with real money to buy random in-game products. This idea was so successful, that nowadays MOST of upcoming multiplayer games include chests, and already created games start to do so, like Riot Games with League of Legends.
REFLECTION
Since primary school I have knew what I want to do in the future and this did not change. As I started this course I had a clear idea of what I want to do and who I want to be. For 7 years I have been studying different sections of the IT industry; repairing software, hardware, programming and training other. This entire time I wanted to become a developer and create my own games.
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After starting this course I started doubting whether I will really do it or not. By doubting I mean that I found out other things that I like and I am good at. I really started enjoying creating graphics, posters and animations.
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I have also found different important things about the industry. It seems that I could create my own games, but only after becoming an Indie Developer or create my own company, as right now I would only do work that others would want me to do. I have also never thought of specialising in some direction - I thought that if you want to make games, you do everything. Now I know that different people will be responsible for different tasks, from being a manager, programmer, engineer to designer or concept artist.
Because of that I have problem to choose who to be. I never thought of becoming an expert in only one thing. Another problem is that I do not know if I should go into the Creative Design or Games Development Industry as I am not sure what I would do better.
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My problem is that I have always wanted to be good at everything and I have achieved that, more or less. Thus right now I do not know what I am the best at.
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Thanks to this course I have been able to gather information that did not matter to me before; I did not know how different it is to work for a small or big company. I did not know how long it takes to have a successful career. I also did not know how hard it could be.
MINI PROJECT A
Creating an ad was a time consuming task for both of use. We had to work on our own as individuals but also work together. If not for that, we probably could not be able to finish it.
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In order to create that ad we have decided to take a series of photo showing a wooden doll around the Manchester. I already had some experience with still-life photographs where I am photographing dolls, mannequins and toys. However, I had not any better equipment than my phone so I had to instruct Linda how to take photos like that.
For that reason I have prepared some images taken by myself and other photographers and then showed it to Linda. I have instructed her how is that doll built, how does it move and what poses it can do.
After taking photos I had to experiment with different effects in order to make our photos look even better.
BLURRED BACKGROUND
CHANGED COLOUR TONES
'ARTISTIC PAINT' EFFECT ON A DOLL
'ANTHONY' EFFECT TO CHANGE COLOUR OF SHADOWS
After editing our photos I had to put them together in a video clip - there I had to test different variations of orientation of photos, their order, transitions. I also had to find music that would match our photos, edit it and then download font that would look nice.
MINI PROJECT B
As a group we had to discuss many things related to our project. We did it both in person, in the College or in town, and thought the Facebook's Messenger.
Firstly, we have shared our ideas for this project and talked about our good points in order to decide whether we will take photos or draw a poster.
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We were able to work very effectively thanks to the communication; we discussed all aspects of our project. Outside the college, when we had to work together we were using Messenger to both communicate and share our files, and links. This way we could easily save our conversations and files and then access them at all times.
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We shared all responsibilities accordingly to our skills and experience; Linda who was taking photos for a long time and had a good camera was responsible of photos. At the same time I was responsible of editing photos and then creating a video clip as I have long experience of doing so as well as good software like Camtasia. This way we were able to be as productive as possible.
Then we have presented our project to the rest of class. At that time we discussed all important parts of our project; how we came up with our idea, how we have divided our roles and responsibilities and how important was communication for us. We were able to effectively present our Prezi to the rest of class even though we were not confident. Personally, I was not expecting being so worried about that - I have done many presentations in my life, some lasting to even 30 minutes. This time, however, my legs were shaking after 2 of 6 minutes of our presentation.
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I think that it is because I have never had any presentation with someone else; all my presentations were prepared, produced and presented by me without help of others. I suspect, that I lack confidence in not myself, but people working with me.
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Thanks to this project I have been able to find some areas to improve, like working on confidence. I have been also to gain some experience in working with others, communicating outside the college and share responsibilities (I tend to do most of the work in all group activities, as then I am sure that everything was done properly, so working 50-50 was new for me). In order to improve myself for the next project I shall learn more about group-working and improving confidence.