Last Updated: 3/23/2004 11:18:51 AM
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Programmers, Look To Video Games

Electronic Arts Inc. said Monday that it has made a multimillion-dollar donation to the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television to fund an advanced video-design program.
The Electronic Arts Interactive Entertainment Program will offer specialized courses in video-game design, writing for video games, and creating games with multiple players, courses the vendor says aren't part of the curriculum at most university computer-science departments. As part of the program, students will have access to a research lab where they can focus on exploring interactive entertainment and study the discipline of game development.

"To create the next generation of entertainment, we need the next generation of talent," said Rusty Rueff, executive VP of human resources at Electronic Arts, in a statement. "Melding storytelling, art, music, game design, and technology has become so complex that it is imperative for tomorrow's designers and producers to acquire an education with both depth and breadth in order to achieve success in our ever-growing industry."

Students are paying attention to the discouraging state of the IT jobs market in the United States. In response, some students with plans for a career in IT have begun thinking about whether they should look more closely at the emerging interactive entertainment field.

"Outsourcing is my No. 1 fear, so that's why I want to turn from basic programming to game programming," says Peter Rayson, a 21-year-old computer science major and mathematics minor at Queens College. The layers of interrelated infrastructures--programming, design, script writing-- that go into building interactive entertainment make those jobs harder to outsource, he says. "It's a creative field, and I have hope there."

Electronic Arts, which was founded in 1982, reported $2.5 billion in revenue in 2003 and says revenue for its fiscal year ending March 31 will rise to between $2.85 billion and $2.93 billion, up 15% to 18% year over year. While that growth looks promising to would-be video-game developers, the market for those jobs is a competitive one, industry observers say. "The gaming industry is extremely competitive in terms of jobs, but it's a real advantage to have students coming out of universities with a required skill set," says David Cole, president of DFC Intelligence, a market-research firm. "This includes not only creative skills, but also technical skills."

IT's interaction with the entertainment industry has strong roots, but other universities also are offering programs that speak to the ways that technology intersects with other fields.

For instance, Polytechnic University in New York has introduced an executive management of technology master's program that includes tracks for helping managers develop their skills in specific knowledge-intensive industries, such as the burgeoning biopharma sector. That track is part of the university's Department of Biological Science and Chemical Engineering. Says Mel Horwitch, professor of management at Polytechnic University, "The courses deal with the managerial overview of a sector, the management of innovation, and new innovation technologies and trends."
Source: Shot4u Studios