Courses
CTCS 564: Seminar in Digital Game Studies
This graduate seminar explores the formal, aesthetic, and cultural aspects of digital games, the emerging critical discourse around the nature of meaningful gameplay, and the relationship of digital games to media such as television and film. Readings will include recently released texts and articles which establish a basis from which to examine games as an artistic medium. Classic and cutting edge games will be played both in and out of class of class to encourage wide-ranging literacy in various genres and historical periods of gameplay and to provide context for the critical discussion.
CTIN 309: Introduction to Interactive Entertainment
Digital games and interactive media are exciting new forms of entertainment that have changed the way that we live, work and play. By their nature, they are experimental forms that deal with questions of engagement, authorship, narrative and the changing relationship between the makers and consumers of media. Understanding the nature of interactive entertainment, its history, properties, practices and potential will make us more literate players, more empowered users and consumers, and more articulate designers of future interactive entertainment products.
CTIN 488: Game Design Workshop
This beginning game design course introduces students to the playcentric method of game design. The workshop focuses on understanding of game systems, analyzing and critique of mechanics, practice in design, prototyping and playtesting methods. Students learn the fundamentals of game design through the study of classic games in both traditional and electronic form, design their own games and playtest/critique fellow students' games. This course is supported by the companion text book Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games.
CTIN 489/CTIN 484: Intermediate Game Design & Development
This follow up to the classes, CTIN 488 Game Design Workshop and CTIN 483 Programming for Interactivity, introduces students to more advanced concepts in game design and development such as ideation, digital prototyping, interface design, usability testing, level design, quality assurance, team work, project planning and management. The main emphasis of the class is on the conceptualization of innovative design goals and the execution of those goals in the form of a complete, polished intermediate game project.
CTIN 491: Advanced Game Projects
This two-semester advanced project class challenges students to use what they have learned in previous classes to design and execute a large-scale, innovative game project. The class introduces professional-level concepts in game design and development, such as competition for project greenlight, specialized team-building, advanced ideation, visual design and technical implementation, effective use of marketing & focus groups, advanced project planning and management, budgeting, actualization, usability, quality assurance and project polish and distribution.
CTIN 534: Experiments in Interactivity I
This course is the first in a two-semester sequence which will introduce students to a variety of concepts in interactivity and teach creative techniques for conceptualizing and producing original interactive projects. The sequence approaches interactivity as a participatory art form, with the designer's goal to provide a specific and meaningful experience for the users and to respond quickly and creatively to feedback during the design process. In the first semester, the exercises focus on low- and non-technical forms of interactivity, experimenting with games, improvisational theater, fine arts, toys, interactive narrative, and real and virtual play spaces.
CTIN 541: Design for Interactive Media
This course introduces students to core skills in interactive design, including conceptualizing interactive systems, prototyping, playtesting and managing an iterative design process to meet specific and meaningful experience goals for users. The overarching themes of the class are: preparation, process, practice and partnership. A central purpose of this course is to give students the opportunity to explore various types of design strategies, to discover their own strengths and interests, and to provide them with a wide repertoire of techniques upon which to draw in the future.