Tell your kids, there are more and more ways to make a career out of video games! They could become game designers; they could also play games all the time (or observe other people doing so) for academic research. — Anne Collier —Web News Brief 7 (Net Family News)
Tell your kids — maybe it’s not quite that simple.
It’s interesting to see how the general public is constructing this field — and of course this helps me see what to expect when I start publicizing my “Game Culture and Theory” course for next January.
While it’s important to choose an academic field that you enjoy, I spend far more of my (limited) research time reading scholarly works and writing up my own research, than I spend playing games or watching others play games. And playing a game for fun is a different kind of activity than playing a game because you’re about to write a paper about it. When you’re about to give a talk on Adventure, you want to be sure you don’t confuse the crystal bridge that appears when you wave the rod and the rickety wooden bridge that collapses when a bear crosses it. (I’m happy to say I caught that mistake before I delivered my paper, but only because I had the game with me on my PDA during the train ride…)
Another corner building. Designed and textured. Needs an interior. #blender3d #design #aesthetics #medievalyork #mysteryplay
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Good point... I made web pages to pay my bills while in the English Ph.D. program, and here I am now. One never knows what doors a particular skill will open later.
When I was in grad school, I knew a handful of colleagues in the English program who applied their skills writing technical manuals and game guides for the game manufacturers. So that's always another job. They seemed to enjoy it, but I don't think they ever saw it as a career.