Game Creation Society
Why I Really Went into Computer Science
One will have noticed that Mozilla posts have rather died off over the past months. The cause behind this is that of school starting up as my internship ended. So Mozilla posts will periodically continue (the shadows patch is ready to land, btw), but the start of the new school year seems an appropriate time to begin talking about one of my major hobbies: game development.
Video games were, without a doubt, the reason I first became interested in computer science. As a kid, I had always imagined creating worlds, be it on paper, with blocks and toys, through music, or only in my mind. Amazed by the games I played as a child, I dreamed of being able to create some of my own, but it somehow never occurred to me that I should do something about it. However, during my senior year of high school, I finally decided that I didn’t want my dreams to be merely dreams, and taught myself programming so I could start writing games. Within 2 years I found myself to be a CS major spending nearly all his free time designing, programming, and making games. And I haven’t really looked back since.
Carnegie Mellon’s GCS
At Carnegie Mellon University, I help run a little game development club called the Game Creation Society. It’s purpose is rather straight forward: to provide an environment in which students can get together and have fun learning to develop video games. People get together in groups and develop a game over the course of a semester.
The organization is not related to the curriculum in any way: everyone who participates is doing so on a volunteer basis, entirely for the desire to make games. Some do it to build experience for the potential of going into the industry, and some do it to practice skills in the many areas involved with game development. Many others, like myself, do it simply because making games is damned fun.
GCS has so far been an invaluable experience for me. My skills in all areas (software engineering, sound design, art, game design, project management, etc.) have greatly improved from my experience on projects. Very few classes provide the experience of working with a sizable group on a sizable product and seeing that product all the way through the development cycle from brainstorming to release. I’ve learned and developed a lot, and I’m very grateful for what I’ve gotten out of the club. Also, and most importantly, it’s been a blast. I really can’t emphasize how enjoyable game making is.
All of this is (among other things) why I wanted to give back to GCS, and took on the position of Director of Development, which essentially entails managing all the active projects, and ensuring to the best of my abilities that everyone has the resources they need to learn and create awesome games, and have fun doing so. This post served as a little introduction to the organization and what’s it’s all about. In the near future I will talk more about games, both about personal projects on which I am working as well as my experiences running a game development club.
Tags: Carnegie Mellon, Game Creation Society, game development, video games