

Dear Teacher, a Video Game Developer Is a Real Job and Should Be Celebrated - mattmurdog
http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/20/dear-teacher-a-video-game-developer-is-a-real-job-and-should-be-celebrated/#0EXlkW:Rz3e

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deeviant
My experiences with the educational outlook on video game programming is very
different.

I put together a video game programming club for the junior high school my
nephew was in. The response was phenomenal. The teachers loved it, the
principal talked about it every time he got a chance and the club was featured
in several local news outlets as an example of the excellence and modernity of
the local school system.

The language was C# using the (sadly now defunct) XNA game development
framework, and it wasn't long before I had 7th and 8th graders making
games/winform/console apps of all sorts. We made a 2D side-scrolling space
shooter and a tower defence game and the parents are still begging me to put
it on again, which I sadly cannot due to a moving out of the area.

One thing I will say, and I spoke of this to all the kids, is the game
development can be a very harsh environment. Often with substandard pay, long
hours and tons of stress. Which I found out first hand as I went into the game
dev industry right out of college and quickly decided it was not a fit for me
(being that I enjoy having a life outside of my career). But game development
as a hobby is an excellent way to build up programming chops, have a ton of
fun, and even work your way into the game industry if you find it fits your
life/career goals.

In regards to the article, the teacher seems likely to be acting under the
mistaken assumption that anything that involves computer games was "bad,
mmmkay". I feel it is a safe statement to make the video games _can_ have a
positive affect on youth as I go interested in computers in general and
programming specifically when I got into the Diablo 1 hacking/trainer scene so
many years back. I was light years ahead of the read of my peers entering
freshmen CS already familiar with visual studio, C++, memory debugging, binary
dis-assembly and the many other tools of the game hacking trade.

~~~
kazagistar
You don't have to scare them off too hard from games. Games are the gateway
drug for programming... more then half of the freshmen coming in to university
CS programs want to write games, but they all get distracted or change their
mind along the way.

~~~
mattmurdog
I wouldn't be where I am today if it weren't for video games. Eventually got
bored of playing games and decided to make my own.

