The Academic Study of Games
Undergraduates will be the exclusive focus of the B.S. in Games and Simulation Arts and Sciences (GSAS) program and educating our students in the principles of games and simulation and involving them in research to further their knowledge is a primary goal of the this new program. We are harnessing the excitement of our students for studying and creating games and the technological sophistication of our institution to create a vibrant, internationally recognized interdisciplinary community committed to fundamental research and principled creative application of knowledge.
Undergraduate students will play a central role in this enterprise as students, junior colleagues, and partners. We are proposing a second generation program that will draw upon and integrate already articulated faculty research and teaching in disciplines such as the visual and aural aspects of new media in the arts, cognition and artificial intelligence in cognitive science, digital graphics and software development in computer science, experimental game design in psychology, human computer interaction and computer graphics in communication and the arts, and critical studies within all these fields.
The GSAS will be a comprehensive B.S. program that stresses acquiring both fundamental principles and skills in a range of disciplines and also obtaining some depth in a single area of game studies. The keys to success in this dynamic area of intellectual pursuit are a balance of disciplinary competence, a comprehensive understanding of interactive digital media, and a mastery of a clearly defined set of related disciplinary choices.
One signature of our graduates will be their ability to communicate and interact effectively within teams composed of individuals with highly diverse backgrounds, while bringing a strong disciplinary background and developed skill set of their own to the team.
The study of games as a distinct discipline is very new. There is ample evidence that game studies is emerging as a distinct area of inquiry, with contributions from various disciplines forming a unique nexus of research and design practice. Academic study of games can be approached a number of ways, including
- Technical research (hardware and software development techniques)
- Design research and practice
- Critical and cultural analysis
- Artistic exploration of the form
- Applications research (e.g. education and training, health care, bioinformatics, physical systems modeling, government, business)
- Games as a platform for basic research (e.g. psychology, ecology, human communication)