The world-famous college that helped launch the careers of artist Damien Hirst, fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and musician Damon Albarn has been making a name for itself in games. Goldsmiths offers an MSc in Computer Games And Entertainment centred on programming, maths, business, physics, animation and AI learning, where teaching is delivered by Sony coder Andy Thomason alongside other professionals and leading academics. The course’s co-founding professors, William Latham and Frederic Fol Leymarie, tell us about the core skills they’re teaching students and their enviable record of getting graduates into industry jobs.
What are Goldsmiths’ key attractions for game students?
William Latham Our programme flows into the industry and focuses on placing students with independent developers and on triple-A projects. It’s the first Masters to be accredited with the Creative Skillset Tick in the Greater London area, due to this commitment to giving our students a launch pad for a successful career. Our lecturers have tens of years of experience in the industry and still practise on current and emerging titles and consoles.
Why is big-budget console development still important for students?
Frederic Fol Leymarie Triple-A development is a bit like classical music, and Unity and WebGL are the emerging artists. Some of the greatest rock groups of our time have been composed of classically trained musicians, and it’s imperative that students are well-versed in triple-A to become industry professionals.
Goldsmiths is famous for its creativity. Would you rate it above technical skill?
FFL It definitely takes a little of both, although it’s much easier to get a job off the back of a solid technical education than from a pure design background. Some of our students come from a design background but learn programming as a way to stand out from the crowd.
What skills should students prioritise?
FFL The core subjects of algorithms, maths and programming are what employers really want to see. If these foundations are there, they will have to spend far less time getting their new recruits up to speed. We encourage our students to demonstrate their creative flair through examples of their coursework too. To gain experience, we hope to place all students in industry for the summer or give them an industry-supervised in-house project.
What are the biggest challenges facing today’s students?
WL The industry is more competitive than ever, with many more students wanting to get into the industry. Graduates are often refused positions due to lack of experience and are left frustrated that they can’t get their foot in the door. To counter this, we offer placements across some of the UK’s most exciting gaming institutes. Students work with their lecturers – who are still working in the industry – to secure work placements and gain valuable experience.
Where have Goldsmiths’ games graduates been employed?
WL We have former students at Sony Worldwide Studios, Supermassive Games, We R interactive and Geomerics. And a few like Simon Grinberg at Dream Farmer who run indie studios as well as stars such as Patricia Afari who makes games for children with autism, to name but a few.
Do you work with firms outside of the game industry?
WL We love game hack events and had a great time working with the world-renowned advertising agency M&C Saatchi, who collaborated with staff and students for a 48-hour event dedicated to making and developing interactive games. M&C Saatchi were impressed by our students’ software engineering skills. Each of the teams showcased original games thinking – despite battling sleep deprivation!
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