Career Advise!

Hi Ppl. This is Smooth_Criminal u all can refer to me as Smoothie. I am currently doin my graduation and want to get into game Devolpment. It will take another year and a half 4 my graduation to complete. In the mean time I doin course on 3Ds Max 6.0 which will be completed by this Oct and I also plan to do Maya and Photoshop also. This for the modellin part. Apart from this I am also gonna learn some codin softwares like C, C++, VC ++, n VB. Then I plan to go to either Canada or U.K for a complete course in Game devo. By doin the present courses I think i can make a good base 4 myself in this field. Wht do u guys suggest.

my advice is that you need to specialize. unless you have a genuine talent you should try to forget about being great at both 3d art, 2d art and programming. also, if you want to break in as a programmer you should go for at least a bachelor in computer science / software engineering, all while working on your vc++ and preferably also opengl or directx skills (if you're going towards graphics programming). You could of course go for physics, ai, or even tool programming. the bottom line is, figure out what you like the most, get a proper education, and see where it takes you.

good luck

Yeh i have a friend thats doing programming and says it takes all his time up learning it, i agree with interman. Learn one of the things like graphics or programming but it might be hard learning both. But of course thats only my opinion i've never done programming.

Programming is interesting, if u like it, u can really get into it.

For anyone whose never programmed(VB, basic, Java, JS, html, php, xml, perl, and python do not fit under programming in my book, scripting yes, programming no) Its mostly debugging and tricks. Figuring out how your going to do something is a pretty large part, then doing it is quick(in minutes really) and then debugging that takes between 30 min-hours and days. Writting the basic code is no problem, figuring out how to write what u need to, and debugging it and getting it to work are the tricky parts.

3D Art is cool, but its very very tedious...Ive done more then a fair share of models, and all i can say is its tedious work, the actualy modeling is cool, but it takes a lot of effort and time, u gotta get the details just right. the the UVW probably the worst part, what do u get from doing it? nothing directly, but u can't do a model witout it. How long does it take? about 2-3x as long as it took to model it.
Skinning is tricky to get right, but its interesting.

I would take some (basic) classes in them all and try it out, then choose the one u like the most. Game devs have a lot to worry about, so try out what you love because its buttloads of work.

3D artists need to know the following though
Animation
UVW
Modeling in several programs
Skinning
Shaders
Bump Maps
Particle effects

2D artists a lot of the time are just 3D artists expanded.
2D art is also pretty tedious, and long and u gotta make so many damn textures for the mappers...... so many..

mappers and map designers are surprisingly hard to find. It takes a lot of effort, brainpower, natural talent, skills and effort, in order to make a good map. Go read up on the creation of de_dust, de_dust2 de_aztec and de_aztec2 that isn't hard to find. also read up on CLiffyB's stuff at his site, a lot of stuff on map and game design, and an article on how to become a game dev.

Game devs spend years for little respect, low paying jobs, and chances are, making games few peopel want, thats just the honost truth of it,

U guys will probably be making games like Deer hunter or like, bowling for champs 6, that is the sad truth of it.

Game devs spend years for little respect, low paying jobs, and chances are, making games few peopel want, thats just the honost truth of it,

U guys will probably be making games like Deer hunter or like, bowling for champs 6, that is the sad truth of it

Hey thanks 4 the info dude. Ae u said above Game devo is a tough job. I would say nothin comes easy in life we will hav to struggle 4 it. And, I am ready to do tht 4 my career. Well I am a commerce student basically but, as I said I am doin my courses on animation. The piece of advise tht I was given by my faculty was... If u hav creativity u will go far in this field. Of course creativity is not the only thing tht counts... know the subject and implementin it accordingly also does.
I am buildin a base 4 myself rite now. I am jus 19 and hav a really long way to go. Coz its was only this year tht I started buildin up interest in makin games rather than jus playin them.
If each and every person would hav though abut the returns in this field then my fellow gamers we would'nt had been able to play these good games. (I am gettin a bit senti )
Anyways r there any 3D modellers out here or anyone interested in game devolopment??? DO u do 3D modellin Sepht??

i suggest you start reading as many articles as you can on gamedev.net, flipcode.com and gamasutra.com

Originally posted by Smooth_Criminal@Oct 1 2004, 06:13 PM

Hey thanks 4 the info dude. Ae u said above Game devo is a tough job. I would say nothin comes easy in life we will hav to struggle 4 it. And, I am ready to do tht 4 my career. Well I am a commerce student basically but, as I said I am doin my courses on animation. The piece of advise tht I was given by my faculty was... If u hav creativity u will go far in this field. Of course creativity is not the only thing tht counts... know the subject and implementin it accordingly also does.
I am buildin a base 4 myself rite now. I am jus 19 and hav a really long way to go. Coz its was only this year tht I started buildin up interest in makin games rather than jus playin them.
If each and every person would hav though abut the returns in this field then my fellow gamers we would'nt had been able to play these good games. (I am gettin a bit senti )
Anyways r there any 3D modellers out here or anyone interested in game devolopment? DO u do 3D modellin Sepht??

3dModeler(with all the things listed above as requirements to be a decent 3d modeler), programmer, mapper, game/map designer.

2d art... is still not on there, looking to add it though.

anyway....

http://www.cliffyb.com/ he has some good rants/articles/tips for people like you.

Ok thanks dude!
Anymore advise plz.
Wht do u guys think abut these universities?
Dave School: Uk
Vancouver Arts: Canada
Or anymore really good ones? Links plz.

having a full game mod of doom3 on ut can help if yur are the main coder, and the mod is popular, if u add it to yur CV as a hobby or some thing

make a AssKickin MP MOD for DooM3 and the people will love you and you gonna be da rulor of da world...some CS n@b might say 1337, but that's alright...