Major Change. What Do You All Think?

[MysticSlayer]

So a little background: Tomorrow I'm going in to talk to an advisor at my university about changing my major. As of right now I'm in an Environmental Science major. The problem arises in that it just doesn't seem like a good fit for what I want to actually do. Originally, I was just thinking of switching to Civil and Environmental Engineering, but the form I had to fill out for the meeting asked me what majors I was interested in...And that's where this came from.

I noticed Computer Science and Engineering on the list. Now I've always been interested in Computer Science, in large part because of my interest in game design. Most of my life has been spent wanting to design games, and this has continued as I began to look at games on a deeper design level, not just seeing them as an enjoyable past time. In short, I have considered changing majors to Computer Science multiple times because of this desire.

The thing is, every time I've talked to others about the prospect of game design I always seem to get a usual response: What purpose is there? And that's the issue that keeps pulling me away. My GPA is very high and I've gotten special attention from multiple professors, so a lot of people see my prospect of going into game design as a serious waste of my talents. While I think taking that viewpoint is a little haughty, I do often question what I can really contribute to society in game design compared to pursuing a career in Environmental Engineering (primarily working on water systems). It makes me wonder if it is actually worth pursuing, and I tend to concern myself with how it would look if I start pursuing a Computer Science degree and my explanation is "I want to help develop games." (when I was younger, I had a couple people viciously make fun of me for that) This is only made worse when I considering that my dad is an engineer for one of the largest power companies in the nation, my mom works for one of the largest banks, and I have a brother going into the medical field. I guess there's sort of that need to live up to what my family has done.

So what do you all think? Of course, I'm meeting with the advisor tomorrow, but I can't imagine she will be more sympathetic to the idea than others have been when I brought it up. Do you all think it would be best to pursue a practically lifelong dream, or should I invest my talents in something generally considered more meaningful? I'm really just asking to get the perspective of gamers, not the non-gamers I usually talk to.

Just a few final notes: Yes, I know I will likely enter as an entry-level programmer, not as an actual designer. I am OK with this. Part of me just wants to work with games, even if I may have to wait 10-20+ years before I eventually reach the best job level. Also, I am sure I'd be happy as an environmental engineer, but it is a relatively new desire, largely coming from a career assessment I took a couple years ago. Still, it looks interesting, but it has never been able to get rid of the desire to be in game design. Then again, I'm not sure if I'll reconsider wanting to do environmental engineering once I get on a track of computer science. Also, my college doesn't have a degree in Game Design. The closest you can get is a general degrees that can help lead into one part of the field, among many other fields.

Edit: Not sure if this edit means much, but I do want to specify that any reference to "game design" should be taken as "I just want a job in the industry," not that I actually want the title "Game Designer". In other words, I would be perfectly happy just in the programming or engineering side.

 

[ohnoitsabear]

I don't want to discourage you from going for a career in Computer Science, as it's a very in demand field, with good pay and high job satisfaction rates. That said, the game industry is kind of notorious for being shitty to work for. While it's getting better, and there are some companies out there that are absolutely fantastic to work for, most studios you can expect long hours, insane crunches, and a constant threat of layoffs, even if the game you're making is successful.

But there are worse things you could be doing than taking a few comp sci courses, if that's what interests you. If you decide you like it, a not bad plan would be to aim for a more standard software development career, while still leaving yourself open for the possibility of a fantastic games industry job, or maybe even doing game design as a hobby. Just remember that for getting a job as a software engineer, especially in video games, portfolio is more important than education, so make sure you're doing stuff on the side in addition to what you need to do for your classes.

Finally, don't close yourself off from any options. If you see a field that interests you and that you think you would be good at, don't be afraid to look into it.

 

[kurokotetsu]

I don't know how it is in your college, but Comp Sci in mine does not prepare you that much for Videogame design. You will study about Von Nuemann architecture, algorithm conplexity, concrete and discrete math, assembler language, and other stuff more specialiced thatn your standrard programming, and that I doubt are of much use for videogames. Try some classes indeed, but go more to the engineering stuff or other things. ABout what they are telling you, jsut do what you want to do, what makes you happe, it is your life after all.

 

[Esotera]

Spoiler

Computer science doesn't have much to do with creating games unless you end up programming the engine, which even then will likely be something very abstract and boring. It has very good career prospects though, although I don't know whether your other course does as well. In the end go with what feels right to you, as there's no point doing a job you hate for the rest of your life if you can find something better.

 

[frizzlebyte]

Spoiler

Computer science doesn't have much to do with creating games unless you end up programming the engine, which even then will likely be something very abstract and boring. It has very good career prospects though, although I don't know whether your other course does as well. In the end go with what feels right to you, as there's no point doing a job you hate for the rest of your life if you can find something better.

This is one reason I switched from Comp. Sci. to English. What I really enjoy (and find meaningful) is telling stories, so I switched to something that will develop that mental muscle.

If I end up writing for games or transmedia experiences (i.e., alternate reality games), great, I'd love that!

If I end up writing novels and short stories, and teaching English somewhere (preferably at college level) to make ends meet, great! I'll be contributing to the next generation of students out there, and making some people happy writing stories they enjoy.

I think the concept of "meaningful" is what you make it. The people who enjoy video games find your work meaningful, and who knows, you might just be the guy that makes video games more than just games.

Just because you don't solve global warming doesn't mean you didn't make an impact on someone with your work. If it hadn't been for my unassuming first-semester English professor, I probably wouldn't have considered English for my major. He changed a life, and all he did was teach a class.

When I was heavy into Computer Science, my professors loved me and said I had an uncanny knack for it. While I'm sure that a career in it would have been lucrative, I don't regret going into English at all. I'm even doing volunteer writing for a video games website now, so I know I've made the right choice.

Obviously, if you are so deep into your environmental science major that it would be a huge step backward to go another direction, get that major and do what you can to get yourself on the track you want to be on. Otherwise, change it if that is what will, in the long run, make you happy.

Living your life for other people (which is what it sounds like you're doing) is what I did for most of my young life well into my early twenties. I really wish that hadn't happened, but learn from The Anonymous Guy on the Intarwebs: it ain't worth it.

 

[MrBaskerville]

If you want to do game design, do game design, just remember to work on your portfolio while you study, you will need it^^. Speaking as an aspiring leveldesigner, it really isn't an impossible dream to fulfill.

 

[Retardinator]

As everyone already said, computer science has very little to do with actual programming, especially video game programming. Don't get me wrong, CS has eveything to do with programming in a topical sense, but from a practical perspective there is not as much knowledge as one would expect that you can directly connect to video game programming.

If that's the only thing you're interested in doing, I would advise against it, as CS gets down to nuts, bolts, bits and bytes of what makes a computer (and any device hooked up to it) tick and makes its way up in computer architecture until it gets to the actual programming part, which is way up there.

(It can, however, expand your knowledge and experience in a certain type of problem solving and give you a bigger perspective when approaching them, which sometimes comes in handy)

I am currently working on creating a game engine, and about 10% of what I'm going to implement I've learned in college. Everything else will be done through my own thinking and stuff I've learned online. I could've learned the former online as well, but either I didn't even know about it or wouldn't know what to look for if I hadn't taken up the classes.

So put it on a scale. If the desire to learn programming outweighs the torture that is the mess of Turing machines, Von Neumanns, bits, RAMs, stacks, packets, protocols, sockets, databases, assemblers and whatnots, go for it.

 

[Strazdas]

Sounds like you are studying what you are studying for the purpose of "helping somone" and not because you actaully want to. study what you want to instead, but be prepared to realize that gaming industry is hell to work for. long hours, little pay and massive competition. so choose wisely.

but if you go into programming ,you better well do something like this: http://www.99-bottles-of-beer.net/

 

[Hero of Lime]

As someone who is double majoring in Business and Computer Science, I would definitely recommend either switching over, or going for both if you can. You'll be in school longer doing two majors, but it will make you more flexible when you get to the job market.

Computer Science is in such demand as pretty much every business is deeply connected to computers these days. Engineering is pretty much the same case, lots of demand. Either way you should do fine with whatever you choose.

I would not recommend going to the gaming industry as a programmer, I've heard way too many horror stories involving that type of job. Though that is up to you of course, you shouldn't take all you life advice from me, just most of it will do fine.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Thanks everyone for the replies, everyone. I didn't finalize the decision during my meeting with the advisor, but I am going to be talking to an advisor more closely related to engineering and computer science to help with finalizing the decision.

If that's the only thing you're interested in doing, I would advise against it, as CS gets down to nuts, bolts, bits and bytes of what makes a computer (and any device hooked up to it) tick and makes its way up in computer architecture until it gets to the actual programming part, which is way up there.

This was an idealized post, not a realistic or broad-view one. It isn't the only thing that interests me about the field, but it is sort of my primary point of interest in the field and what keeps reminding me that the field exists and/or causes it to stick out to me whenever reading a list of majors (as was the case here). I'd probably be happy with other careers, though I'd likely be looking for opportunities to get into game programming even while in those other careers. Needless to say, though, my interest in game programming wouldn't be there if I didn't also have an interest in computer science in general (i.e. it would have died long ago if there wasn't the interest in computer science to keep the interest going as I got older).

In short, the post was about my end goal, but that doesn't exclude other options.

I think the concept of "meaningful" is what you make it. The people who enjoy video games find your work meaningful, and who knows, you might just be the guy that makes video games more than just games.

Just because you don't solve global warming doesn't mean you didn't make an impact on someone with your work. If it hadn't been for my unassuming first-semester English professor, I probably wouldn't have considered English for my major. He changed a life, and all he did was teach a class.

When I was heavy into Computer Science, my professors loved me and said I had an uncanny knack for it. While I'm sure that a career in it would have been lucrative, I don't regret going into English at all. I'm even doing volunteer writing for a video games website now, so I know I've made the right choice.

Thanks for the perspective. It certainly helps give a more logical side to the decision.

 

[Yopaz]

My advice would be to not ask people on the internet.

However listen to what they say about computer science being something different than game design. That bit is true.

 

[ForumSafari]

Now I've always been interested in Computer Science, in large part because of my interest in game design. Most of my life has been spent wanting to design games, and this has continued as I began to look at games on a deeper design level, not just seeing them as an enjoyable past time. In short, I have considered changing majors to Computer Science multiple times because of this desire.

Protip: Computer science is not what most people think it is. Research the contents of the course and decide whether it's what you really want to do.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

OK I can't tell you how to live your life or what you should do or how you want to try and "live up" to your lineage.

What I can tell you though, is that making or building games is not some inherently bad thing just because it isn't curing cancer. Entertaining others is as noble a goal as any other. The world can be harsh. Life can be tough. And if you think you can use your gifts to make others happy through designing games and game play, how is that anything other than a total net good?

It sounds like you have some interesting decisions to make and I wish you luck in whichever field you decide to pursue.

 

[Griffolion]

-snip-

1: Do what you want to do. Life is too short to do something as a career you don't necessarily like just for the sake of it "being a good fit", or whatever. Something being "more meaningful" is a relative term. Do what's meaningful to you, and what gives you gratification.

2: Your family is your family, they are their own people. Your own success, whether as "grandiose" as that of your family or not, is your success. Achieve what you want to achieve, not what you think you "should" to keep pace.

3: Taking computer science will still leave you perfectly open to games development jobs. Just orient yourself around software engineering classes, AGILE methods, and maths. For your final year project, take a look at making a game (it will count as SE). Computer science also allows you doors into other fields, too, if you feel like the games sector isn't for you after all. So don't worry about not doing an explicit games development course.

Source: I did Neuropsychology at university first time around because I thought that computer science/games development "wasn't a proper thing", and didn't want to disappoint my family (this was entirely all in my head, they would never have been disappointed). After my graduation, worked for 18 months, went back into study where I am now in the final year of a Computer Science degree with the purpose of going into anything I damn well please in this sector.

I know how you feel to an extent, and can tell you as someone who made the mistake of doing the thing I didn't really like but felt it was more "meaningful" first time around, just do what you like most.

Best of luck to you, and every success.

 

[MysticSlayer]

3: Taking computer science will still leave you perfectly open to games development jobs. Just orient yourself around software engineering classes, AGILE methods, and maths. For your final year project, take a look at making a game (it will count as SE). Computer science also allows you doors into other fields, too, if you feel like the games sector isn't for you after all. So don't worry about not doing an explicit games development course.

Bold Section: If you're talking about the final comment I made, that was really just an explanation as to why I wasn't taking a degree more dedicated to Game Design (figured someone would ask if I didn't mention it). But yeah, I'm not worried about taking Computer Science over Game Development, and I know career sites generally advise Computer Science due to its greater versatility.

Also, thanks for the course advice.

Source: I did Neuropsychology at university first time around because I thought that computer science/games development "wasn't a proper thing", and didn't want to disappoint my family (this was entirely all in my head, they would never have been disappointed). After my graduation, worked for 18 months, went back into study where I am now in the final year of a Computer Science degree with the purpose of going into anything I damn well please in this sector.

I know how you feel to an extent, and can tell you as someone who made the mistake of doing the thing I didn't really like but felt it was more "meaningful" first time around, just do what you like most.

Best of luck to you, and every success.

Thanks for sharing, and yeah, it does sound a lot like what I've been dealing with.

 

[Amaror]

So a little background: Tomorrow I'm going in to talk to an advisor at my university about changing my major. As of right now I'm in an Environmental Science major. The problem arises in that it just doesn't seem like a good fit for what I want to actually do. Originally, I was just thinking of switching to Civil and Environmental Engineering, but the form I had to fill out for the meeting asked me what majors I was interested in...And that's where this came from.

I noticed Computer Science and Engineering on the list. Now I've always been interested in Computer Science, in large part because of my interest in game design. Most of my life has been spent wanting to design games, and this has continued as I began to look at games on a deeper design level, not just seeing them as an enjoyable past time. In short, I have considered changing majors to Computer Science multiple times because of this desire.

The thing is, every time I've talked to others about the prospect of game design I always seem to get a usual response: What purpose is there? And that's the issue that keeps pulling me away. My GPA is very high and I've gotten special attention from multiple professors, so a lot of people see my prospect of going into game design as a serious waste of my talents. While I think taking that viewpoint is a little haughty, I do often question what I can really contribute to society in game design compared to pursuing a career in Environmental Engineering (primarily working on water systems). It makes me wonder if it is actually worth pursuing, and I tend to concern myself with how it would look if I start pursuing a Computer Science degree and my explanation is "I want to help develop games." (when I was younger, I had a couple people viciously make fun of me for that) This is only made worse when I considering that my dad is an engineer for one of the largest power companies in the nation, my mom works for one of the largest banks, and I have a brother going into the medical field. I guess there's sort of that need to live up to what my family has done.

So what do you all think? Of course, I'm meeting with the advisor tomorrow, but I can't imagine she will be more sympathetic to the idea than others have been when I brought it up. Do you all think it would be best to pursue a practically lifelong dream, or should I invest my talents in something generally considered more meaningful? I'm really just asking to get the perspective of gamers, not the non-gamers I usually talk to.

Just a few final notes: Yes, I know I will likely enter as an entry-level programmer, not as an actual designer. I am OK with this. Part of me just wants to work with games, even if I may have to wait 10-20+ years before I eventually reach the best job level. Also, I am sure I'd be happy as an environmental engineer, but it is a relatively new desire, largely coming from a career assessment I took a couple years ago. Still, it looks interesting, but it has never been able to get rid of the desire to be in game design. Then again, I'm not sure if I'll reconsider wanting to do environmental engineering once I get on a track of computer science. Also, my college doesn't have a degree in Game Design. The closest you can get is a general degrees that can help lead into one part of the field, among many other fields.

Well for starters:
You don't learn Game Design by studying Computer Science. Trust me, i study computer science.
You learn Game Design by studying Game Design. Sounds kinda obvious doesn't it?
But just trust me, studying Computer Science has nothing to do with games. The ones that design the Games studied Game Design and the ones actually coding the games did not study anything, but learned directly from the job. There's a word for this in German. You go to a Job and get schooled at it by the business that would hire you later. You get less money, but you get to learn stuff. Google tells me it's "apprenticeship", but that sounds kinda old...
Anyway my point is:
With Computer Science Degree you won't make games. You could maybe go indie, but that's a tough road to take. You will be managing the It Infrastructure, the Network and the Security of Businesses. Or you will design programs on demand for certain businesses.
If you want to learn how to code you can do that in your free time. Coding is not something you study. It's not THAT complicated. What you learn in Computer Science is how to write efficient Algorithmes, how to plan and program security measures, how to program with several processors in mind and a lot of stuff in that Direction. And Math. Tons and Tons of Math.

If you want to go into Computer Science. Do it because you want to do Computer Science. Not because you like Games. Because you won't end up making Games, unless you will apply for a coding job somewhere making much less, than what you could earn with your degree.
If you want to design games, study to design games, not computer science.

 

[frizzlebyte]

Thanks for the perspective. It certainly helps give a more logical side to the decision.

Sure thing. I just know that, once I decided to do what I love (writing), instead of what seemed like everyone thought I should go into (though my parents really just wanted me to be happy, and didn't actually care), I feel like life has finally started to work out for me. I've been a lot happier this year than I have been the better part of a decade, because I finally started living life for *me*.

Once you do that, as corny as it sounds, life begins to fall into place. At least, that's been my experience.

I wish you all the best, really.