Communications of the ACM
Game On at Kingston niversity
"I've been building landscapes for 3D characters to explore and it makes such a difference to be able to work on the programming and the images at the same time," says computer science and games programming student Ivan Kabunga.
Credit: Kingston University
A new state-of-the-art gaming facility should help Kingston University produce industry leaders in game development. Every desk in the laboratory has an Xbox and a handheld Sony PSP game console, and development hardware links the consoles to PCs. Students also get to use special development software provided by Sony and Microsoft to gain hands-on experience. "The students can work together taking on a variety of development roles and can use a lot of different equipment simultaneously — all of which reflects what they will find in the real world," says Kingston's games technology field leader Darrel Greenhill.
The lab also features three pairs of large projector screens, which will enable the class to study code and see the corresponding graphics at the same time. Teachers also will be able to display the work of students for discussion.
Kingston offers both games programming and games technology degrees, and students will be able to study games development at the postgraduate level beginning in 2010. "With the new courses and our new games lab, I would definitely say we are ahead of the game at Kingston," Greenhill says.
From Kingston University London (U.K.)
View Full Article
Abstracts Copyright © 2009 Information Inc., Bethesda, Maryland, USA 
No entries found