Feedback

I’ve had a really great time this year and I think that I’ve learned loads of skills that are good fun to put to use. Since this is the final formal blog task, it seems fitting to begin it by discussing the blogging itself. It’s been good fun and it’s really great to be writing things that you know people you know are going to read. It’s also definitely advantageous over writing an essay as everybody has their own personalised style and it’s fun to read peoples’ writings and watch it develop with each post. The blog tasks have helped me to gain a more focused insight into the game industry and although I’ve found some very challenging, they’re always rewarding upon completion.

Working with 3DS Max has been a challenge but an enjoyable one, however, it’s been made all the more difficult with the amount of hardware problems, so many computers have been down. Having to go through 5 computers in a row that don’t work is pretty demoralising when all you want to do is get your work done. More contact time would be very good as it’s helpful if you run into an unstoppable problem to have Joel quickly show you what’s going wrong.

The drawing side of the course has been very useful. I’ve learnt far more than I thought I would and the workshops and wire modelling classes have added a lot of variety and allowed us to learn new and original skills. It’s also been great going over the basics of drawing and I feel I’ve developed a more mature approach to the way I draw. I’d like us to be able to have more contact time with Chris and Jack as I don’t feel we can get quite as much personal tutoring with the class being the size that it is. I also really enjoyed our trip to Bradgate Park and the various sites around Leicester and I’m sure everybody else did too so more class outings would be great! As I said before, the workshops were really good so I think more work of a “hands on” nature next year would be helpful.

The lectures have been interesting and insightful and I’m looking forward to the idea of lectures on key games for next year and looking at film alongside games would be very helpful due to the cinematic direction that games are able to take with the development of technology so all these sound like good plans.

I’d like to see more games installed on more computers in the labs so everybody can get involved and interesting rivalries within the class can truly begin to flourish. Being able to have CryEngine 2 would be very, very awesome and getting Unreal Engine 3 as soon as possible would be great too.

I think I’ve covered all the issues I wanted to raise and I’m looking forward to next year, should hopefully be very awesome indeed.