Games Masters

Frans Mäyrä of DiGRA and the University of Tampere Hypermedia Lab has just launched an interesting Master's Course in Digital Games Research and Design.

The course is distance learning based (no you have to go to Finland) and materials are provided by the likes of: Richard Bartle, Jessica Mulligan, Jesper Jull, Gonzalo Frasca, Espen Aarseth and Katie Salen – which is pretty much a top team of practitioner / theorists.

So if you fancy taking this stuff _really_ seriously check out the admissions details.

Here is the announce. Please check the accreditation details if you are looking to link this with other studies.

Announcement: http://www.uta.fi/hyper/gamestudies/

Online Master's Course in Digital Games Research and Design, 2004-2005

The Master's Course in Digital Games Research and Design is a course module series that uses the resources of several disciplines to address the digital game as a medium of high cultural importance. It aims to educate participants in academic game studies and in conceptual game design fundamentals, by exploiting their practical and theoretical connections.

The course is intended for students, researchers, new media professionals, creative professionals working in the audio-visual industry, teachers and others wishing to specialize as experts on computer games. It comprises of 14 months of distance learning course modules at an intermediate level (between BA and MA), which can also be studied individually. The Master's Course is designed to be studied as a part time course with an estimated workload of thirteen hours a week. The course modules are provided as a part of a pilot project aiming at creating a full game studies degree. Currently the 15 study week credits (15 Finnish credits/30 ECTS) are provided with a diploma that serves as a certificate of full authorization and compatibility with the University of Tampere Hypermedia Studies courses. The course can also form a part of an MA course at the University of Tampere. Accreditability and compatibility with courses of other universities may be possible but have to be discussed individually by the student with the university in question.

Course Modules

Module 1: Introduction to the History and Culture of Computer Games
(3ov/6 ECTS, September 6th 2004 – October 24th 2004)

Module 2: Introduction to Theories of Games and Play
(3ov/6 ECTS, November 1st 2004 – December 19th 2004)

Module 3: Analysis of Games and Playability
(3 ov/6 ECTS, January 10th 2005 – February 27th 2005)

Module 4: Game Design Fundamentals
(3ov/6 ECTS, March 7th 2005 – May 8th 2005)

Module 5: Project Work
(3ov/6 ECTS, September 5th, 2005 – October 30th)

The online course materials and exercises will be provided by scholars and experts of high international repute. These include:

Espen Aarseth, Denmark;
Richard Bartle, United Kingdom;
Matthias Bopp, Germany;
Gonzalo Frasca, Uruguay/Denmark;
Jussi Holopainen, Finland;
Aki Järvinen, Finland;
Jesper Juul, Denmark;
Andreas Lange, Germany;
Frans Mäyrä, Finland;
Jessica Mulligan, USA;
Britta Neitzel, Germany/Finland;
Claus Pias, Germany;
Katie Salen, USA.

Each online module will be tutored by one teacher and tutors. The working language is English.

For more information on course contents, pricing and admissions (open now), go to: http://www.uta.fi/hyper/gamestudies/

Contacts:
Britta Neitzel, tel. +358 3 215 8313, [email protected] (currently on
holiday)
Frans Mäyrä, tel. +358 3 215 7933, [email protected]

Comments

[Betsy Book]

1.

Very cool. Richard, which module(s) are you teaching?

What tools will be used for communications between teachers and students - Email, web, text chat? Virtual worlds?

[Richard Bartle]

2.

Betsy Book>Very cool. Richard, which module(s) are you teaching?

I'm not teaching any modules myself. I was asked to submit some course materials, so I did. Someone else has the problem of making sense of them to students..!

Richard

[Bart]

3.

I'm happy to see more courses like this spring up at Universities. Thanks to MIT's Open Courseware Initiative, there's another great syllabusavailable for games-in-edu enthusiasts.

I didn't see any modules on games in education from this new course offering, which I'd hope to see discussed at some point ;)