SAN ANTONIO – From “NCAA Football 25″ and “Borderlands” to the Xbox versus PlayStation debate, the gaming industry has experienced a meteoric rise. Now, students at the University of Texas at San Antonio will have a chance to learn the fundamentals of how today’s games are made.
UTSA debuted its game design program at the beginning of the fall semester. It is a concentration in the university’s multidisciplinary studies bachelor’s program.
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“Gaming continues to expand as the largest entertainment industry in the world,” said Samuel Ang, an assistant professor of instruction in computer science at UTSA. “The computer science department has offered a game development course for some time, and that course is always filled with a waitlist out the door.”
As for UTSA taking the steps now to create the program, Ang said it was time.
“The games industry is an attractive career path to many students across the country, and UTSA felt it was time to provide a more structured offering in that regard,” he said.
How the games (will) get made
Gaming has evolved since the days of “Pong” and “Space Invaders.” In the program’s Fundamentals of Game Programming course, students will learn how these games were made.
Students will complete coursework with relevant instructions drawn from UTSA’s College of Sciences and College of Liberal and Fine Arts, respectively, according to a UTSA Today story published in early July.
The program’s three focus areas will allow students to pull information specific to game programming, digital art, and media and game studies.
Jacques Ballou, president of UTSA’s Roadrunner Gaming and junior cybersecurity major, expressed interest in the field finally seeing its own program.
“I know previously there was only an upper-level elective in the computer science track for game design, so it’s great to see that there’s now an entire degree program now with multiple different focuses including digital art and programming,” Ballou said. “It’s a great feeling to know that the university really acknowledges the rapidly growing field of video games.”
Ang will teach the fundamentals course, one he designed from the ground up.
Another aspect of the program is the focus on developing students’ portfolios, which is especially critical in a highly competitive industry.
“Game development courses at UTSA will emphasize project-based learning so that students can get hands-on experience while building their portfolios,” Ang said. “In the future, we would like to partner with companies in the game’s industry for cooperative events.”
Gaming as an enterprise
A map from the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), an industry trade group, shows Texas has garnered a roughly $6.6 billion economic impact in the state, accounting for more than 9,400 jobs.
In terms of the states with the highest impact in millions, Texas ranked third behind California and Washington, according to ESA numbers.
The three states, along with New York and Florida, account for approximately 72% of the industry’s employment, according to an ESA 2024 Economic Impact Report.
Video game companies had an economic impact of $5.5 billion in 2022, according to figures from the state comptroller’s office.
While some small-scale developers call San Antonio home, the more established companies — Activision, Bethesda and Blizzard Entertainment, to name a few — operate regional offices in Austin and Dallas.
However, despite the successes, a question of stability amidst volatility still remains.
Gaming’s good, bad and ugly
Despite the gaming industry seeing titles such as “Diablo IV,” “Baldur’s Gate” and “Star Wars: Jedi Survivor,” released in 2023, one ongoing industry blemish remained troublesome: layoffs.
More than 12,000 layoffs have been reported in the U.S. so far this year, a stark increase of 1,500 from last year’s total, according to a game’s industry layoff tracker.
In late July, Bungie — developer of the first-person shooter “Destiny 2″ — announced layoffs and a restructuring period as the Seattle-area developer continues to “leverage strengths” with its parent company, Sony, a post to the developer’s website said.
Sony acquired Bungie in 2022 for a reported sum of $3.6 billion.
The announcement from Bungie’s CEO said that 17%, or around 220 people, were affected. In October 2023, the company laid off 100 staffers, citing in part a drop in the popularity of “Destiny 2″ as a title.
The Austin-based media company Rooster Teeth shut down earlier this year after a two-decade run in the media and gaming landscape; about 150 employees were affected, according to Variety.
Rooster Teeth was made famous by its “Red vs. Blue” web series, which was set in the world of Bungie’s “Halo” games.
Certain Affinity, a games developer based in Austin, laid off 25 of its U.S.-based employees in late March. A first for the company in its 17-year history, according to a post on the company’s LinkedIn page.
Arkane Austin, a branch of Lyon-based Arkane Studios, seized operations in May. Ninety-six employees were issued WARN notices, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
The company is owned by Microsoft, which, on Thursday, laid off 650 employees in its gaming division, per a memo sent by Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft Gaming.
The layoffs have affected the job search from the top down; new graduates are applying alongside people with decades of experience, said Nicole Carpenter, a senior reporter at Polygon covering business, culture and labor issues in the gaming industry.
But for the sheer amount of layoffs, Carpenter said it’s not normal.
‘Long-standing structural issues’
Carpenter and others attribute the layoffs, in part, to gaming’s “long-standing structural issues.”
“Unfortunately, there is a cycle that studios go through when they hire up for development, and then once the game is launched, (and) they don’t need a bigger team, they lay everyone off,” Carpenter said.
While the COVID-19 pandemic played a part in this process, Carpenter said the practice had existed before.
“The cycles of hiring up and then letting folks go existed before the pandemic,” Carpenter said. “But the pandemic has really supercharged that bad cycle.”
In 2021, the gaming industry saw large public investments, which Carpenter said, in turn, encouraged companies to invest in hiring. A driver of this was the release of “Animal Crossing” in March 2020.
However, Carpenter said that within the last three years, investment has decreased.
“Those numbers couldn’t sustain themselves, so that’s why we’re seeing the layoffs now,” Carpenter said.
The nature of the video game industry is changing partly due to the rise of live service games, Carpenter said.
These games typically involve a publisher planning to provide continual new content to its players at varying rates in an effort to retain engagement and interest.
Examples of live service games are “World of Warcraft,” “Fortnite” and “Destiny 2.”
Gaming is a billion-dollar industry, and, by all accounts, it’s not going anywhere.
“(The) video game industry isn’t doing bad. Companies are not doing horrible,” Carpenter said.
But even big tech companies are experiencing rifts.
Computer chip maker Intel reported 15,000 job cuts in early August, a stark difference compared to their competitor Nvidia, which is now worth over $3.2 trillion, as reported by the Associated Press.
Nvidia has now cemented itself as the foremost provider of power for testing new technological frontiers brought by artificial intelligence (AI), even if it has marred some in the gaming industry.
Opening the AI doors
In addition to a near-constant surge in layoffs, conversations are ongoing about the usage and reliance of AI in game development.
In June, the Associated Press reported that video game actors went on strike over a halt in negotiations with gaming companies over AI concerns and clearer safety and protection measures.
Company divisions for Activision and Electronic Arts, among others, were part of an industry bargaining group working with the cohort of actors and motion capture artists, the AP said.
Gaming companies have employed Generative AI to aid in development. The process can create various sorts of content when prompted by a user, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
Moreover, a Forbes report said that Generative AI could “speed up game development” for big-budget titles, presumably replacing the work of artists, designers and musicians if readily used by companies.
A survey conducted by the Game Developer Collective found respondents’ views on the technology were skewed, with 30% believing it could help lower development costs, especially as the budget of some AAA titles teeter in the millions.
To put that in perspective, Insomniac Games’ “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2″ was released in October 2023 and boasted a $300 million budget, rivaling the Hollywood blockbuster.
While some of these negotiations have seen deals struck — 80 games reached agreements with striking workers in early September — those in UTSA’s program do echo concerns about AI’s future in game development.
“The role of these technologies still remains to be seen,” Ang said. “We will definitely be incorporating some use of AI into the course since that’s the way I believe the wind is blowing, but it will not be a central focus.”
As for AI’s concerns, Ang believes that curation and oversight are important factors, especially in game development.
“I think that AI should absolutely be a concern for artists and programmers alike. As we’ve seen with a lot of AI output, the results are not going to be to anyone’s liking without proper curation, however,” Ang said. “My hope is that going forward, these tools will allow artists and developers to do more with limited time and resources rather than outright replace them.”
Seeking sustainability
Though, for UTSA and other game design programs across the United States, Carpenter said they are good for bringing diverse, new voices into the fold.
One significant way Carpenter hopes the industry can be reshaped is by better supporting entry-level jobs, especially for new graduates.
“Rethinking how you support the video game industry should be rethinking how to support new people coming into the industry and throughout their careers,” Carpenter said. “We can’t just have senior roles; there has to be a very clear pathway for how people can enter the industry.”
In her reporting for Polygon, Carpenter said despite the ripples in the gaming industry, passionate people are working in it.
“The people who work in this industry are very passionate, and they are very dedicated to what they do,” Carpenter said. “It feels like a part of people, you know, this is their creative passion (or) their hobby.”
Ballou supports a unified approach for the students who will make up this program now and in the future.
“Because game design, like a lot of other tech fields (is) very competitive, I’m hoping to see the university develop connections and a reputation in the industry so students can have an easier experience finding a job right outside of college,” he said. “It would be great to see UTSA host Game Jams, a competition where participants create a video game from scratch within a set time frame and in accordance with a theme.”