Winter

This course will provide an introduction to genre history and theory in videogame studies through a focus on the “platformer.” Though not a common name outside of videogame culture, the platformer has introduced or popularized some of the medium’s most recognizable figures (Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog, Donkey Kong) and gameplay mechanics (running, jumping, avoiding enemies, and collecting items). The genre has also been instrumental in and reflective of changes across the videogame medium. This course will cover two decades (roughly 1990 – 2010), emphasizing both historical details and theoretical questions, such as: How have game genres been defined? How do distinct genres emerge and change over time? How do broader trends (technological, formal, industrial, discursive, experiential, etc.) influence individual genres, and what roles do individual genres play in these broader trends? What resources and methodologies exist for studying videogame genres? 

Throughout the course we’ll see the platformer alternate between an emphasis on linear, acrobatic movement across two-dimensional spaces and the free exploration of three-dimensional virtual worlds; between providing mascots for the biggest game companies and becoming a marker of independent, small-team production; and between being hailed as “revolutionary” and epitomizing the retro-nostalgic. Classroom lecture and discussion of readings will be accompanied by weekly gameplay sessions on original hardware at the MADD Center.

Focusing on experimental moving-image approaches at a crucial moment in the emerging medium of virtual reality, this course will explore and interrogate each stage of production for VR. By hacking their way around the barriers and conventions of current software and hardware to create new optical experiences, students will design, construct, and deploy new ways of capturing the world with cameras and develop new strategies and interactive logics for placing images into virtual spaces. Underpinning these explorations will be a careful discussion, dissection, and reconstruction of techniques found in the emerging VR "canon" that spans new modes of journalism and documentary, computer games, and narrative "VR cinema."

This class introduces students to the popular forms of Sinophone cinema though the aperture of the New Year Film (hesuipian). The first movies advertised as New Year films date to the 1930s, when cinema-going became a part of the Chinese urban holiday routine in commercial port cities such as Shanghai and Hong Kong. Today, the popular movies that top Chinese domestic box office are almost always released in January or February as Spring Festival offerings. The New Year Film is thus both a holiday marketing category in Sinophone territories and a mass cultural phenomenon that vividly illustrates the cinematic organization of space and time. Over the nine-week winter quarter, we will launch a comprehensive inquiry into the kind of experiences—globalization, urbanization, migration, and diaspora—that mediate the transformations of the Chinese New Year Film, while enjoying a number of its incarnations together over the course of the Lunar New Year holidays. Open to upper-level CMS students: Instructor consent required for all other students.

The Production course is the culmination of the Media Arts and Design program, offering students hands-on experience in bringing their creative concepts to life. In this course, students delve into practical project execution, guided by experienced instructors and equipped with state-of-the-art tools and technologies. From video game design to Internet art, this studio course provides the opportunity for students to apply their skills, refine their projects, and focus on craftsmanship and articulation, preparing students for the Capstone exhibition and beyond.

A studio class exploring techniques for creating realtime augmented performances, from VTubers to motion capture, mixed-reality to machinema. Students will explore the possibilities and opportunities of these emerging technologies, then create and perform their own virtual or augmented productions. No technical experience necessary, and perfect for writers, filmmakers, theater performers, choreographers, or musicians looking to elevate their practice.

Why do we work together? What does it mean to collaborate? How can we create digital environments and systems that encourage teamwork and working towards a common goal? This studio course centers on collaboration by asking the class to conceive, plan, and produce a single shared project from start to finish. Students map their individual skills and interests, then study models of teamwork and group decision-making. We compare traditional frameworks (like Agile and Scrum) with practices drawn from improv, community organizing, sustainable ecology, and arts collectives. These tools guide pitching, role assignment, critique, and feedback. Most weeks run as production sessions focused on updates, planning, and peer review. Technical workshops and visits from domain experts support development as needed. This course helps students practice core collaborative skills and functions as a practicum that mirrors real-world making, culminating in a finished, shareable work.

We generally accept that computers and the Internet evolved outside of fine art contexts, in fields like science and mathematics. That said, the history of these technologies is a history of creative individuals collaboratively shaping one of the most important narratives of our time, "the Internet is the great masterpiece of human civilization" (Heffernan). In this studio course, we'll learn what the Internet is, how it works, how it got here and how to engage with it as a creative medium. This means we'll be learning how to craft it from code, specifically HTML (hypertext markup language) and CSS (cascading style sheets), but also studying its aesthetics, conventions and practices. We'll be drawing inspiration from various Internet art movements, from the net.art scene of the 1990s, to the digital folk art of GeoCities at the turn of the century, to the Web design and CSS art scenes of today. The goal of this course will be to cultivate our own piece of Internet art/design, informed by the research, discussions, exercises and experiments we'll make along the way.

In this class, students will learn how to create high resolution 3D model concepts for the production of video games. High resolution sculpting is an integral part of today’s 3D production pipelines. This course aims to focus on this stage of the production pipeline, and its role in creating high quality games. While this class will focus on creating assets for video games, digital sculpting skills can be applied to a variety of other industries, such as architecture, fashion and jewelry, to name a few.

A practical and theoretical introduction to the design of brand identity, from logos to copy to moving image. In addition to experimenting with practical applications of branding, students will also use history and theory to engage with anti-consumerist post-branding approaches championed by artists and designers such as Jason Grant, Oliver Vodeb, The Yes Men, Barbara Kruger, and Adbusters. Students will practice the process and strategies used to benchmark, research, and ideate effective brand systems through assembled logo, type, color, illustration, imagery, and graphic elements while negotiating the ethically complex histories of branding in practice.

This course surveys a particularly rich quarter-century of gaming history, in which the concept of “indie game” both gelled and evolved. As the 21st century brought an explosion in internet-based games distribution, small-scale game developers faced a definitional question: what does it mean to be “indie”? Does it describe a model of production? Or an aesthetic? (Or something in between?) From emergence of a distinct “independent style” in the late 2000s to the queer games avant-garde of the 2010s to the rise of boutique publishers such as Devolver Digital and Annapurna Interactive that dominate the scene today, this course maps the history of “independence” in games while drawing illustrative connections to earlier indie scenes in music and movies. Focal points range from individual games (Braid, Undertale, OneShot) to genres (walking simulators, cozy games) to platforms (Flash, Twine). To confront the turbulence of engaging with recent history, students will be expected to research and present on one or more games of their choosing outside the syllabus.