BA (Hons) Games Art

Creating art for games is both specialised and rewarding – a mix of technical know-how and creative thinking that can make a huge impact on the look, feel and experience of any computer game. A game artist can create entire living and breathing virtual worlds, dynamic animated characters and beautiful atmospheric effects in one of the most challenging and exciting roles in the creative industry. Our BA (Hons) Games Art course offers this mix, with core skills and vital understanding that will equip you for your future career in the games industry.

While it’s a specialist course offering a specialist skill set, being part of the School of Digital Arts offers the unique opportunity to work with others from across our broad creative community. By working in collaboration with students of photography, animation, sound design and more, as well as students from the Department of Computing and Mathematics, you’ll get a taste of the kind of cross-disciplinary teamwork that’s essential in the fast-moving digital sector. It’s not only a creative environment, but a well-equipped one too. SODA has been purpose-built to develop industry-standard skills, so it offers industry-standard facilities – giving you every opportunity to get to grips with professional-grade development and design technology.

Just as SODA provides a vibrant, dynamic environment for studying games art, Manchester provides an exciting, creative setting. The city is not only home to one of the largest media and creative sectors outside of London, but also has a rich history of video games creation, from Ocean Software in the 1980’s to TT Games and much more today. On our doorstep, you can find renowned CG, visual effects and VR/AR agencies like Flipbook and Carbon Digital, not to mention the BBC’s entire digital and games teams. In short, it’s much more than an exciting city for students, for qualified, well-rounded game artists, Manchester can provide the perfect launch pad for a rewarding career.

This course offers the chance to explore the role art plays in the process of game development, while gaining essential skills in creating concept art, 2D and 3D game assets. As you progress through the course, you’ll focus on the practical processes central to making games, building up an impressive portfolio of games and game-like artefacts, while exploring the specialist areas of games art you’d like to pursue. With innovative assessments like our ‘Game a Week’ challenge, you can prove your abilities and grow your confidence. Then, in your last year, you’ll not only have the chance to focus on your own game art specialism, but you’ll also work as part of a virtual game studio – contributing to a large-scale game through a series of smaller projects.

What is the length of the course?

• 3 years full-time
• 4 years full-time with placement
• 4 years full-time with Foundation