The popularity of video and computer games in today's culture has created the need for game programmers.

In response to this demand, colleges across the country are offering courses and in some cases entire majors in game programming.

Marquette does not offer a major or a minor in game programming, but it does have its own computer game-related class.

Computer Science 174: Programming Computer Games has been offered at Marquette for six years.

"It focuses on the programming aspects of the games," said Michael Slattery, associate professor of math, statistics, and computer science . "The main focus of the course is to get students to use graphics to communicate with the user," he said.

"Right now we're working on 2-D games," said Mike Rodey, a student in the class and a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences. "Eventually we're going to be working on network games and 3-D games."

"We start with basic game designs like Pawn and Tetris. There's a lot of math behind it," said Tim Bindas, a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences who is taking the class.

Although the course focuses on computer game programming, the skills can be used in other places.

"Computer game programming is one of the toughest types of programming, so this course will make me better at working with any type of computer programming," Rodey said.

It takes anywhere from one to two years to produce a video game, according to Slattery.

"There are big groups of people working on them," he said.

People are needed to work on a game's story line, music, and the publicity, among other things.

"The programmer has to take all these ideas and turn them into a working game," Slattery said.

The popularity of the course has fluctuated, but on average there are about 20 students in the class every semester, Slattery said.

"The students have talked about adding another course, but the biggest challenge is trying to fit it in the schedule," Slattery said. "If we add one then we have to take another out. It's possible that we could add more."

Although video and computer games are popular today, some people wonder if society is putting too much influence on video games.

"I think that at many of the schools there is a resistance to offering these courses for the social reasons," Slattery said.

On the other hand, Slattery said, "It's the reality at this point that video games are a huge source of entertainment. It's silly to ignore it. The games industry is rapidly growing."

Mark Van Spankeren, a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences in the class, said the course is a legitimate one to offer.

"It's a legitimate source of jobs so colleges should be training for it," Van Spankeren said. "The industry is rapidly becoming bigger than the Hollywood movie industry."

This article was published in The Marquette Tribune on October 4, 2005.