The 10 Best Undergraduate Video Game Design Schools

Gaming enthusiasts, take note -- the University of Southern California has been named the Princeton Review and GamePro Media's best school for video game design at the undergraduate and graduate level in 2011.

In 2010 and 2011, the Princeton Review questioned officials at 150 institutions that offer game design programs on their schools' academics, faculty credentials, facilities, infrastructure and post-grad employment placements. The top ten undergraduate and graduate schools were then selected based on these responses, as well as on the Princeton Review's own data on scholarships, financial aid and career opportunities at the schools under consideration.

The 20 best schools -- as well as five honorable mentions in each category -- will be featured in GamePro's upcoming April edition, to be released on March 8. The article -- currently available online -- offers information on each school and gives advice on how to be accepted into top graduate programs.

Below, check out the top ten undergraduate video game design programs. Princeton Review and GamePro have more info, plus the honorable mentions.

Did your school make the cut? Let us know in the comments section.

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University of Southern California

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Interactive Media Division & Computer Science (Game Development)

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Interactive Media Division & Computer Science (Game Development)

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Comments

[cincinnati]

04:28 AM on 03/03/2011

University of Cincinnati also.....in
Design, Art, Architecture, and Planning or DAAP....
one of the top design schools in the world....

[although the architect who did the wild addition and roof
about 10 years ago.....it leaks and needs $ 10 Million repair...]

[Sandy LashinCurewitz]

03:12 PM on 03/02/2011

Try this for a more detailed 2011 list: http://www.gamepro.com/article/features/218324/the-princeton-reviews-top-10-grad-undergrad-game-design-schools/. The College Surfing link is from 2010.

[-swift]

01:32 PM on 03/02/2011

That's my new goal. I'm tired of sitting in a cubicle grinding away at a computer all day. I'll retrain myself as a video game designer and be the next Sid Me....I'll sit in a cubicle at some game factory and grind away at a computer all day.

[eek]

12:34 PM on 03/02/2011

Here is an excerpt from an article in College Surfing Insider detailing locations of some of the schools in the slideshow:

http://www.collegesurfing.com/blog/2010/03/03/top-schools-for-video-game-design/
"..So who is No. 1? That’s the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. GamePro notes that the school’s Interactive Media Division has helped launched careers of graduates who are well known in the indie gaming arena.

Others rounding out the top 8 are on both coasts. They are: DigiPen Institute of Technology (Redmond, Wash.), Drexel University (Philadelphia), Becker College (Worcester, Mass.), Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.), The Art Institute of Vancouver (Vancouver, B.C.), Worcester Polytechnic Institute (Worcester, Mass.), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, Mass)..."

[eek]

12:27 PM on 03/02/2011

Wish the locations had been added to the headers. DigiPen? Becker?