Your Application
ARRANGING AN INTERVIEW
The stages you must complete for an interview: 1. Complete the Study Skill Tests (Kies Actief) 2. Complete the quiz to select your Path (or 2 if an Indie applicant) 3. Pay for your interview You will then receive a scheduled interview time.PREPARING FOR THE INTERVIEW
For the interview, if you have little or no experience to show, you will need to complete: - Visual Arts - Art Assignment. - Programming - Programming Assignment. - Design & Production - Design Assignment and Production Assignment. - Indie - Select 2 from above. You will need to bring along your completed assignment/s along with all portfolio evidence of your relevant experience. For International Students this will all be done via a video conference over Skype.INTERVIEW DAY
Early Intake Interviews: 27th, 29th and 30th January 2015 Final Intake Interviews: TBA On the interview day there are 2 parts: 1. Examination Everyone will sit a common entry exam to see where your math, problem solving and scripting levels are at. Then, depending the one or two paths you selected, you will need to complete: - Visual Arts - Drawing Challenge - Programming - C++ Basics Test - Design & Production - 100 Word Game Pitch - Indie - Select 2 from above 2. Interview In the interview you will present a portfolio to support your strength/s of: - Visual Arts - Programming - Design & Production - Indie - Evidence of 2 from the above In the interview you will need to present portfolio evidence for your selected strength/s of either Visual Arts/Programming/Design & Production. Bring your own laptop/computer if you need to show anything electronic.Please bring a portfolio to be reviewed by our staff. It can contain examples of 2D or 3D artwork made by you in any medium. We have a strong preference for representational art made from reference or industrial and architectural design. Please do not bring fan art or fantasy subjects. You may bring original or digital art as a portfolio. We will have a laptop available for viewing digital art (saved as PDF or JPG) delivered on a USB device. As an alternative, you may bring your own laptop or tablet. There will be no Internet access at the event. Visual Arts Assignments In addition to bringing a portfolio we highly recommend you to do the following assignments (if you have no portfolio these assignments are mandatory): ● Self-portrait ● Landscape with buildings ● Clean line drawing of a vehicle ● 3D model of a bicycle. These assignments will give us a good idea of art skills outside of your comfort zone. By doing these assignments and bringing them to the intake interview it will highly improve your chance of a successful application.
Please take care of the following: The drawings must be based on the subject itself, draw what you see. Do not use photos, do not draw from imagination, and make sure to avoid stylization. Make sure to practice, try different takes on the same subject before delivering. Please look for ways to show depth in the drawing. It may help to use a straightedge like a small triangle or ruler for parts of the drawing to make straight lines, this is allowed. For the 3D bicycle model, make sure to work from actual reference (using photos is allowed) and pay close attention to proportions and detail. Keep your model clean and
wireframe will show this.
You can use any 3D software you like (please check: http://www.autodesk.com/ for a free/trial edition of Autodesk Maya). Make sure to bring 3 screenshots (saved as JPG) of the modeling viewport, showing your 3D model including wireframes in side,
perspective and close-up for review.
DESIGN & PRODUCTION PORTFOLIO AND ASSIGNMENT
Your Design & Production portfolio should have examples of mechanics and game structures as well as examples of any game projects you’ve worked on, any documentation examples you’ve developed and any project management you’ve done. Construct your portfolio in a logical order, if your portfolio requires a laptop to view a component you must provide your own, please ensure this laptop is charged, awake and has all portfolio pieces loaded before coming into the interview room. Wherever possible provide video and .exe versions of your work rather than running from applications, in order to save time and reduce the pressure on you to present the work and play at the same time. We cannot extend an interview slot to wait for applications and files to load. Strong preference is given to industry relevant portfolio pieces including: ● Game Design Documents ● High Level Concept Documents ● Mechanic Prototypes ● Project Management Documentation ● 3D & 2D Level Design ● Board Game Design Programming code examples and 3D art are a nice addition but not essential at all. Design doesn’t comprise character art therefore please don’t apply for D&P if you want to design characters. Narrative as a discipline is the smallest group of designers in the industry, our programme represents this with only a small number of courses relating to storytelling while far more are devoted to mechanic design, level design and production. Therefore portfolios consisting only of story, character and setting pieces will not be successful. During the interview we will assess your verbal and written English language comprehension and ability. Designers and Producers often act as facilitators within a team so we will assess your sense of responsibility, attitude, personality and communication ability.assignment: Select a well known game which you have completed and which was released between November 2005 and November 2010. Highlight a core mechanic of that game and analyse the following: 1. How that mechanic was conveyed to the player. 2. How that mechanic interacted with other mechanics. 3. How that mechanic interacted with the world. 4. Suggest one improvement to that mechanic. The important focus of this exercise is to provide a balanced view of the mechanic, highlighting it’s positives and negatives. Therefore we recommend selecting a game which you can remain objective about. The analysis should be around 500 words and be formatted in a readable and understandable way. Please spell check and proofread this work before presenting. If you do not have a sufficient Production portfolio please undertake the following assignment: Please assess the process of making a cup of tea, with milk and 2 sugars, in the most efficient manner possible and communicate that process in a clear and understandable way. Your assignment should clearly answer the following: 1. What items are required to make the drink? 2. What steps go into making the drink? 3. How long does it take to make the drink? Successful applicants will look at the best way to represent this information that minimises the amount of reading required whilst not compromising the end result.
PROGRAMMING PORTFOLIO AND ASSIGNMENT
You will need to present all your most relevant game programming experience. C++ games programming is the most desirable. If you have not done any C++ game programming then it is mandatory that you at least attempt the programming assignment below and bring this to present at the interview. At the presentation (you may use slides) we expect, on your own laptop/computer, for you to show us your best game programming examples along with a quick code walk-through of programming you are most proud of. Programming Assignment (This is optional if you already have C++ games programming examples) Write a small 2D single-player game based on the following theme: ‘Jelly’ Observe the following requirements: 1. The game should be your own work. 2. If you use source-code, tutorials and/or art from others then state this clearly 3. Graphics are irrelevant, unless produced by your code (e.g. a particle effect) 4. Feel free to use third-party art or use simple lines and boxes (again reference where everything comes from) 5. The fact that the theme can be interpreted in several ways is intentional. You must however stick to the theme 6. Must be done in C++ and makes use of functions and optionally classes8. Game can be compiled with a C++ compiler (Visual Studio Pro or Express) 9. The game has graphical game-play and runs without error 10.Your code is well structured and commented If you have never programmed before then we recommend a book that will prepare you for the interview and topics encountered in the first year programming is Beginning C++ Through Game Programming (3rd Edition) by Michael Dawson (2006) published by Course Technology (ISBN 1435457420). It is highly recommended that you work through this book before beginning at NHTV.
