Get Game

Displays of games, consoles, and books about gaming.

If you’re curious about what it takes to get a career in the video game industry, don’t miss this: on April 19th, the UGL will hold our annual Gaming Career Night. From 7-10pm, artists, writers, programmers, IT managers, music composers and more from local video game company Volition, Inc. will be in room 291 to share their advice and experience. You will have the opportunity to meet one-on-one and in small groups with Volition team members to discuss careers, networking and job-seeking tips, academic advice, and more. PLUS: if you have any artwork, story line ideas, and/or games you’ve created, bring a portfolio of samples to have them critiqued by the experts!

Did you know that Champaign is home to a world-class video game company? Cool, huh?! Champaign-based company Volition, Inc., was born in 1993 as Parallax Software, founded by Mike Kullas and Matt Toschlog. In 1994, the released a shareware version of Descent, which quickly made it into the Top 100 Internet Games charts. The full version of Descent, released in 1995, won a PC Gamer’s Editor’s Choice award, earning one of the top ratings (96%) a game has ever gotten. In 1996, Parallax became Volition, Inc, and the affiliated company Outrage Entertainment. Since then the company has released more highly popular and critically-acclaimed games such as Summoner, Red Faction and Saints Row.

Wondering why the UGL is hosting this particular event? Well, the UGL is part of a Gaming Initiative, which is why we have a large video game collection, a gaming center in the library, and handheld consoles like PSPs for you to check out. The collection supports interdisciplinary research in gaming that goes on in the areas of psychology, computer science, information science, literature and more. Ridiculously awesome.

If you can’t make it to the Gaming Career Night, check out this handy guide to careers in gaming! Here you can read sample job descriptions, advice from industry insiders from previous Gaming Career Nights, a list of UIUC courses in gaming and game design, and more.

Filtered image of games on shelf

 

 

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