Course Essentials
Welcome to MA Games Design! My name is Will Henniker and I'm a senior lecturer and the route lead for the MA Games Design course here at CCCU. Alongside our team, I am looking forward to meeting you all this September and supporting you in developing your professional pathways, taking your next steps towards your future in games!
Will Henniker
Course Director
Your Teaching Timetable
Teaching for your course will begin w.c 21 September 2026.
To help you plan your first few weeks, you can view an overview of the teaching activities for your course.
View your first trimester teaching timetable.
On a mobile device, click the arrow next to “Search” at the top right of the page to view your timetable.
If your course is taught in groups, the overview will show activities for all groups. You will only need to attend sessions for your allocated group.
Once teaching begins, your individual timetable and group allocation will be available in MyTimetable provided you have completed online registration and created your computing account.
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Your Trimester 1 Modules |
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Professional Pathways in Games |
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Creative Collaborations |
Key dates
Academic Calendar: Trimesters [15 Week]
View key dates for this Academic Calendar for 2026-27 including when teaching starts and finishes and when you break for holidays.
Welcome
We look forward to meeting you for the first time during Welcome Week where we aim to help you find your feet!
We will introduce you to the teaching team, your Personal Academic Tutor (PAT) and core university systems you will use during your study, but most importantly we will introduce you to your cohort, and help you take the first steps at settling into our community.
Getting started
The academic year is split into 3 Trimesters:
- Trimester 1 - September to January
- Trimester 2 - January to May
- Trimester 3 - May to September
Your Trimester 1 Modules
Your first set of modules are Professional Pathways in Games with Holly Steventon, and Creative Collaborations with Matt Wright.
During Professional Pathways in Games you will develop a not only your creative and technical skills, but also your core understanding of the industry you wish to step into, resulting in a professional pathway plan and a portfolio containing a project that demonstrates the skills you need for your target role.
Your second module, creative collaborations will explore how you can effectively collaborate on projects of your choosing, be it a commercial game project, live performance, or escape room, you set the goals with the result being an effective portfolio piece demonstrating your skills and collaborative ability.
Teaching
All MA Modules on our course require students to get hands on with projects, representing what work in industry would be like, this is a course about doing! Whilst you will still have classes and guidance from experts in the games industry, there is huge room for individual development and creative freedom.
To help you prepare
On the lead up to your studies with us, we strongly recommend that you reflect on what area of games interests you the most and what you want to get out of the MA. Having these understood early on will help you get a significant jump start in the creation of your professional pathway!
Students on MA Games Design will need to bring their own development devices. We strongly suggest a laptop with a dedicated GPU.
Your Must Do Tasks
Once you have been invited to register for your course, there are some key tasks you'll need to complete to make sure you are ready to become a CCCU student.
Registration invitations are sent towards the end of August. We'll send yours to the email address you used when you applied, so please check this inbox regularly to make sure you don't miss any important information.
Pre-course reading
You may want to dig into early the recommended reading for Professional Pathways in Games, this isn't mandatory, but is a great way to prepare for the course.
Barton, G. (2016) Don’t Get a Job… Make a Job: How to Make it as a Creative Graduate,
Laurence King. Cottrell, S. (2016) Skills for Success: Personal Development and Employability,
Palgrave Macmillian. Dunlop. R. (2014) - Production Pipeline Fundamentals for Film and Games.
Routledge Josef. A, Van Lepp, A, D.Carper, M. (2022) - The Business of Indie Games: Everything you need to know to conquer the Indie Games Industry. CRC Press Nichols,
R. (2014) The Global Videogames Industry, BFI Press. Ruggill, J. (2016) Inside the Video Game Industry, Routledge.
Schell J (2018) The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses.
CRC Press Schreier J (2017) Blood, Sweat and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made. Harper
International student success programme
International students: don't miss out! Make sure you register for our international student success programme which provides practical advice on preparing to live and study in the UK.
Contact details
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