Degree Program in Architecture, Game Design and Performing Arts

This creative program brings together three fields that share a concern for space, structure, narrative and audience. Architecture studies how buildings and public spaces are designed to serve people, game design examines how interactive worlds, rules and player experiences are built, and performing arts looks at how bodies, voices, stage environments and timing shape live expression. Learners who enjoy working across disciplines, thinking visually and spatially, and making work meant to be experienced by others are the audience this program is shaped for. If you are looking to study this combination in a structured way, you can explore the Online Degree: Architecture, Game Design and Performing Arts Program. The intended outcomes are a clear understanding of how these fields inform one another, practical skill in designing environments and experiences, and the ability to frame creative work with a reasoned, well-documented rationale.

The curriculum is organized around three major subject areas that run in parallel and then converge. The architecture strand covers spatial reasoning, the history of built environments, site analysis, form and circulation, and the basic principles of how people move through and perceive enclosed and open spaces. The game design strand covers interaction, systems and rules, level and environment design, narrative structure, and the study of how players respond to challenge, feedback and exploration.

The performing arts strand covers staging, movement, the use of voice and presence, stage and set conventions, and the rehearsal and critique practices that help a creator refine a live piece. Modules within each strand are grouped by theme rather than by a fixed sequence of tools, so each topic builds a body of understanding that can be drawn on later. Knowledge is distributed across the strands so that spatial thinking, systems thinking and embodied expression are each developed deliberately.

Learning moves from foundational concepts toward integrated practice. Early work in each strand establishes vocabulary and basic principles, such as scale and proportion in architecture, core loops and feedback in game design, and blocking and spatial relationships on stage. Once those basics are in place, modules begin to connect the strands. For example, a learner might study how the sightlines of a theater auditorium shape audience focus, then apply the same reasoning to the camera framing and level layout of an interactive narrative environment. Another common exercise pairs a building plan with a player route through it, asking how circulation guides attention and emotion.

As the program advances, these connections become more deliberate. Learners work on projects that require a single creative idea to be expressed through more than one discipline, such as a small installation that is simultaneously a built space, a playable experience and a staged performance. Concepts that began as isolated skills are combined into coordinated decisions about form, rules and presence. The progression from foundational to advanced work reflects a shift from learning individual techniques to judging when and why each technique serves the whole.

The program is completed by consolidating the knowledge gathered across the three strands into a final body of work and a written account of the design decisions behind it. This consolidation emphasizes reflection as much as output, asking the learner to explain how spatial, interactive and performative choices were made and what they were meant to communicate. The result is a portfolio-style record of the learner's thinking that documents growth across the program.

Completion can lead to further study or specialization. Some learners focus on architecture and spatial design, others on interactive systems, narrative design or performance, and others pursue research that sits between these fields, such as immersive environments or experimental theater. Continued academic or professional development can build on the same foundation through advanced study, independent projects, collaborative creative work and ongoing practice in whichever discipline the learner chooses to deepen.