OK I just wanted to know How much Math would be required lets say if you worked on a game..Or like to Program a game. I heard you neeed math skills and many gaming colleges have tons of them. Heres my problem..Math Is one of my Weakest Subjects..And I would gladly Worl more with my math if it heavily required it.( I hate math) So does the industry require ALOT of it? and if so what kind of math

I've known a few good programmers who weren't particularly strong in math. They made up for it in other ways.

However, when you see what you can do with the more math you learn, you'll be motivated to learn even more. For game development, you'll want to be at least comfortable with vectors and matrices (linear algebra), as well as understand what makes code fast/efficient (avoiding divisions, sqrt, sin/cos, etc.). If you want to make things move around on screen (especially for physics), learning about basic differential equations and integrators is helpful.

While learning in school won't hurt, you're best chance of success is to learn as much as you can on your own time. If you're not motivated to learn on your own time, you probably won't enjoy doing math+code as a game developer.

If you start by writing simple code to move an object around the screen in 2D, you'll begin to appreciate math (especially as your ambitions to perform more interesting motion grows (such as a particle system, object collisions/bouncing, etc.)).

In general, yes. More accurately though, games generally require a lot of real world modelling [3d objects, physics, economics, growth, flows], which requires a lot of math. If you're not dealing with much modelling either because your game is more abstract, or the part you're working on doesn't deal with it, then less math is needed.

I college I only got through 4 semesters of maths (calc 1,2,3 and differential equations), and have found all of it useful in my 2D, hobbyist little strategy games. I've found times where I've regretted not having math I've not taken formally (statistics, linear algebra, set theory).

And that all ignores some of the mathematics that are useful in formal computer science training, which I've also missed out on.

Yea well maybe you will like math when you relate it to something cool > games. You dont need much of any math for 2d games. 3d games you should know at least something about vectors and matrices(scaling, translation, rotation). You will need more math to do cool stuff with your game tho, such as collision detections.

If you want to do graphics or physics, you absolutely need to have the math skills down pat. If you want to do other types of programming, you might be able to get away with less. Just remember that the market is competitive and your resume might be compared with someone who does have strong math skills.

Well, programming is mostly all math. Usually it's pretty simple math though. There's a lot of algebra involved and some complex forms of math but not too much. I'm not a programmer so I can't give you a true definition but it's important to know your basic math when it comes to anything, especially programming and game development. You'll come across a lot of huge math problems.

You should have a feeling with computer math too, I believe. Schools teach you math in decimal (0-9). Computer math will teach you binary (0-1), octal (0-7), and hexadecimal (0-F). These are important with very technical programming. Hexadecimal is probably the most widely researched though as programmers try to avoid binary whenever possible and... well, I've never even heard of octal until learning it in class.

so if im not good at math now?? I will just not do good at all in having a career?? I am willing to work on my math .

Quote: Original post by Jetto
so if im not good at math now?? I will just not do good at all in having a career?? I am willing to work on my math .

Don't say that. A lot of professionals don't even start out professional. They'll have one goal that's not even near the game industry, such as tourism, then become a professional designer or programmer. Just try to study programming, preferably C++, and see how good you do with it. Pick up some books and look over through them. If you have problems with the math needed after studying, then try paying more attention in school. I find most math that is taught in school complete crap, honestly. You should just have some common logical skills, the basics, and basic algebra.

One of the questions I've encountered very often in job interviews is "how strong is your math?", and if you say that it's good, you have to be ready to back it up, because the question was usually followed by a problem for you to solve on the whiteboard.

As for your original question, I used quite a bit of math on a daily basis at work, for a great deal of things, for example, calculating whether you're in an enemy's line of sight, interpolating between two colors, decreasing or increasing the speed of units in a game programatically, converting distances to game units, calculating altitudes... the list goes on and on.

I guess my point is, the stronger your math the better, but like John said, you may be able to get away with knowing little math if you're able to make up for it in other areas.

edit:
I guess one more thing worth mentioning is that my math abilities improved by several orders or magnitude when I started working professionally on a game... nothing like being thrown into the water to learn how to swim ;)

If you are not strong in math right now, that's probably not a big deal. You can always go to the used book store and load up on math reference books for cheap. It's never too late to learn.

I would recommend having several math references on your desk regardless of your skill level.

I HATED math growing up. Math in school generally isn't fun. It's very abstracted. Why do I care what X equals? I'm kicking myself now for not seeing the big picture back then. Math is a very useful tool. The problem for me was that it was not applied to something interesting to me. Professionally I use math all the time. I've taught myself a great deal on the job. There is no better way to learn than to just "do" it. If you're interested in programming games, then work on writing a small simple game. Write a bunch of really small games. That's the best way to grow your skill if the end result is a career in programming. Nothing looks better when it comes time for an interview than a ton of samples of your work.