First off, an introduction!

Hello everyone! I've stumbled onto this site recently and decided to join so I'm completely new to this community. :)

Just out of curiosity, I wanted to get an idea of what you guys think think of the current situation I find myself in. First off, I want to make games. I've always wanted to make games ever since i was a child. I'm currently 19 and am going to Community College, working a part time job, and developing a game I plan to release on IOS and Android this summer. I've been developing this game whenever I can find the time for the past 2 months and I believe it has a lot of potential. As much as want to keep developing and spending more time on this project, I feel like my education is holding me back. So that leaves me to my big question...

Should I leave College after this semester to work on my project full time?

I know education is important but wouldn't it be easier to get into this industry with a 100% completed project rather than any kind of degree? This semester in itself has been tough just because I try to make time for my game rather then studying and my grades show that. I've been thinking about this for awhile now and I would definitely appreciate some advice from people currently in the industry. :P

Don't quit college to do a game.
The game market is crowded and marketing can be as big an issue as the game development itself! That's assuming your game manages to look okahy and be fun and accessible etc... i.e. Don't count on the game being a success or being popular. Also, your best chance at getting into working in the industry will be having a portfolio of projects AND graduating college.

wouldn't it be easier to get into this industry with a 100% completed project rather than any kind of degree?

How about both?

wouldn't it be easier to get into this industry with a 100% completed project rather than any kind of degree?

Nope. In fact it might be harder.

Stay in school, finish your degree. Work on projects on the side. Most of the people you'll be competing with in the job market once you graduate will have done that. They will have interesting hobby projects and a degree. So to stay on par with them, all other things being equal, you'll probably want that degree.

Naturally there are exceptions, and it it's certainly possible to get a job in the industry without any sort of relevant degree. Are you willing to make that gamble? There are probably things that will be taught in your degree program that will be hugely useful to your future career, things you don't currently know about, and which you probably don't even know you don't know about. By cutting yourself off from that experience you risk weakening yourself, both as a candidate on paper and as an actual developer doing work on a game.

Finish college and get a degree. Of course I have no idea what you're studying, so maybe the issue is you're not that into whatever that is and need to change it up. But, a college degree will look better on your resume and will help you more throughout your life than a "completed" iOS game. There's plenty of crappy iOS games out there, so that in itself means nothing. Also, you havent completed anything yet. If you cant complete college then what makes you think you'll complete a game project that anyone would care about?

Thanks for all the replies. Really cleared things up for me. I guess I just thought that since all of the most popular start ups CEOs never finished college that it would be unnecessary for me either, but then again, those guys are few and far between. I'll just suck it up and take the debt that a degree earns me. lol

wouldn't it be easier to get into this industry with a 100% completed project rather than any kind of degree?

How about both?

And make that multiple completed projects... nothing shows that you are able to not only complete projects, but complete them on time and repeat the success than having not only one completed project (that might have taken you forever to complete), but multiple of them.

Not finishing your degree and trying to bootstrap your own business is like to stop working when you buy a lottery ticket.

Of course it could work out well... but the chance is incredibly small.

Better to quit the job when you are certain you have hit the jackpot. I am sure most of the "CEO's without a degree" did the same. Most probably they didn't just quit school and then started thinking about what they could do instead... they quit school when they already had a thing going on and where quite certain that it would turn out well.

Thanks for all the replies. Really cleared things up for me. I guess I just thought that since all of the most popular start ups CEOs never finished college that it would be unnecessary for me either, but then again, those guys are few and far between. I'll just suck it up and take the debt that a degree earns me. lol

A lot of those CEO's also came from rich families who had something to fallback on if their company failed.

I don't know what your game is, but two months for your first(?) game isn't very long to fully flesh it out. Unless it is something niche and hits that perfect storm like Flappy Bird or Crossy Roads it will just drown in the sea of crap in the app stores. If you want to try and swing your game as some kind of employment helper it needs to be fairly good. Everybody and their dog has a game on the app store now.

Stay in school and finish the degree. Pretty easy to pay off student loans once you get a job.

I'll just suck it up and take the debt that a degree earns me. lol

Thanks for all the replies. Really cleared things up for me. I guess I just thought that since all of the most popular start ups CEOs never finished college that it would be unnecessary for me either, but then again, those guys are few and far between. I'll just suck it up and take the debt that a degree earns me. lol

Yeah, that is less than 1%. Always have a backup plan, finish your degree.