Master of Fine Arts in Game Design

Laguna College of Art + Design’s Game Design MFA seeks to advance the art, science, and culture of play by creating a context for advanced study and innovative work.

LCAD’s Game Design MFA is an online 2-year terminal Masters of Fine Arts (MFA) degree that allows you to explore the design and development of games as a creative practice. The program offers a unique, multidisciplinary approach that bridges the gap between theory and practice in game design.

The Game Design MFA online curriculum is centered on the processes of both the creation and the development of games. The program acknowledges that games are responsible for providing much more than mere entertainment; they also are meaningful products of a thriving global economy that illuminate truths about our world, our societies, and ourselves.

LCAD’s Game Design MFA is structured in such a way that will empower you with both the knowledge base and the skill sets to ensure that your own meaningful game design enterprises are economically impactful and sustainable.

Our Game Design program will develop your creative skills and enhance your potential as a game designer, developer, and entrepreneur.

Select program candidates will create a graduate-level game development environment, replicating that which reflects the current industry model, nurturing advanced skills in design, research, and development, leadership, and marketing in the creative art of game design.

FOUNDED IN 1961

Laguna College of Art and Design (LCAD) was founded in 1961 as the Laguna Beach School of Art, a non-profit college of art and design. In the early 1900s, artists, intellectuals, and entertainers began a thriving cultural community in Laguna Beach. Drawn to the stunning luminance of the area, Plein air painters like Edgar Payne and Anna Hills founded the Laguna Beach Art Association, while screen actors like Bette Davis and Charlie Chaplin helped inspire the founding of the Laguna Playhouse. These pioneering cultural ventures spawned the Festival of Arts, Pageant of the Masters, Laguna Art Museum, and Laguna Beach School of Art (LBSA, the predecessor to the College). Nellie Gail Moulton was one of the founding members of LBSA and provided the first significant gift to the then-fledgling college.

Since its founding in 1961, LCAD has grown significantly to include eleven undergraduate majors, three graduate degree programs, nine minors, and a Post-Baccalaureate program. LCAD’s campus also has grown to include seven sites throughout Laguna Canyon and Laguna Beach that accommodate its student population of more than 700 full-time students. The College has been under the leadership of thirteen College Presidents including our current President, Jonathan Burke. LCAD is now one of the leading colleges of art and design in the country.