MS 157

Course Information

Course Title: Interactive Media Studio
Semester: Fall 2026
Weekly In-class Study Time: 5 Hours
Weekly External Study Time: 9 Hours

Instructor:

Vinny Roca, Scripps College
vroca@scrippscollege.edu

Office Hours:

By appointment on Tuesday/Thursday 4:00 - 5:00
Schedule Office Hours

Course Description

Interactive Media Studio is an advanced studio-based course for students with prior course work in digital art and programming. Students will additionally be able to make use of prior course work in 3D digital design, video art, and game design when producing projects. The course is focused on teaching the fundamentals of interactive media design using the Unity game engine. Although the class will largely be focused on the history, theory and production of commercial and art games, students are not require to produce video games for their projects. This course encourages experimentation with interactive media and each student will work individually with the instructor to develop their projects.

Course Outline

Media arts, as a field of art, is constantly exploring and pushing the technology around us to both understand the technology and make sense of a technologies impact on our culture. In this same way, interactive media art works always have a relationship to contemporary technology and culture. As media theorist Laine Nooney notes, “…game software is the only kind of software whose whole goal is to manipulate the limits of software…the spirit of a game is to make a computer do something it shouldn’t be able to do.” In this way, to understand interactive media art and games, we need to understand the context under which those art works were produced. The aim of this course then is to ask the questions:

How does technological and cultural context effect the production of interactive media art?
How do media artists produce interactive media work today?

To address these question, this course will focus on three units:

Unit	Focus	Technology	Tutorial	Project
1	Public Games	Arcades	Space shooter	Arcades Everywhere
2	Multimedia	PC and CD Rom	Point and Click	Media Island
3	Game Artists	Game engines	One on ones	New Engines

During each unit we will focus on a particular historical moment in the history of interactive media. To explore the historical time frame associated with each unit we will engage with media and readings. The final unit will explore the contemporary approaches to interactive media by artists, designers and game makers.

Unit 1: Public Games

Week 1-4: Tutorial, Exercise, Readings
Week 5-6: Arcades Everywhere Project

Unit 2: Multimedia Art

Week 7-9: Tutorial, Exercise, Readings
Week 10-12: Media Island Project

Unit 3: Contemporary Approaches

Week 13-15: New Engines Project

Note on 3D

This course is primarily focused on 2D production with the Unity Game Engine. The main reason for this approach is that this course only requires prerequisite knowledge in programming and 2D digital image making techniques. As a result, 3D is expected to be beyond the scope for many students. With that said, students with experience in 3D modeling are encouraged to explore the 3D sections of the Game Development and Unity Essentials Unity Learn tutorials. Additionally, those wishing to use 3D skills with Unity are encouraged to let the instructor know of their past skills and to work with the instructor on developing their 3D Unity abilities during project studio time. The programming skills we will learn within this course will be directly transferable to 3D design within Unity.

Learning Outcomes and Course Objectives

The objective of this course is for advanced students to develop technical media art skills through the development of playable media projects, and to contextualize this knowledge within contemporary theories of interactive media. Through projects, assignments, presentations, readings, technical tutorials, and lectures, students will achieve the following learning outcomes:

Gain the design, software, and programming skills required to develop interactive media art.
Gain an understanding of the contemporary cultural impact and role of interactive media art.
Ability to analyze interactive media art as cultural and artistic objects.
Ability to craft expansive interactive media projects.

Course Breakdown

%	Course Item
30	Final Game
25	Arcade Game
25	Point and Click Game
10	Participation
10	Attendance

%	Letter Grade
93-100	A
90-92	A-
87-89	B+
83-96	B
80-82	B-
77-79	C+
73-76	C
70-72	C-
67-69	D+
63-66	D
60-62	D-
0-59	F

Grading Criteria

Projects and Late Work

Grading Criteria for each project can be found in the Projects section of the class website.

All project components should be turned in before the start of class on their due day. Project components will lose one letter grade for each day they are late. Project components received more than three days past due date will not be accepted. Unexcused absences during proposal and playtesting sessions will result in students receiving a zero for their proposal or playtest grade. Unexcused absences during critique days will result in a two letter grade reduction in the final project grade.

Participation

Playing, understanding, and designing interactive media in a collaborative effort. As such, active participation in all aspects of the class is crucial. Students are expected to actively participate in all aspects of the course. In order to prepare for active participation, students are expected to engage with assigned material before each class session. Phones and laptops are strictly prohibited from being used in-class unless noted otherwise. Use of electronic devices during class will significantly impact the final participation grade.

Attendance

Students are expected to be prepared for class by the start of our class meeting time. Students are allowed one free unexcused absence during the semester. Students may not use their one unexcused absence during critique, proposal or playtesting sessions. Additional absences will only be excused for documented illness, emergencies, or religious observances. Students who arrive to the class after the class meeting time will be marked as tardy. Three tardies will be considered an unexcused absence. Each unexcused absence will decrease the attendance grade by 20%. 5 or more unexcused absences will result in a zero attendance grade. Each unexcused absence beyond 5 will result in a 20% decrease in the student’s participation grade.

Class Resources

Class Website

This class website contains the course syllabus, schedule, assignment descriptions as well as written lecture notes and resources.

For those interested, this website is written in markdown using Obsidian with slightly off-beat syntax to get links working. Jekyll is used to compile the markdown into a static site, and custom layout and CSS is used to build on the Minima theme. The color scheme of this site is based on Flexoki. The website exist as a repository on GitHub and is hosted using GitHub Pages. Gifs are recorded using LICEcap. The typeface if Funnel Sans by Kristian Möller

The class website is a living website and is maintained by a human (me.) With that in mind, if you notice any grammatical errors, missing links, or other bugs, please email me at the above address.

Box, Canvas, Discord and Email

All of the class resources (readings, etc.) are hosted on Box. You can access the class folder using this link. This link requires a password. This password will be shared with students on the first day of class.

Canvas will be used for grading, attendance, and tracking completed assignments. While all assignment descriptions exist on this website, we will use canvas to track what is submitted and when it was submitted. Additional upload information can be found within the project description.

Students will be invited to join the class Discord server on the first day of class. The Discord serves as a community space outside of our physical classroom and our community guidelines extend to this space.

I will respond to community Discord messages and email within 24 hrs of receipt. I will respond to messages sent over the weekend on the following Monday.

For course communication, please send me an email rather than a direct message on Discord. I will not respond to friend requests or direct messages.

Course Success

Best practices for this course:

Review technical tutorials before class.
Complete all assigned technical tutorials before class, questions are encouraged.
Complete all readings when assigned. Practice close reading and take notes. All projects contain a writing component that will ask you to directly respond to the readings.
Be prepared and logged into your computer by the start of class.
When creating projects and following tutorials, test code frequently to check for errors.

Course Fund

We have course funds available that can be used to purchase games, interactive media or devices that will assist students in the development of their projects. Please contact the instructor for more information if you have a specific request.

Lab Hours

Students are expected to work on exercises and assignments outside of class. To complete some assignments, students will need to make use of their personal computer.

Students enrolled in this course will have 24/hr access to the class computer lab. If you have any issues accessing the lab outside of the course hours, please contact me. The lab is not available when other classes are in session.

Statement of Inclusion and Community Agreement

We understand the classroom as a space for practicing freedom; where one may challenge psychic, social, and cultural borders and create meaningful artistic expressions. To do so we must acknowledge and embrace the different identities and backgrounds we inhabit. This means that we will use pronouns, respect self-identifications, and be mindful of special needs. Disagreement is encouraged and supported, however, our differences affect our conceptualization and experience of reality, and it is extremely important to remember that certain gender, race, sex, and class identities are more privileged while others are undermined and marginalized. Consequently, this makes some people feel more protected or vulnerable during debates and discussions. A collaborative effort between the students and Instructor is needed to create a supportive learning environment. While everyone should feel free to experiment creatively and conceptually, if a class member points out that something you have said or shared with the group is offensive, avoid being defensive; instead approach the discussion as a valuable opportunity for us to grow and learn from one another. Alternatively, if you feel that something said in discussion or included in a piece of work is harmful, you are encouraged to speak with the Instructor.

Statement adopted from voidLab at https://github.com/voidlab/diversity-statement.

Land Acknowledgement

We would like to respectfully acknowledge that Scripps College sits within the historic homeland of the Tongva people. We acknowledge the painful history of genocide and colonization in our area. We acknowledge the strength and resilience of the Tongva people of the past, present, and future as the original caretakers of the land, water, and air, and we recognize our responsibility to be respectful stewards of the Scripps College campus. Today, this area and this campus are home to many Indigenous people from across the globe and we are proud that they are part of our community and institution.

Accommodations

The instructor will work individually with each student on reasonable accommodations.

If you have questions about accommodations for the course, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Campus Disability Coordinators: