Ben: As VP & COO of EA Tiburon in 2003 with a mission of growing to a 1,000-developer studio, we began discussions with the governor’s office, local EDC, UCF and the City of Orlando on developing a graduate program to develop high-wage programmers, artists and producers for the fast-growing video game industry.

Rick: I was working at EA Tiburon at the time. I’d known Ben Noel from the Origin days. He said he was starting up a game development grad program at UCF, and asked me to come teach design and project management.

JR: Ben was my COO at EA Tiburon, and we had just finished moving into our new studio in Maitland. He shared his vision for a new graduate game development school in partnership with the State, City, and UCF, and invited me to help create an even better studio experience at UCF FIEA. With the latest EA project still fresh and the chance to build something groundbreaking with top talent from around the country, it felt like one of those rare opportunities you just have to be part of.

Ron: I was working full time at Disney when I received a call from a gem of a man, Mike Moshell, who was helping recruit the inaugural FIEA faculty. I had previously taught a few classes for him in UCF’s undergraduate Digital Media program. To be honest, I hesitated to leave a secure position to join a brand-new graduate program—those often resemble startups, and we all know how unpredictable that can be. However, through the interviews, trial lecture, and subsequent conversations, it became clear that FIEA was determined to hire faculty straight from industry, especially veterans from Electronic Arts. That’s when I knew the program would be high quality and focus on coursework that genuinely helped students achieve their dream jobs. That kind of opportunity was impossible for me to resist.

Rich: I was teaching in UCF’s film program and strongly encouraged to obtain a Masters degree. I was introduced to Digital Media, but found FIEA instead, which was still in the planning stage. It was literally three or four guys sitting around a table imagining what the program might be. I loved the idea of learning video game production techniques and applying those to filmmaking, so I signed up for FIEA’s first cohort, and joined FIEA full time a few years later.

Ben: Every Fall commencement when students earn their degrees, 20 classes so far, having developed life-long relationships, and head off for their dream career.

Rick: Gabe Gonzalez pulling off a miracle comeback when demoing Battle Fortress Tortoise during final presentations.

“I vividly remember when our GDC Alumni Party really exploded for the first time. A throng of incredibly successful alumni had already infiltrated many of the most coveted game studios.”

Ron: Technically, this memory didn’t happen at FIEA, but rather at the Game Developers Conference. In FIEA’s early years, we carried a certain amount of anxiety about how well we could help our students break into the notoriously impregnable game industry. I can’t recall the exact year, but I vividly remember when our GDC Alumni Party really exploded for the first time. A throng of incredibly successful alumni had already infiltrated many of the most coveted game studios. It was working—and I reflected with other faculty, feeling an overwhelming sense of relief and pride. Hearing about our graduates’ accomplishments was intoxicating; we had been cheering them on for years. Seeing their joy that night, I walked back to the hotel on such a high.

JR: Watching the kids of the FIEA employees grow up, including my own daughters. Occasionally my two girls would come in during their summer vacation from school, having watched lots of TV and playing a video game about a show/game called Totally Spies, and would play “Spy” behind the art cubicles. A certain art faculty was their spy nemesis, and his code name was “Whiteshadow.” It was such an endearing name, that I named the cohort color printer “Whiteshadow” to memorialize my little spies and their nemesis. During the years we saw so many of the faculty and staff’s kids grow up in the FIEA Family. Several even did summer stints in the Operations department!

Rich: When basketball legend Shaquille O’Neal worked on our MOCAP stage, he brought a giant hookah pipe to the shoot. During breaks, Shaq sat outside on the loading dock with the hookah, dressed in his MOCAP suit with markers, like some futuristic seven-foot-tall genie, waving at people walking by who likely had no idea what they were looking at.

Ben: Continuing to evolve the program and one day see some of our alumni replace some of us at the greatest place in the world to teach and make games.

Rick: 30th Anniversary (I expect to be here for it).

Ron: My hopes for FIEA’s future aren’t focused on our standing among other graduate programs, but on our role within the game industry itself. I want our name to be indelibly linked to the most extraordinary graduates. I want game studios to fall over themselves to hire FIEA interns. And most importantly, I want our students to trust that earning a FIEA degree is synonymous with launching a successful game career. It’s an ambitious goal—to level up that high—but we can achieve it by fully committing to the highest standards.

“Building a FIEA so robust that it can be successfully handed off to a new generation of leadership when we all retire.”

JR: We have great executive leadership and superior faculty strength and the best facility in education, so that makes our future bright. I can only imagine what those strengths will lead to going forward but knowing those involved, I expect great things.

Rich: Building a FIEA so robust that it can be successfully handed off to a new generation of leadership when we all retire.

Ben: This isn’t fair. The Blob was the first. Opera Slinger was so collaborative and innovating. Plushy Knight made us cry. Flicker of Hope is one of the best free games ever on Steam. What I enjoy most are those capstone teams that bonded for life. So many of them!

Rick: Sultans of Scratch had insanely fun game play, but managed to create adrenaline without shooting anything. There were some others that had tremendous game play, but I tip my hat to Sultans for doing it in differently. That, and the fact that they completely changed designs a month into Capstone and still pulled of a great game.

Ron: At the risk of disgruntling hundreds of students whose capstones I’ve advised—it’s hard to beat our early IGF darling: Opera Slinger!

Rich: Well, The Blob, of course! It was my pitch, and it thrilled me to watch the game be totally transformed by the rest of the cohort, and Rick Hall, who gave us sage advice: “Put a clock on it. This is a race game.”

JR: Well, I was going to say The Blob, but I’m sure Rich already put that one in! But seriously, I have never actually played any of the games, so I can’t really give you a favorite in gameplay or artistic value, or story. But one game stands out to me because the production process for this game resembled what I was familiar with when I was at EA. During my early years at Tiburon, we had 20-40 people working on a title, and for that one year at FIEA when we were still growing, but not so big, we had 34 students, and everyone worked on that one game together. So my favorite game is Masterplan from Cohort 3!