See what Sid Meier says: "I’ve found that the best game designers have a well rounded education that includes the necessary Math, Science, & Computer Science c

See what Sid Meier says: "I’ve found that the best game designers have a well rounded education that includes the necessary Math, Science, & Computer Science courses, but also focuses on history, literature, science and other core subjects that take their imaginations to many different places. The games I’ve made have been based on topics that have interested me since I was a kid – history, airplanes, pirates, railroads etc. – topics I studied in school, read about in books, saw in movies, and learned about through boardgames and card games. It is definitely important to have strong technical skills to be a designer, but you also have to have cool ideas for games – and those ideas will come from places outside of computer science. One of our young designers graduated from Stanford with a degree in History and Computer Science which was key to his success in designing Civ IV. Other designers have studied a variety of things and honed their programming/designing skills by creating prototypes of games as a hobby, or being a part of beta testing groups. The most important thing is that your son has a passion for playing games – and plays them often (after he finishes his homework of course!)." (from http://www.firaxis.com/community/asksid.php http://www.firaxis.com/community/asksid.php) Anyone who likes computer games would be well served by playing Pirates! (and reading the manual that came with it, which is in itself a bit of a history lesson).