If you are not working at a large game-dev studio, you need both skills. Most of what you need to do is already 'designed' but often you end up taking calls on

If you are not working at a large game-dev studio, you need both skills. Most of what you need to do is already 'designed' but often you end up taking calls on things that are not clearly laid out for you. You may also end up working where there is a clear 'game designer' and 'game programmer' separation even if it is a small studio (20-30 people). In both these cases, you need to know your basic 3d maths to be useful in your role. I concede that it's much easier nowadays since you end up using an engine that abstracts most things for you. Nevertheless, you do end up hitting the limits of the engine and may want to implement that killer feature yourself. I have encountered all of these situations. I'll say that the minimum you should know if you want to be a game programmer is: - high school level algebra - high school level trigonometry - basic 3d vector mathematics - an understanding of graphics transformation (and the corresponding matrices) - basic splines If you are looking for a very specialised role, then you can probably forget these and focus on say AI or Networking but I see that as too risky in an industry that is already infamous for its treatment of employees. [Edit: Formatting]