Seven creative talents from the highly-regarded video game development courses at »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â Leicester (»ÆÉ«²Ö¿â) have been nominated for recognition in the prestigious annual education awards of the UK games industry body, TIGA.
Image by Joseph Lord - »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â Game Art BA (Hons)
Joseph Lord, from »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â’s renowned Game Art BA is up for TIGA’s Graduate of the Year – Artist award, while Ciaran Lennon, also Game Art, and Dylan Mather, BSc Games Production, are both nominated as Graduate of the Year in the Designer category.
Julian Taylor, BSC Games Production, and Tom Harrison, BSc Computer Games Programming, are both in the running for up for Graduate of the Year – Computer Game Technology.
Kamil Turecki, BSc Computer Games Programming, and Lunar-Skie Hackett, BSc Games Production, are nominees for TIGA’s Programmer award.
Image by Ciaran Lennon - »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â Game Art BA (Hons)
»ÆÉ«²Ö¿â’s group of seven are among a total of 79 students from the best games development courses across the UK to be names as contenders for Graduate of the Year 2025 awards from TIGA, the trade association which represents the UK video games industry. Initially put forward by their own institutions, the final nominees were selected by judges from TIGA’s Education Committee after reviewing submissions and evidence of the students’ work.
The winners in each category will be announced on 30th September at a ceremony in London.
The nominations are a significant achievement for »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â as it has only been ten months since the university’s three game development courses gained full TIGA accreditation.
Craig Mooney, »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â Game Art BA (Hons) Course Leader, said: “Joseph and Ciaran and the other »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â students received these nominations in recognition of their excellent work. The winners will be announced later in month, but a TIGA nomination in itself is already a fantastic achievement. We are incredibly proud of them all and we have our fingers cross for the finals.”
There are thought to be around three billion active gamers across the world and, according to international business magazine Forbes, in 2022 the global games industry was worth £184billion, significantly larger than the recorded music industry, and film box office, generated around £26billion each during the same period.
The »ÆÉ«²Ö¿â Game Art BA (Hons) show reel for 2025 can be seen here: Game Art BA (Hons)- with placement year
Posted on Monday 22 September 2025