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Access to Music branches into games with £1 million investment

Independent Manchester-based college will offer B-Tech courses in Game Design, Games Art & Technology and Animation & VFX

Access to Music, an independent training company, is moving into games education, investing £1 million in a new college in Manchester,

The new facility, Access to Games, will be based in Manchester. The curriculum will be managed by Mikael Hellberg, who previously worked at the British arm of the Swedish games education provider, PlaygroundSquad.

Access to Games will offer pathways to a career in Game Design starting in September 2017, with Games Art & Technology and Animation & VFX added in September 2018. Students will receive training for up to two years, and will leave with a B-Tech qualification extended Diploma in Creative Media Production.

"Our team will teach and nurture the skills required by the industry," Hellberg said in a statement. "These include games art, character modelling and animation. They will also learn best practices about the business side of games production, including marketing, distribution and ultimately prepare them for the industry".

The games industry is new territory for the organisation, which has offered independent training for young people with aspirations towards the music industry for 25 years. Access to Music now has ten music colleges across the country, which offer Level 3 courses that carry UCAS points.

In an Oftsed inspection in May 2016, Access to Music was awarded a "Good" rating in all areas of assessment.

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Matthew Handrahan

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Matthew Handrahan joined GamesIndustry in 2011, bringing long-form feature-writing experience to the team as well as a deep understanding of the video game development business. He previously spent more than five years at award-winning magazine gamesTM.