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Being in the video game industry is thankless: low-paying compared to other computer fields, too many hours, and very low job security (companies come and go). Also, it's very hard to get in. Even assuming he does land a position, it'll be an unsatisficatory "grunt" programming position where he will not be able to show off his creativity at all.

Your son's better off learning C/C++ on his own, then taking a computer graphics course or two (OpenGL is -very- easy) and then trying to shareware his games in his spare time.

I'm a fairly recent computer science graduate working for that MS; if I had to do it all over again, I'd go into engineering.

If your son really wants to get a job in the computer industry, community college, TopCoder, certification classes, and the like are MUCH more practical than going to a "good" CS program and learning how to doodle discrete finite state automatae.

However, most jobs require that 4-year-degree, so... dunno. Just don't let him go into computer science solely, let him pick some other area to broaden his horizons. *shrugs* Only a luck of the draw that enabled me to go into the academic/research side of CS rather than the professional side has saved me from unemployment.

You should tell your son to master another area of expertise to compliment his technical skills. The tech market is sluggish for people with specialized tech skills only.

Here in the Chicago area one area that has bucked the national trend is for experienced programmers who also have a subtantive expertise in option pricing models and finance. Artificial intelligence is also another hot area at present.

The long term trend is obvious: specialized but routinized technical skills are starting to be farmed out overseas. Americans with technicals skills AND business analysis skills are still enjoying strong demand for their skills.