Mobile game development is seen an area likely to exhibit increasingly influence on the structure of the games industry although many current pc/
console game developers are struggling to adapt their existing practices to this new medium. This is due to both the physical restrictions of the
mobile phone and the mobile network as a development environment and the very different demographic of mobile gamer. They are generally
ignoring the inherent features of mobility, almost universal connectivity, context, location, and proximity available on mobile phones and thus the
possibilities of creating new game genres. Academia is well-placed to teach the skills required to produce the innovation in mobile games
development through burgeoning research in pervasive and mobile computing. However, they must also overcome the prejudices of the game
industry which has often criticised academic games courses for failing to give students a true insight into its day to day operation of the industry
and in particular the commercial pressures of working to budgets and timescales. In this paper we describe the structure around our MSc in Mobile
Game Design and M-Commerce Systems which encourages innovation and entrepreneurship within an academic environment by employing an
industrial approach to academic game development through collaborative partnerships with industry and the provision of a direct route to market