I need some advice

Hey guys, I really need some advice. I have been thinking about this for a long time. I am currently in my community college studying general education, I found that there was an associats of the arts in animation degree that I would like to get because I might give me a foot in the door for a job in the video game industry. I also have been debating with myself that community college doesn't teach me the real things I would need to know on how to make video games. (I've looked and this animation degree is the only thing that comes close to making video games, in any university, or community college in las vegas) I was thinking of going to one of those private schools like IADT, or ITT-Tech. those are extremely expensive and I am scared to be that much in debt when I have never in my entire life been in debt before. I believe though, it would be a lot stress free during the school year, because you wont have to worry about money, rather than now, when I do worry about money all the time, in paying for classes. I cant get financial aid because I am still a dependent and my dad makes too much money, but he is making me pay for college.

The bottom line is this, I want to make video games, and I just want an honest and an opinion from somebody who knows how to get into the video game industry, or is also trying to get into it. what should I do? should I just get a small student loan and go for the animation degree, and hopefully be an animator for video games, or should I go all out and go to one of the schools like IADT for the video game design degree?

I know this sounds obvious, but have you tried approaching any games companies to ask what skills they would value?

I agree with razor, the art world (whether it's games, music, film etc...) is a hard one to get into, maybe you could get work experience with a local company - if you can get a foot in the door somewhere you will have a better chance of success.

Also do you just want to work with the artistic side of game production or would you consider programming as a decent programmer could work in a huge range of companies, where as an animator you will be restricting yourself greatly. If you have the aptitude for programming, that is the route I would go.