Getting a Job in the Games Industry - Part 1
The most common question I get from people about the video game industry is, “How do I get a job?” Personally I think the first question should be, “Do I want a job in the game industry?” Most people who want to work in games do so because they have a passion and love of games, but having your passion become a job can kill said passion quickly. Eventually I’ll write about that, but that’s not what you came here for, so moving on!
I suspect most of you know this, but for those who don’t, the video game industry is highly competitive. There are far more people looking to get into it than their are jobs available. You need to give yourself every advantage, keep your expectations in check, and be ready for an uphill battle, especially if you are looking for a harder to define position. Video games have several different areas you can specialize in, commonly referred to as “disciplines”, although terminology varies widely throughout the industry. The most common disciplines are: art, audio, design, production, programming, and writing. Of those, I know the most about design, because that’s my background. Design is also the hardest discipline in the industry to define a path towards a job. I’m not saying it’s harder to get a design job, but rather that it’s harder to tell someone ‘how’ to get a design job. Probably splitting hairs on that one, though.
So lets start with some general advice, followed by the other disciplines, because the combination of a clearer path and less direct personal experience on my part makes that part, well, shorter. :)
Make games now!
If you listen to no other piece of advice I give, listen to this one: Do not wait for a job. You do not need permission. If you want to make games, do it right now! Pick your discipline, and practice it. There’s no excuse for any creative person not to do this. I rarely see this as an issue for disciplines other than design, but it’s worth saying for everyone. If you aren’t practicing your discipline on your own than question if you should really be seeking a job to do that discipline full time. I promise you that those you are going up against are making games practically as a compulsion.
For prospective designers, don’t use your lack of a concrete pathway as an excuse. Learn a level editor. Play around with basic scripting. Write a mod. Play around with highly moddable games with lots of tuning variables. Run a D&D campaign. Build a board game out of a cardboard box. Create and test house rules to whatever you like to play. Critique every game you play, and play a broad array of games, including ones you wouldn’t play normally. If you want to design games, then design games. I’ve met few professional designers who don’t do things like this in their spare time, often in addition to their job, simply because they enjoy doing it. Most designers who are good at their job look at every game from a design perspective.
BTW, any discipline should feel free to practice the above paragraph, but it too often isn’t done by those focused on game design.
Build a portfolio, Make it readily available
If you don’t have experience to recommend you, all you have is your interview personality, and whatever body of work you put together. Not everyone interviews well, so make sure that your portfolio is strong, always improving, and is easy to get to. I can’t say how many resumes I’ve seen get passed over because they provided examples of their work that required a ton of effort from the prospective employer to view. Make a website, create a physical portfolio that stands on its own, provide videos for things that otherwise require specialized programs or games.
For example, if you’ve made a cool mod for a game, don’t rely on the employer to download that game, find your mod online, learn how to install it, and play through an hour intro to the game to get to your modded part. Make a video that walks the employer through your work. Put it on Youtube. Link reviews if you have them. Assume that everyone you contact is super busy, because they likely are. And recognize that making things easy for your prospective employer is also showing them that you may make things easy for your team once you join.
If you are following my first piece of advice you will make some kind of work examples automatically. I’ll talk a lot more about this in the design specific section, because this is a sticking point I’ve often had with prospective designers. That being said, nowadays this is less of an issue than it used to be due to improvements in both tools and presentation options.
Stand out from the crowd
As you are building a portfolio, be it physical or digital, do anything you can think of to catch people’s attention. If you’re an artist, create a leather bound and decorated portfolio book or 3D print one of your characters into an action figure. It’s easiest to come up with examples for artists, but every discipline can do this. Don’t just rely on the quality of your submission, find a way to make whatever material you submit stand out. The content itself should always remain the focus, but doing something extra is a great way to get your foot in the door. Games are often about what is awesome, so be awesome in your presentation.
Get a degree if you can
If there is a degree to get for your discipline, you should probably get it. Everyone benefits from the knowledge, practice, and critiques that come with a degree. The toughest one here is design due to the lack of options, but there are still options out there.
A degree is not necessary to get an industry job. College is expensive, and may be out of reach to some. If that’s the case for you, focus on two things: the quality of the work you submit, and the finding a way to replace the benefits a degree gives you. The first one is hopefully self-evident: Practice your discipline.
The second is less evident if you’ve never been in college. The primary benefit of college, in my opinion, is not the piece of paper (which is what I thought when I was younger), but rather the experience it provides. It gives you a structured place to practice your discipline and get better. It gives you deadlines which can build your work ethic. The ability to focus and get work done can be like a muscle that needs working out. It pushes you through competition with others. It makes you better by not only giving you critique, but teaching you to take criticism. Professional game developers take an enormous amount of criticism both inside their studio and without, and those whose egos bristle at this can struggle. If you can’t afford the rising cost of college find replacements for these things. Seek peers online who will give feedback. Self-impose deadlines. Give yourself a daily work schedule. Seek out books and tutorials to challenge yourself.
If your work is solid, and your attitude is good, an employer will probably overlook a lack of degree.
Ever notice how many crates are in games?
Think about what game companies need, not just what you enjoy doing. I’d never recommend someone take up doing a creative job they hate, it could kill the joy you had in the first place, but ask yourself what you’re okay with doing. Game development is often not glamorous. Those sprawling open game worlds need a lot of rocks, trees, bushes, barrels, crates, pipes, wires, etc. Someone has to make those. Racing games have dozens of cars whose performance are dictated by a bunch of variable numbers that equal a ton of math. There are people who make a living at identifying and fine-tuning those variables, and if they are good at it they are valuable. There are hundreds of quests to write, UI menus to code, developer tools to design, icons to draw, and thousands of fields of data that need to be hand entered. When working on your portfolio, showing you can do the minutia as well as the epic matters.
Games need variety, can you provide that?
Look around at your peers and see what they’re doing. If you’re all doing the same thing it’s likely that your peers across the world are also doing the same things, and you’re going to be in competition with one another over a small subset of jobs. Artists often enjoy making epic characters. Designers like designing monsters. Programmers like working on gameplay. If these kinds of common interests are what you want, I wouldn’t tell you not to pursue them. But, as an example, keep in mind that networking programmers are incredibly valuable and more rare than gameplay programmers. If everyone around you is doing the same thing, maybe consider thinking about the other things that go into games, and if you might have an interest in a slightly less popular focus.
Versatility is power. The broader your skill set and interests the more uses you have to a prospective employer. Find a niche, and focus on it.
Don’t get discouraged
It’s incredibly challenging to get a job in the gaming industry, and can take a long time. Prepare to be in it for the long haul. It might take months or even years. If you stick with it you vastly improve your chances. So believe in yourself, keep your expectations in check, and keep plugging away at improving your resume and getting your name out there.
End of Part One
This turned out to be a lot longer post than I thought, so I’m going to break it up into several parts. This ends part one. In part two I’ll discuss more general advice, then talk about each discipline in future updtaes.
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