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Virtual Worlds Forum Europe 2008Tokyo Game ShowIndieCadeBlizzcon
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New York Comic Con 08
Getting a Job in the Video Game IndustryPanelistsMike Capps, President, Epic Games Mike Capps moderated the session, and started out by proceeding down the panel and asking everyone to give their top tip for getting into the game industry. He stated that, “You have to have tons and tons of passion, and it has to show. As much as it pains me to admit it, being a former college professor, I’m less interested in your educational background than I am of your passion for making games.” He elaborated by giving the example of a fictional candidate applying for a job at Epic relatively fresh out of college who did one internship at a database company but claims “games are my true passion.” In his opinion, a person passionate about games who has pursued a computer science/programming education will have tried to make a mod, get something into the Make Something Unreal competition, make a game on their own… Jason Schreiber seized on that point as said, simply, “Make your game and SHOW it!” Continuing, he pointed specifically to mods as a good way to make an impact and establish your passion and prospective value to a development company. He also said that mods are valuable because they typically involve multiple contributors, and seeing how well you work with others is important to people looking to hire you. Both stressed that artists need to show their content in a game engine, because working with the content pipeline is a critical part of the job description. Losing man-hours because a map broke the build due to an artist not paying attention to detail is a huge negative. Julianne Greer, speaking primarily to the game journalism side of the industry, couldn’t stress enough the importance of the cover letter. “Check your punctuation and spelling” – a statement she would come back to repeatedly, even in another session. “Show that you’ve done your homework.” Josh Ortega said that, for a writer, the key to getting a position in the game industry is getting your writing published. “It’s hard to get attention if you haven’t been published previously.” Pointing out that there would be a separate Writing in Games session later in the day [DREW: we can place a link to that here], he said he’d reserve more detail for then. A statement he would repeat later was something he said his sister told him: “It only takes ten years to become an ‘overnight success.’” Mike gave specific advice to artists: “Be good at getting people to look at your portfolio. Pay attention to detail.” He advised a “small, perfect” portfolio: “Send me three or four images, not 50. Don’t start with your first drawing ever, because I’ll never get to your good stuff.” He also gave advice on culling portfolios: “Three good and one bad will sink you. Send only your best stuff!” Jason Schreiber said artists had to be willing to submit to an artist test. “Sure, it’s uncomfortable and inconvenient, but you have to be ready to prove yourself. Prove to me that I should take you over the other guy who’s just like you, but who can also bang out something decent within a half hour, on the spot.” Julian Greer reminded all prospective applicants, “Sell yourself!” She continued: “Don’t apologize for writing to me in your cover letter. I know you want a job. Tell me why I should give you one.” Josh suggested an unusual tactic specifically for writers. “Writing is a tricky gig,” he said. “Try to get your work presented to the lead designer, maybe through a friend or contact you’ve cultivated.” Explaining, he pointed out that often, in games, the basic story framework and character outlines exist, created by the designers, and writers are brought in to flesh that out, fill in back story and write dialog for specific situations. “Getting your stuff in front of the designer can help, because if he likes your voice then he’s going to push for you over someone else.” Mike Capps pointed out that writing is probably more valued or easier to get into at an RPG or MMO company like Blizzard or Turbine. Blizzard reportedly has 40 staff writers, because of the volume of descriptive, narrative or spoken content required to sustain their games. Again too, the suggestion of mods came up, in this case, a mod centered around a story. Jason Schreiber encouraged writers to “go make a game that shows off your story and writing.” He gave the example of New York based independent developer Dave Gilbert (Wadjet Eye Games), who built story-driven games on top of Adventure Game Studio and gradually progressed from free “chapters” for the community-driven Reality on the Norm to critically acclaimed original games of his own (The Shivah, Blackwell Unbound). Mike Capps stated that QA is one way into the industry, due to the large number of testers hired and the fact that it’s easier to network and get your skills noticed once you’re in the door. Jason Schreiber followed up with, “We’re hiring testers!”, to laughs from the audience. He also added that in almost every case, people who have started as testers have gone nowhere but up. Examples include Tommy Tallarico and Blizzard’s CEO Mike Morhaime. “It took me 20 years,” said Jason, “but now I have my own company.” Opening up to questions from the audience, Mike said the Bay Area and Los Angeles, Austin, Montreal and a few other cities were probably the “best locations” for game development, but encouraged everyone to check out the Game Industry Map to see where there are concentrations of studios. Responding to a question about telecommuting as a worker in game journalism, Julianne Greer felt that it was possible for online writing, but she preferred staff writers to relocate. Both Epic Games and Themis Media are located in the Raleigh, NC area. Continuing, Julianne said it’s possible even for staff writers, but you have to be “super, super communicative. Have every IM and chat application, be an email fiend, provide your home and cell phones, and be very much in your editor’s face even though you’re not in the office. The key to telecommuting is to be a superb communicator,” but she felt most people really weren’t equipped to do it. There would be a greater discussion of this in the Game Journalism session [DREW: link]. Asked why developers seemed to stick to only one genre and become known as, say, “the FPS studio,” and whether a programmer with a portfolio focusing on another genre has a chance, Jason Schreiber pointed out that Powerhead Games fights genre stagnation and typecasting every day. “Other companies, however, may prefer to stick to one genre if they’re at the top of their market.” He said, “Show us your app and your code. That’s your portfolio as a programmer.” Mike Capps seized on this to give the example of Epic Games: “Guys come to Epic to make kick-ass adrenaline games, so we can’t say we want to make a horse simulator!” He also pointed out the impact of lengthy development times. “We work on a game for three years, just about. If it was three months, then I could say, ‘Guys, we’re going to make the Horse Simulator, then the Barbie Game, then Gears 2,” and my guys would say, ‘Okay, that’s six months of crappy games I don’t like – I can stick that out.”” When asked how best to locate QA openings or internships, and specifically whether there was an online resource for them, Jason Schreiber stated that those positions were really not advertised for. “Be a pest to the companies you’re interested in. Check back with them and see if they have new openings that you can fill. But,” speaking to the audience member who asked the question, “if you create an online resource for that, you could make a lot of money!” Mike followed up by admitting that Epic only advertises for QA in the local paper and internships on Vault, because “we’re not going to move a guy for QA,” implying that local candidates make for the best QA applicant pool while interns would normally be responsible for their own relocation and would thus look in areas where they have the means to be. The next question dealt with what sorts of writing clips to send to a publication. Responding, Julianne Greer said they would depend on the specific position the candidate was applying for and the focus of the publication. Miss Greer did point out that she’s always looking for writers and new content, and encouraged interested parties to send her their resumes, writing samples, videos and other journalistic game content. Asked about submitting ideas to development companies, both Mike Capps and Jason Schreiber were quick to shoot the notion down. “No. We reject them flat out. We have no shortage of ideas, and legal issues abound” Mike said. Responding to a redirect about genre specialization and applicant portfolios, Jason said, “We don’t ignore cool demos because they’re not in our genre. Send me something creative and cool.” A number of education related inquiries were next, leading to some quite funny mocking of the “game design degree” commercials on TV. “Yeah, QA/testing is nothing like that,” Jason went on. “It’s mind-numbing, tedious work that would drive most people crazy, not ‘Hmm, we should remember to put that special effect in this level over here!’” For programmers, he said, a solid background in math is preferred. For artists he suggested a classical arts background. Both Schreiber and Capps pointed out that this wasn’t to take anything away from digital arts programs around the country, specifically naming DigiPen in Washington State and Full Sail in Florida. Mike pointed out that the wildly successful first-person puzzler, Portal, released by Valve Software was a final project made by DigiPen grads, and an excellent game to boot. Nevertheless, he said “The information you need to get started is available for free online.” Asked if there was any way for an applicant to get prepare himself for console development, Jason Schreiber pointed to the homebrew scene. “The GBA and DS scenes are vibrant, and those skills are valuable.” Session coverage by Drew Sikora, Oluseyi Sonaiya
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