For so many students, myself included all those years ago, the dream is to end up in the AAA space & be a part of the legendary teams who build games that are remembered forever.
The lived reality of pursuing this goal isn’t something we often talk about. It’s not enough to even get into an excellent college, with a thriving game development program that helps you build an amazing portfolio. Because even then, the odds remain long.
To provide context, a wonderful GDC presentation by Bradon Keogh broke this down in staggering clarity. In 2018 only half of game development graduates in the United States end up making it into the games industry as a whole. In other locations with a smaller home-grown industry, the number of students who graduate EACH YEAR surpasses the number of available roles. While I don’t have data to back this up, I would guess that the % of students who make it into the AAA space is even smaller. To put it plainly,
It’s become a numbers game to make a AAA dream into a reality.
I’m putting these facts forward, not to deter you, but to ensure that you move forward with eyes wide open. It’s a common saying in the game’s space that if you want more stability, better pay & better work-life balance, go work in the tech industry. But if Games are what truly drive you & you’re prepared for a strange, sometimes winding road towards building a career then here are a few things I know about how to help tilt those odds in your favor.
It starts with 4 key ingredients:
- A polished, easy-to-read & accessible resume targeted towards a specific role.
- A tremendously good portfolio
- No small amount of luck
- A helping hand from your network
The Resume
- Your resume, especially as a student, should be no longer than 1 page. If you have other experience that starts to push you over the page, leave off the least applicable roles to remain on a single page.
- I highly encourage students to have at least 2 resumes targeting different roles they feel they embody. Personally, I had a Level Design resume & a UI Resume. They may have the same projects listed, but what I talked about varied greatly to better reflect my skills in that role.
- List out the various projects you’ve worked on. If you’re a student you can spice this area up with team size, duration of project & engine used. But you should ALWAYS have a short blurb about what precisely you worked on.
- Please create a bullet-pointed list of skills/techniques/software that you’re familiar with. Algorithmic resume crawlers will pick up on this way easier & give recruiters keywords to latch onto.
- Unless you’ve got a graphic design background, it is better to have a visually minimal resume than something overly designed.
The Portfolio
- Please have a portfolio website linked to your resume and somewhere on your portfolio please have a link to your resume.
- Especially as a student the single most important thing to show in your portfolio is your process. We want to know how that portfolio piece evolved over time because’s a window into your brain. We can begin to understand your workflow, what types of challenges you encountered & how you overcome them.
- For those that have a level design focus, do a fly-through of your level at various points in development. Edit these together so we can see change over time.
- For UI Developers show various Mockups of a given UI element or screen.
- For Technical Designers focus on a single module/mechanic & talk about how it was implemented. What did the prototype look like? What worked, what didn’t work? How did it evolve?
- Having 2 solid portfolio pieces is way more valuable than 10 poor ones.
On the Subject of Luck
- It’s undeniable that at some point the fate of your application will come down to luck. Despite all your talent & hard work, you cannot control this. Which is why persistence is so important. Sometimes a rejection has nothing to do with you.
- When I was interviewing at Insomniac, unbeknownst to me, the Senior UI Developer who would become my mentor, was about to go on Paternity leave. They had completely run out of time to continue the hiring process & they had to make a call on the recent batch of 2-3 candidates they had interviewed. Had that not been the case, it’s a very real possibility that they could have elected to continue the search.
Your Network
- Your professional network is incredibly important for your career and encompasses all of your colleagues, any alumni at your school, and anyone you take the time to introduce yourself to.
- I think you’d find that the vast majority of folks in the games industry would be happy to help as long as you ask nicely.
- When reaching out to someone on LinkedIn, send a personalized note saying “hello” to increase your chances of connecting by 1000%.
- When applying to a role, put your application in, then hunt for someone on that team on LinkedIn & introduce yourself. Doing this will put a human to the application.
- You can even reach out prior to applying to inquire about advice or more information about the role. 9 times out of 10, that person will then forward your name to the hiring manager.
Additional Data/Links:
HEVGA – 2019 Graduate Survey