Job and Work Experience

You can make money off shareware but will you? It can take alot of work and it might take you a few games to find a succesful formula. This site has a bit of info for interested developers:

http://www.dexterity.com/articles/

Personally I would be far happier seeing a finished game than a fancy spinning cube and I'm sure most developers agree. Make a simple game and make sure to really finish it including menus, sound effects, high score screens etc. That will show people that you can stick to a project and complete it rather than just copy pasting a bunch of OpenGL tutorials onto your cube.

Hope this helps!
:)

Hi there, we've got a whole section on Australian/NZ Game industry and education, which you [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=17"]can read here[/url].

For a more specific thread on the AIE, you can read [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1587"]one of the many posts here[/url].. Look around in the section and you should find other posts on the AIE.

I would assume that when they say 'published' they mean any title including a published indie. Which really, isn't all that hard to do, it could be the most stupid FPS in the world, but if it was published (by any publisher) you could most likely get in. They only want to see that you are able to finish what you start ;)

I agree with bootface, it IS that mentality that drove some of my working ethos home. We dont ask for years of experience OR titles under your belt. If you have the talent, and can do what we require, theres a job waiting for you regardless of experience [:)]

Noone would hire me as an artist, because i didnt have any "experience", so i founded a now highly successful and expanding business and 'made' a job for myself and 6 other people that have no 'titles' under there belts, but i believe they DO have the passion, dedication, talent and drive to suceed.

Good show ? HELL YES, best thing I ever did.

Now we are all working on various projects doing exactly what we have been striving to do, and are generating worldwide interest. Not to mention being paid for what we are worth.

Not bad for a bunch of "inexperienced" industry wannabees.

Burnt bridges ? nope, a few are charred and teetering on the brink of destruction but definately still capable of supporting commerce.

/end fuming rant. [:(!][:(!]

i can understand what you are saying.. the best thing you should do is ignore comments like three years of experience etc.. and make sure you apply for these jobs.. As for me, I didnt wait around for a job to be advertised, I got out there and practically made the position for myself (before I had even finished 1st year uni). Like most work, work is still work, and its isnt all roses and running through green grass. It can be a prick of a thing meeting deadlines [:p] That being said thou, you sound like you have passion, and to be honest thats a huge part of it. Stick at it dude, the industry is rapidly expanding and there should be oppotunity for all! [;)]

Thanks for the vote of confidence and advice you guys [:)]. I was probably just having a bad day. I am feverishly working on updating my online portfolio and getting my show reel up to scratch. After reviewing my show reel and doing some research, I concluded that there was a lot of unnecessary crud in there. Unfortunately, I have been receiving mixed messages from people on what makes a good show reel. Thankfully, I did not send it out into the world and cause irreversible damage to my reputation as a 3D artist. So, soldier on is what I shall do.

My online portfolio is at the following address.
http://users.chariot.net.au/~bootface
Any honest feedback would be greatly appreciated. Once again thanks.
[:)]

Hi Bootface! thought I'd give ya some contructive critz on ya site to help you out [8)]

Firstly its good to see you have site up and running, nice way to maintain a portfolio...

right... I'd have to say that you still have a way to go before I'd consider you to be industry ready as a 3d modeller.. the most immediate thing I noticed is that not much of your stuff is textured, and if it is youve used materials...

It would be a realllllly good Idea to finish everything as much as possible.. as a 3d modeller I would expect you to be quite proficent as a uv unwrap artist as well.

The industry is still focused around getting the most bang for you poly as well, some of your models could be optimsed a great deal and still have the same appearance, especially if textured...

also I can see small errors in you models, things like 5 sided faces etc.. its important to be as tight as possible in your modelling, this generally demostrates a keen eye for detail.

I'd also have a tendanancy to lose the chrome guy.. it might effect your chances instead of improving them.. some people just don't like seeing shiny things in applications... its a kinda of self imposed stigmatism if you get my meaning, I'd probably retexture him or something.

moving on.. I think you have good variety of 3d stuff cars, bipedals, incidental objects.. continue along those lines, and you should be able to pull together a good all round package..

I hope I havent put a dent in you confidence by posting this, but I think you need to hear that kinda thing.. like some old guy said once... whatever dosent kill ya.. will make you stronger...

cheers[B)]

I agree with Me109, you need to texture the models you have. The ones on your portfolio look unfinished. Besides, I think companies are looking these days for people who are multi-skilled, do more than just model or just texture or just animate. if you are more into the animation side of things than the texturing then put some AVIs of your animations on your portfolio and maybe ask someone else to texture your models for you.(of course giving them credit and be sure to let people know you didn't do the texturing if you didn't)

Also I noticed that in your A-wing type ship model that the sphere in the cockpit looks like its got more polys than the rest of the ship! and I'm no artist. Small things like that are what the people hiring will pick up when they look at your portfolio.

All I can suggest is that you use the Exhibition forum on this site and other similar sites to get feed back from your fellow artists. its the best way to improve your work. I'm sure they're are plenty of people out there who will be willing to give you constructive critisms of your work. Just take the feedback (both good and bad) as it comes and keep improving your portfolio. Even the best artists I know keep going back and updating their portfolios.

-kul

quote:'minimum 3 years experience in game dev industry'
Generally thats to filter out the unskilled and fanboy portion of the reels.

If they just said, "anyone who wants a job" they would get alot of people who just think, "hey thats sounds cool, I might have a go", then they have to sort thru 3000 bad reels to find the 4 good ones.

If someone has amazing skills and no experience, they will get hired.

If its after an interview that you hear those words unfortunately its generally just a nice way of them saying, "Err...no thanks."

You also have to take a look at the level of work out there at the moment and honestly ask yourself, am I capable of that level right now, not trying to be a rude but I don't think your website showed that level of skill at this present time.

My advice, work your butt off, everyday, take negative critism as constructive information and use it to challenge yourself to get better, look at whats out there and really study it, buy reference books (anatomy, lighting, rigging, animation etc) and finally apply to those "3 yrs experience" ads anyway, they can only say no. [:P]

Good luck.

Thanks for all the feedback. Unfortunately whilst being on a 56k connection, I have not had the web space to really show all my work the way I wanted to (hence, the lack of texturing). As you know file size is a big problem when you only have around 3mb allotted space to show your work. I have just paid for my shiny new ADSL connection and I am just waiting for the nice Telstra man to come and hook me up [|)]. I am still working away on the new and improved portfolio site and have taken into consideration all the very helpful feedback that I have received from you people. Mark my words, once I get my ADSL you will see a very good site indeed.
Once again, thanks to all Sumeans who gave me feedback [:)].

It can swing the other way when trying to get work. I've worked on some of the biggest games and got more than 14 year experience. Yet i'm finding it impossible for anyone to consider me. I think that's partly due to me being in the UK but also having been around for so long people presume experience is going to cost a lot.

Bootface: You're better off having 5 really good peices of work rather than 5 good mixed with a few bad/unfinished ones.

hi bootface, u'r right getting in can be hard! I got a break into the games industry through and internship sponsored by Film Victoria. You should check out if the South Australian Film Corporation does anything similar http://www.safilm.com.au

Good luck with it [:)]

Is there some problem for people in their early 30?s getting into the industry?

www.gamesindustry.biz [:D]

awsome site, thanks!

If you're under 28 you can apply for a Working Holiday Visa which will allow you to live and work in the UK for 2 years. You are able to work in your profession apparently.

You could always save up and go over to the UK and try your luck. Nothing to lose, even if you don't end up working in Graphic design you can still do normal jobs and travel!!

Canada is also another place which offers the working holiday visa, but I think it's a max of 1 year there.

I went to the UK back in 1999.. and when I first rocked up I went into news agent looked through games industry mags, and grabbed addressed for bunches of different companys and applied.

at the time I had no 3d work and relied on my 2d instead... unsurprisingly I heard nothing, until six months later when I got a call from one company to come in for a interview...

Unfortunately I had to turn it down, because I had just accepted a position to go teach water skiing in Turkey on the mediterranean coast at a place called Bodrum for the summer..

Some people might think I was crazy turning it down, how I saw it was I'd have another chance to have a crack at the gaming industry.. but not another to go and drive ski boats, waterski, wakeboard everyday for a period of six months. [8)]

But yeah there a plenty of oppotunitys in the UK.. it's not particulary nice workin there over winter thou.. cold and dark...

just make sure you have a tip top portfolio and you should get a job straight away..
I had a mate here at uni who quit it last year because he had managed to get a job in the uk as a 3d modeller... all before even getting there... so there lots of options..

Hope that helps

cheers[8]

do you think a year is long enough?

I think in 12 months using an existing engine (e.g. not designing ones own engine), and with 5 full time people it's possible to produce something that is suitable to present to a publisher.

If it's not ready to present, we have a regular cash flow from our existing activities so can fund it for longer without publisher backing if we need to.

Thanks,
- Will

Oh, and, could you answer the same for game designers?

Well if you do anything for a significant period of time it becomes somewhat boring. So far level design has been challenging and rewarding job. I certainly could not see myself being a programmer for any significant period of time. I haven't really been in the trenches long enough to comment on its long-term appeal however.

From my experience, level design, 3d art and 2d art depends entirely on your portfolio. Do not expect some game dev course to make it any easier to land a job. For level design in particular, you need to learn the skills yourself.

Big no-no asking about game designers. You will need at least 5 - 10 years experience in the industry before you can even think of achieving that title.

I see. I was under that impression.

So you are saying that I could get in to the industry solely based on my portfolio? I mean, I culd just come in with a degree in medicine and get a job because I have a good portfolio?

And what is the work time/salary of level designer(and is that actually a good salary - Life expenses obviously warry)

When I mean "portfolio" a level design specific portfolio, like an art portfolio. Usually consists a bunch of levels you have created to show your skills as a level design. Being highly educated, while that is a obvious bonus, won't get you a job in this industry, unless you are a programmer. My university degree is really just a $18,000 US work visa.

How much depends where you get a job. From what I hear junior level designers get $35k to $40k. If you work in the US you can get twice that amount.

"When I mean "portfolio" a level design specific portfolio, like an art portfolio. Usually consists a bunch of levels you have created to show your skills as a level design."
I got that.

And how much hours of work do you do in a week? Do you have a 60h+ week like programers?
What additional skills are good for a level designer? Do you do the scripting(I'm talking scripted events that are unique to a level)?

The hours really depend on you. Most companies adopt a milestone approach, so as long as the level is done on time you can work as much or as little as you need to. However expect to pull some long hours during crunch time.

Being able to model with a 3D package like 3D Max, Maya, Lightwave, XSI is almost a must these days. Being able to create textures using photoshop is also *very* beneficial. It depends on the company whether you will be required to do scripting. Some programming experience definitly won't hurt.

That's all OK. I have some knowladge of 3DMax, probably not nearly enough, but I'll learn.
Thank you very much for answering my questions.

http://www.sloperama.com/advice/idea.htm

I would read that web page with all its good info

I think with programmers like most people, almost any work we do eventually becomes boring. Its more the fact that we lose interest if there no more challenge. As long as the industry gives me challenges to overcome, I'll keep making games. I have to admit I even revel in the long work hours if I have an interesting problem to solve. But if I had to say do the same old AI all the time, I'd eventually give up and move on, there are many other industries for programmers. Programmers want to solve problems, once things become routine we tend to get restless. Boredom is not just the realm of programmers, can you imagine say an artist modelling the same sort of character for years or only doing unwrapping all the time? [xx(].

-kul

If I had to do UV mapping all the time I think I would take myself out the back and shoot me. [xx(]

I hate UV mapping.

I would hope they are to gauge what level you are at with your art skills, not something thats just given out to anyone.

If you received an art test from me, it would say your good enough to have a crack at the test. They generally aren't something to raise your hopes over however.

Around $15 per hour, depending on your experience testing

quote:Originally posted by Chaos

Around $15 per hour, depending on your experience testing

Thanks for the info Chaos.

Hi Zammo [:D]

Not sure whether your talking about,

Progressive motion scanning ( used to capture double the frames of normal picture - to remove motion artifacts on screen etc )

or

3d Scanning ( scanning face and body to help with modelling / texturing 3d models )

or

Motion Capture ( Retrieving motion data from actors / stuntspeople for animation use etc )

Thanks for your reply.
I would have to say Motion Capture is the one that i am looking at here.
Do most gaming companies use an outside source for their motion capture projects as i understand that the cost involved is quite considerable or would they invest in the equipment?

The cost of a motion capture suite varies considerably, from approx $20k up to something like the gypsy4 (for basic suites) which is approx $80k US dollars.

My advice would be to write a cost benefit analysis comparing the cost of a Mo-Cap Suite + someone to operate the equipment Vs the price of outsourcing.

Hope that helps [:D]

Team Bondi are supposedly looking for people.

gaming (poker machine) companies are pretty big in sydney (aristorcrat, star game, blue ocean? konami (think they have pokker maching team in sydney too)) and they tend to also like 2d artists.....

I've just posted this up.. http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=16
Definately worth sending your work to Epiphany Games who are based in Sydney and looking for a concept artist right now.

well im not to sure about putting up posters or anything but heres a nice place to start :P
make a post on these forums asking for interest in the mod/game colaborations section

Suggestion, to further what youve displayed, how about finding some free space and making an online portfolio ?

Not to dampen spirits, but at the krome evening a few months back, The lead art guy said something along the lines of " MAYBE one out of the top 5 or 6 artists in this room ( which at a guess was approx 100 - 120 ) would have a CHANCE at getting a job.

It doesnt mean to say people arent good enough - its more to say that theres not enough dev houses to accept all the talent.

Cant stress enough, how much to get your showreel out and fire it off, uprgrading it and your online portfolio as much as you can, until you get your chance. If you keep at it, you WILL get your chance. [:D]

You want to join a company like that *grin* I would say you should expect to at least have a Bachlors degree if not a Masters degree.

One of the lead programmers at Bioware has a masters in AI - just for reference.

At this stage you're probably best to make sure you work on all areas of programming until you have a solid knowledge of the basics, don't specialise to much. Later on when you are more familiar with it you might find something interests you more than anything else, or you might decide to stay as a general purpose coder.

You will need a pretty solid understanding of programming to get into the industry, most have a degree of some kind though it's not strictly necesary. To get started I'd find one of the popular game programming libraries on the net (Allegro, SDL etc) and work on making a very simple game (very simple, eg pong), try to finish it to a level where you are proud to show it, and your source code, off to others.

Don't be afraid to ask silly questions and listen to peoples advice, most of all, have fun!

Yeah, I would say just try and learn the basics of Programming, not necessarily of C/C++. Programming is a wide field, with many different languages out there, and Games programming now is using more and more different languages. C and C++ is pretty much the standard, but some games are using Java (on the Mobile Phone market), Python, Lua and other scripting languages are being used for game scripting, and then there are the numerous shader languages that a programmer might need to learn.

So I say stick with it, but learn the general stuff while you're young, man you've got at least 3-4 years until you finish high school, and a lot can change in that time. I've known people that did C programming and were totally into computers back then, and now they're stricly musicians, playing all over the place and basically doing nothing with computers or programming. Things will change so don't take a career path too seriously at the moment.

Seven pointers from a Big Kid to a Slightly Less Big Kid ;)

1. Try and concentrate on maths and physics in class, and indeed
don't let your schoolwork slide. The 'war games' days where you
could do that and have a job lined up disappeared some time ago.
2. Set yourself very simple C/C++ projects that work; each one will
boost your self-esteem as a programmer.
3. Get a textbook on algorithms, browse around the store for
one that you like. Make yourself classes for lists and trees etc.
4. Watch out for code guilt when you get bugs, a common complaint
in programmers!
5. Remember by the time you're out there programming the landscape
will have changed dramatically, so don't specialise in a current
technology early. Keep it general.
6. Have a play with gmax (it's free) for designing 3D graphics, and UnRealEd for designing levels.
7. When you do play games, try and develop a critical eye as to how you would code the behaviour you see in the game.

WiffleCube

quote:Originally posted by mongolian

I'm only 14 years of age, and I'm very interested in taking part in the game industry, namely programming. I'd like to know how much C or C++ knowledge is needed for joining a game company (i.e. Ubisoft, id, Blizzard, etc.). I'm just beginning with C++.

Also, any clues as to which aspect of C or C++ programming I should give special attention to?

This would help very much. Thanks.

quote:Originally posted by WiffleCube
4. Watch out for code guilt when you get bugs, a common complaint
in programmers!

Code guilt?

[?]

quote:Originally posted by Barry Dahlberg

quote:Originally posted by WiffleCube
4. Watch out for code guilt when you get bugs, a common complaint
in programmers!

Code guilt?

[?]

Code guilt I think was mentioned in a S.E book by Pressman; it's basically when you are feeling guilty that your code has bugs in it.
The aphorism (Goethe) "Failures are portals for success" generally works for me!

To throw my 2 cents into the fray from a different perspective.

I have a diploma of IT specialising in Games programming from QANTM. Now, not for a second do i consider myself a 'programmer' nor do i choose to persue that path - BUT as an artist i found it possibly more valuable to me than the artist diploma ( as we basically mixed in with each other anyhow )

Yes I can dabble with c++ - and from scratch with a blank sheet of paper, i wrote my 'hippy pong' a psychadelic funky hypnotic pong with multi coloured almost neon balls a very bright soundtrack and sound effects. I had alot of help - but the satisfaction of being able to use what i was taught - to start with a blank sheet of paper and NO reference material and create a finished game was for me an achievement im proud of.

My experience was valuable - i got to sit down and see the reasons right there why i needed to stick to restrictions, why i need x bones per vertex, why i needed to reset the xform, why i needed to stl check my models to check for open edges and other artifacts.... the list goes on and on.

I got to experience the problems that arise from any small details that are often overlooked by artists, and experience how frustrating they can be to fix.

This has almost no relevance to this thread, but if anything for such a young guy - just 14 [:D] if i could hope for you to take anything away from the ramblings of an old man, it would be simply to take the time to experience what it is that you are doing.

And learn as much as you can, about what it is you want to do. Dont specialise too soon - learn about GAMES, youll eventually 'fall' into a groove that youll like. [:)]

Cant say ive tested the waters for just character skinning, but its beginning to be looked at in a whole new light ( the freelancing side of things ).

I'd suggest getting just a couple of examples and firing them off to as many dev houses as you can, and simply asking whether or not they would consider it.

Thanks Hazard, I was thinking of doing that.
It would be helpfull to hear from some other poeple in the industry.

If you can roll out some higher detail textures, then you may want to look into Film/TV studios as well. They are always looking for freelance artists.

Just be very careful with freelancing. I have read some pretty bad stories about people's past experiences (I have also read some damn good ones as well).

Further to Avens comments, Some advice when freelancing, be sure to have your documentation sealed tighter than a fish's bum.

Define all areas clearly, so as never to be caught doing 'free' extra work. This is where MANY individuals suffer, as too often helping out and 'customer service' ends up doubling the amount of time required to complete a job.

Having said that - take the film tact as aven suggested, that work is very constant.

hmm.... never really thought of film/tv as a possiblity. Would be hard to break into though.
But what sort of texture work would they be doing?

It's actually easier than you think to get into. I was offered a job earlier this year and the company had never seen any of my work! There are far more Animation houses in Australia than Game Dev houses.

They do a variety of work. From texturing buildings (probably the most common), and general city texturing. Up to characters and vehicles. It just depends what the project calls for. The only problem is that you will have to know how to paint up more than just diffuse maps. Being higher end work, you will need to have maps like specular, bump, reflection. Depending on the place, Shader knowledge will also help you out. That isn't a big deal though.

awww. poor little fella
cheer up rainy face........ it will be allright...

any day now.... one of those nice people from the gaming companies will sweep you of your feet and take you away to one of those big magical places where lots of really cool people have fun all day making really cool and entertaining computer games...

here is a tissue.....

Don,t get to upset, i'm sure there are a lot of people in your position, if you keep on trying you will eventuall y get a job at one of those magical places. If it's any comfort, i went to your work is great especially the drawings. But i couldn't find any low poly stuff

Hey Tojo, you have some brilliant work posted on Sumea. Your drawing style is fantastic! It looks like it came from the hand of someone who's been in the animation/concept industry for years! You're amongst the best concept artists showcased on this site, I reckon.
Yeh, there are numerous reasons why you might not have received a response from developers (they don't have an adequate HR department to handle replies, or they could be inundated with applicants etc). Don't be too disheartened, keep up the fantastic work, I'm sure you'll get snapped up in no time!

Tojo, have you done any game work yet? Mods, shareware ..etc? I can't see any such involvement in the game community from your web page. This is the first thing I would fix, is to get yourself on some MOD/Homebrew/Shareware titles (free work).

Once you can show you can model/draw for a real game, then it will be more in your favour for work prospects.

Also comments on your web page like this don't help...
"although i am the laziest bastard on the face of the earth....."

cheers bullet :)

Thanks Souri... you made my day! You are a legend!

(groovyone) I've squished quite a few things into morrowind and a few other games... weapons/sharks/palmtrees/a tiki bar that plays hula music.... great big giant hammers and volcanos..... tanks and cars, huge guns and naked women[:D]... i should showcase more of this stuff(agreed)... although at the moment i am focusing on a cut scene style animation.......

but i think you are right!.. i should perhaps do more communal modding... something a bit bigger than i am... ... [;)] bloody

hell!! sometimes i think you need 3 lifetimes!
:)....

it is always a toss up with what you learn next.... i have so much i am learning in animation/texturing/modelling/ik/rigging and just about everything... coupled with being cought up in really enjoying designing an enviroment from scratch...

but i totally agree with you .... definately good advice [:)]

and i will remove the 'laziest bastard on the face of the earth' comment.. from my site:) in truth... i am actually one of the most motivated bastards in the face of the earth... that was just meant to be a comic cover for the fact i havent had any money to pay for my new domain[;)]

cheers dudes!

i just fixed that page comment on my site :)

http://www.members.optusnet.com.au/todre/gallery.htm

Your work rocks dude.. nice clean and stylised.. top marks dude..
don't worry you'll be head hunted one of these days for work.. in the meantime don't give up trying to get a job!!! keep working!!

Bah, every company is different, so if you stess about preparing, then you'll just stress too much :) Just make sure you're all brushed up on C++ and OOP topics (my last... bunch... of interviews that's all they asked) if you're applying for something specific, like networking, understand things like star topography, client/server... etc...

Smile, let them know you're excited at the prospect of working there. Think of 1 joke to tell (hey, I've been asked a few times for a joke!) It's typically good to have a Political Correct Joke. If you haven't yet, read up on their company so you're at least familiar with their games. Be honest if you haven't played them when they ask. Actually, just be honest about everything. Example, if they ask you a question about some aspect of coding (Like what each position const can be in means) and you got them confused, say that. A lot can be said about a person who admits he doesn't know something. Of course, always follow up with something like "hmmm, but now I'm curious, I think I'll go look that up when I get back"

Good Luck Cm2! I'm sure you'll kick butt!!!!

Chris

Thanks a lot for the advice DaMunkee[:)]

cant offer much in the way of advice myself but ill just say good luck!!!! hope for all the best :)

I'd go for gargling a vivid blue food dye before the interview, see if they notice ;-)

Yes, as DaMunkee says, it's very important to not guess at questions you don't know the answer to, but rather let them know you are not sure, then tell them how you'd go about finding out, or tell them how you'd reason that it would work. Because as an interviewer (software R&D industry rather than games) I found nothing set me against candidates more quickly than someone trying to spin some bs about an answer.

Hope your interview went well.

Thank You Guys !
[:)]

id like to side with MoonUnit and wish you the best of luck too...[:D]

remember...be yourself...[8]

Just try to relax. Know that worrying about it isn't going to make matters better.

If anyone finds out how to do this, tell me how [;)]

Good lucK to ya matey, you prolly dont need it though if you got to the interview stage :)

I have two pet blue tongue lizards if that helps? Maybe rub them against yourself [:p]?

I think a joke like the gargling food dye like Wombat said might actually make them get a chuckle, and then again it might not, or just wear a tshirt stating 'I love blue tongues!', they make great pets, beleive me i know [:)].

But other then that, good luck!

Thanks for all the help guys! The interview went OK. I showed all of my games that I made and after the interview I sat on a 90 minutes test mostly about 3D stuff and c++. I just hope I got the job.[:)]

HEy Cm2 ! im sure you did fine! sorry didnt get time to wish you luck for you interview , but wish you luck for getting teh job now ! although i reckon youll get it no probs :) i had a look at yer games - quite impressive man! [:D]

quote:Originally posted by HazarD

HEy Cm2 ! im sure you did fine! sorry didnt get time to wish you luck for you interview , but wish you luck for getting teh job now ! although i reckon youll get it no probs :) i had a look at yer games - quite impressive man! [:D]

Thanks Man. I have seen your new website as well nice one i like that logo and the name Kalescent Studios hope it will be a big studio.
[:)]

if i had a dollar for evertime i saw the word "man" in these forums man, i'd like be a millionaire man :P

Yer all a pack of neo-hippies man!

bullet21:
Whoa, man... like... chill-out... man. (Hey, at least its better then "dude") [:D]
Better neo-hippie then neo-nazi :P

Cm2:
Goodluck to you Cm2! Let us know how you went. 90-minute test? How hard was it?

man.

YOoooooouu little smart ass Hazard, i'll give you something to man about, come here

I'll show you Urban Brawl come here god damn it.

ROFL !! sorry cm2 a bit off topic - but i just couldnt resist! [:P]

man this thread is getting out of hand...[;)]

Heard anything about the results of the interview yet?

quote:Originally posted by DaMunkee

Heard anything about the results of the interview yet?

Yeah and it was not a good news. Apparently they are not looking for junior level but more experienced type.Well at least I got the interview.

sorry to hear it mate, but dw the future holds many more opportunities :)

At least you got that far cm2.

Its funny, not mentioning any names, but I do know someone who rang up a dev company 2 times in one day, the first time he said something along the lines of "I dont have any industry experience, but i have a degree and have 2 years exp with max / photoshop" basically thinking industry experience meant working for a company - they said " yeah sorry mate, looking for someone with a bit more experience"

The second time, he rang up and said " Ive been working actively on a couple of mods for approximately 12 months, have a degree, and have been seeking more in depth industry work for quite some time, ive got this this and this yadda yadda" - they got him in for an interview straight away. [:)]

Just goes to show that changing your approach can get you that little bit further. He didnt get the job, but thats not really the point, i was trying to make. I think as long as someone is active in there approach, it will lead you that little bit further.

More opportunities will arise cm2 [:)]

quote:Originally posted by HazarD

Just goes to show that changing your approach can get you that little bit further. He didnt get the job, but thats not really the point, i was trying to make. I think as long as someone is active in there approach, it will lead you that little bit further.

More opportunities will arise cm2 [:)]

Yeah I will change my approach next time (this was my first job interview anyway)[:)]thanks for the advice HazarD

Try this
http://www.gamedev.net/

I would kinda consider a texture artist to be a dead occupation now. I would think that one would need to also be able to do stuff like concept sketches, interface design/general art, and maybe a bit of 3d modelling in order to be hired...

Although I'm an unemployed programmer, so don't take my word too seriously.

Do any companies actually seek anyone specialising in texturing? If by texture artist, you meant concept artist, then I'm sure that people in that area will always be needed (although looking at the quality of talent around in local dev. studios, you'll have to be *really* good to impress them).
As for a texture artist, it seems that this occupation is going to be split in two directions. Low polygon texture artist - the kind of stuff they've been doing for ages now, basically hand painted textures for low polygon models. It won't be completely dead like Daemin says, I reckon, as there'll always be a need for low polygon models and textures for handhelds and mobiles or PC games that want huge numbers of characters on screen like RTS games etc..
High polygon texture artist - perhaps the industry will want specialised people to create the diffuse/specular/bump map etc textures that high polygon models require for next gen engines, but we'll have to wait and see, I think.

p.s don't take my words too seriously either.. [:)]

Really good texture artists, in the traditional sense, i see as not being as neccessary with newer style engines. Basically, with the real-time lighting and shadowing etc. we can do nowdays there is not so much need for texture artists who can get the lighting "right" on certain bits of the texture...now the texture artist just makes things flat colour and lets the lighting/normal mapping etc. take care of the rest.
CYer, Blitz

Well considering those sexy new fangled normal mapped, radiosity lit, poly pushing beasty engines only cater to a small section of the games being developed I'd have to disagree that texture artists are becoming irrelavent. [:)]

Anyone see "Doom 3:the Real Time Strategy" or "The Sims: Unreal2 build" coming to our shores in the next few months?

Good texure artists still have jobs a plenty and even with those new engines I would personaly still employ a talented artist to do the job of making normal, specular, bump, diffuse maps etc.

Saying that, in my opinion if you stick to one thing, be it modelling, texturing or animating you are cutting your employment options down considerably. Try to at least have 2 skills or you'll have to seriously kick butt to get noticed among those who are multi skilled.

Yes, there's still plenty of jobs for dedicated texture artists (as Malus mentioned), I know of many studios that have their texture artists create all in-game textures even though some 3D modellers are capable of creating their own.
It's often thought that by having the 3D and 2D artists concentrating on their specific roles it's easier to achieve a level of uniformity and continuity throughout the game.

Have to agree with both malus and Red5 on that - a good texture artist to me is worth more than an average allrounder 3d guy.

While i understand the importance of the polygon, it is the texture that we all look at and go wow - try running morrowind in wireframe mode continuity in the texture area is paramount to creating a believable universe in my eyes.

Still as malus said - youll need to arm yourself with some other skills if to get yourself noticed more.

However now those extra texture - bump, displacement, normal - maps are generally created (tell me if I'm terrible off the track here) by 3d programs, by creating an ultra high detail model then culling it down and generating those textures as a result. Therefore a dedicated texture artist is not required for the process. However there still will be a market for talented texture artists, for 2D games on small handheld platforms, mobile phone games, and others not using the latest greatest engine.

Just that they won't be as needed for the AAA (shooter titles etc) games as much as they were once.

Daemin, even though it's becoming reasonably commonplace to utilise normal mapping, textures still have to be painted plus there's still a lot of art that doesn't benefit from high poly modelling and normal creation.

Ok, first of all I'd like to address the original question of this thread which people have seemed to have neglected.
Getting a job as a texture artist is the most open way for an artist to get a gig if they're good at what they do. There's a definite bias of average to fantastic modellers in this industry comparatively to well rounded artists, and good quality dedicated texture artists. These modelers, although very employable, still find it incredibly hard to get jobs because there's just so many that can do what they do. Every artist and their gran can model well -- in Australia we have a small handful that can truly push the pixel. It's these people that find getting work considerably "easier" than the others. Then again, if there's no position, there's no position.

Alrighty, now that that's done [:)] ...

The argument of texture artists becoming a dying breed has played out again and again in many other channels and forums, and ultimately they've all been moot points over "what you do now you won't be doing in 1 year... 2 years... 3... 4...". The same arguments where played out over 4bit sprite artists, then 8bit, then 16bit; the point being the technology grew and evolved, and so did the people with it, because it's the people that push the technology.

So what happened to this breed of "dying" artists? They didn't die out, but their roles shifted. Technology moved forward, and they either adapted or shifted around into other areas to compliment it(and still emerging areas like mobile games, watch games, etc).

So what of texture artists and the push of current technologies emerging in the soon future? well first and foremost, nothing -- according to the arguments when this first came about, by now they'd already be gone; this shift has already happened in a few circles, and again roles have only shifted, people don't disappear.
Tools change, methods change, techniques change -- so far it means we have to do 4x the work [;)]. A lot of masking, a lot of subpasses.

Daemin: Stating a texture artist has no hand in that process results in some very nice gray surface geometry that takes AGES for a dedicated modeller to make [;)] in this instance, texture artists roles shift into painting diffuse, bump, displacement, pigment, and shader masks -- in effect, the texture artist doesn't have to fake surface geometry by a texture, but creates multiple passes to physically create it. It still has to be done though, it's not magically modelled vert by vert and then processed into a readily available game asset.

thx,s to you all, This has has been a great help. Since it has been brought up that you need 2 or more skills to help to find work i do model in 3ds Max but my stronger
point is in texturing. I'm back at school at the AIE in the A.C.T. in game development, DIP2 And have a lot to do with the over all texture look and feel of the game, as this is all
new to me and I will be looking to find work at the end of the year. I'm trying to find out how difficult it is going to be for me to find a job. As far as I can tell from what
you have all said and from what people have been telling me so far from the AIE, That have seen my work, My chances are looking good. Now to find a job.[:)]

again thx

Ken Byrnes
kpbyrnes@iprimus.com.au

I'm saying that it *can* be done that way, and there will be tools coming out that will automate the process more.

It's just the same sort of situation as with programmers, as more and more middleware comes in, the programmers attention shifts. Such will be with texture artists, where there *will* still be a market for texture artists, but it will change, and more tools will be created to fill in the gaps.

Also don't forget that you can generate realistic looking textures using formulas and algorithms, so a texture artist could become some sort of artist/programmer hybrid. Of course there could be tools generated to do it all.

Why do programmers believe eveything will become a code handled sooner or later? Theres one thing your code will never be able to replicate and thats a good eye for the asthetic.

Sorry to break programmer ranks here Daemin [;)] but I have to stop lurking in this thread and say that I don't agree :-) The more nifty tools one has the more nifty assets one can produce (and must produce to stay competitive).

I'd say there's no way I can see that with in the next 20 years that we'd come anywhere close to replicating the process/emotions a human goes through in order to judge somethings' aesthetics. I'd also say I hope we never get to producing hardware that can judge this, too :-)

I have to step in and actually agree with Daemin to a certain level. Unless I misunderstand him, there are a lot of good points he is making.

He hasn't actually said the texture artists will become non existant or texturing is a lost art. If there is a way to make a texture look and handle better than just paintng it, then what is wrong with that? Making a texture procedurally has always been a viable option with higher end 3D work, so why not with gaming now? Textures have always been made by painting them as that was the only option. With games coming out promising to have better shader networks (Unreal 3 that supposedly has a shader editor like Maya's Hypershade), 2D painting for textures may start to take slightly less important role. I can't actually see in the future, so I don't know. I think that texture artists will always be around, but they will have to evolve (just like every other field has in the past), and learn the new techs to stay at the top of their game. Think about it, if code can be written to create a ground texture procedurally that would other wise require a few meg of textures, why wouldn't you do it through a shader?

Malus - And why do artists think they are the only ones with any aesthetics? Daemin never actually said that a programmer will take the job of a texture artist, he said that the roles may blend together. The computer wont actually make the texture, it will just render it. There still has to be someone there to tell the computer how to render it. What does it matter if that person is an artist or a programmer? As long as it looks good, what is the big deal?

If shaders do take a bigger role in the texturing of game surfaces, it wont be for quite a few years. I don't think that anyone who tries to be a dedictaed texture artist will lose their job in rush, but it sure as hell wouldn't hurt to learn the new technologies as they become available.

ill just add my two cents further to avens comments, it goes without saying that people working in our industry evolve with technology - if you dont, you simply wont be workin it for long.

A good example is doords post that mentions his boss asked him to start playing around with zbrush - and straight away hes on it posting his work on here trying to gain tips - show off his advancements, to me thats what its all about. growth.

Exactly Aven!...

But I also have to say that some programmers do have an artistic side, no matter how bad it is, but with the proper tools they can create good looking things.

Also I never said that texture srtists will become obselete, I said that they won't be as required for top AAA (fps etc) games. However they will be required for handhelds and other compact consoles, since they won't have the advanced technology of the latest and greatest PC graphics / central processor. Textures will still probably be used for colouring in those AAA engines and such, but they'll just be used for colour, as before textures were used to create details on otherwise flat and lifeless models. The new displacement/bump/normal maps (that will most probably be generated by a tool of some kind - like it is being done for Doom 3 etc) will be used to create the intricate details.

And Malus, *everything* can be handled in code, as some of the nifty 64k demos can attest to. We've been able to generate good algorithmic textures for ages now, and procedual landscapes are being used in many games (Settlers 1 had a random terrain generator, and so did Civ 1). However I don't see artists starting to write code, at the very most they'll be using well designed tools that will generate the code for them.

Finally one last thing to note is that the Games industry is highly mobile and constantly evolving, some roles change despite how much we want to keep them intact (think of the programmer/designer/artist from long past), some new roles get created (think shader artist ?), and some roles will stay the same but move to different areas (pixel/texture artists moving to handhelds, engine programmers moving to middleware). We can't avoid this and doing so will result in failure!

I dont understand how increasing the technology (polies lighting etc) will do away with texture artists for even the ground breaking fps games, even very detailed models created for still or pre-redered shots have to be textured and while it's easier then having to paint in all the details it's still a whole lot harder than simply slapping a color onto the model. There's still the unwrapping and painting of variation/dirt etc.

Like almost every position in almost every industry things will change and evolve.

Stu

Daemin: Correct me if I'm wrong, but from your arguments I assume you haven't worked with, or seen much, if any, source material for this gen tech.

Procedurally generate me anything of a quality to this:
http://www.stevengiesler.com/

The Final Fantasy movie is still credited with the most believable looking digital characters. They used an average of 6 complete texture passes in each localised area, as an example to the extent of this, Aki sat just under 50 hand painted textures for her body (not including her head). The lighting model was handled by a shader which was reliant on 2 other texture passes (translucency, and specularity).

The point I'd like to make is that I'm yet to see a believable character generated algorithmically through code, in games or film, without the use of support from a texture artist. The closest thing is producing procedural bases... which then have to be masked (hand painted by a texture artist), and then rely on other localised textures to detail other areas.

quote:The new displacement/bump/normal maps (that will most probably be generated by a tool of some kind - like it is being done for Doom 3 etc) will be used to create the intricate details.

I just find it funny you're using Doom3 as an example to your argument, when they have Kenneth Scott working full time on texture art. Diffuse, normal, gloss, glow.
One other thing, a good normal map isn't created by a tool. It's ripped by one, not created by it. It's created by the combination of a high res model and a hand painted texture. Have you ever tried to model skin pores? or protruding veins? a displacement map is hand painted to get these localised details, which without it, you've got a smooth baby bum model.
If you'd like, I'd be more than happy to post source material.

I was away for the weekend, and realise that I forgot that I hadn't put the reasons down why I don't completely agree with Daemin. Sorry Daemin, you don't get off thatlightly ;)

I love the idea of procedural maps. No resolution and the ability to create seamless non-tiling textures. The bad part? making them. The best way to handle the making of procedural maps, wouldn't be through coding one. That would just be nuts. Although we do have the ability to work with procedurals by ajusting little sliders and typing in numbers, it can be annoying and frustrating to get those nice little details in there. The way to work around it? How about a program that allows an artist to paint procedurally? This is the reason why I don't think that an artist that can actually paint will ever be killed off. The other way to create more complex textures procedurally (think a logo on a character's jacket), would be to have a procedural generator that figures out the code by scanning a raster image. For an example of what I mean, have a look at Flash and it's raster to vector conversion tool. At the moment, raster images have nothing to fear (as the conversion tool isn't overly great), but the future is always just a day away :)

At the moment, with procedural, the only way to get decent looking fine detailed textures is through creating major shader networks and using masking maps (like Joel said). The plus side of this is that skin is completely random, and a procedural texture (or at least PS filters) can generate random textures far better than I can paint a random texture :) The down side is that for a fine level of control you need to have a lot of textures. Still, I find painting some rough black and white maps for masks and spec passes easier than painting every pore on a person's skin. I would still be more inclined to use a few painted textures for most surfaces at the moment as I don't know how to use Maya's Hypershade incredibly well (mass understatement), and PS makes it easier (for me at least) to create all the different pass maps that are needed (diffuse, bump, spec, reflection, etc.). If I ever learn to use Hypershade better, then I may learn procedural to a greater level.

Joel - I actually find it funny that you use FF: TSW as an example of good skin textures. Most people on line bitched about them non stop and said they were 'too game like'. Personally I think the textures were great and those people are just bitch picking. And any flaws that the FF textures had were easily made up for in Final Flight. The use of multiple maps for translucency is due to the lack of speed in current Sub-Surface Scattering shaders. When the day comes when SSS shaders are faster (and not so waxy), then count for maps will descrease greatly. As for the procedural generation of Steven Giesler's work.... I'm sure that some nut a Pixar would try to give it a shot :D

And just for the hell of it. Why I do think that texturing will be around for just a little while longer...
www.amazonsoul.com
www.renemorel.com/
Ren? Morel is a dude.

hehe, that's actually the main reason I used it as an example -- it's the closest methodology to where we're heading in games; for the most part, it's already being used, albeit in a simplified partly kludged manner.

Ahh well, as I said at the start of this thread, I'm just a programmer not an artist...

Still I think it could be possible in future to generate pretty much all art algorithmically...

Average pay for a new employee with no previous industry experience is $30-40k and generally caps off at around $50-60k for a lead artist/art director. I've know of a few individuals making more than this but it's rare in Australia.

From what I have experienced you get paid *much* more overseas (US).

Interesting. I would have thought the pay to be much lower then that. That's good news!

What about programmers? Do programmers generally get paid more then artists? (Don't get offended artists! I just assume that all artists are under appreciated and underpaid across the board in all industries.)

And then there's the production side of things. What kind of pay do these guys average?

(Hope these questions aren?t rude! Like Bullet said, I'm just curious [:)] )

WHAT?!?!?!?! 30-40k entry for an artist? Damn, artists get paid a lot more in Oz then here in the US. Here's some ballpark figures. Design, no experince <('<' means less then for you non programmer types :) ) $28k US. My friends as artists, entry <$30k Max $100k (very rare). Programmers entry $45k-$50k. Experienced... well, the sky's the limit.
Anyway, that's the US figures... of course some companies pay different depending on where you live... so these are just general numbers.

yes but its hard to compare a US pay to australian pay because theres all the different costs of living and the conversions to think about.

As far as I know entry level programmers are on roughly the same wages as artists here in Australia, maybe around $5k more. Of course this can climb dramatically as they become more important to the developer... artists are generally considered expendable while a talented experienced programmer can be worth his/her weight in gold to a developer.

Just thought id add in that 28K american = 39,823.5 with today oz dollar standings, although like moony said cost of living etc is different.

But having travelled all over the world - its pretty much all relative, no matter where you work or travel, if you get paid peanuts your probably in a place where peanuts is easily livable - its just the change of lifestyle that shocks us into thinking its less money for more work.

The UK also pays well, paticularly around the london area, 18K - 22K for entry level positions which isnt quite so easily livable if you dont have the right contacts, but if you do, you stand to make what seems to be very little - but you can come home after a year or so with quite a package. 18k = 45,677 oz dollars at the moment. so you get the picture.

30-40 K aint that much. Is that only for like newbies or is it the average for all non lead artists.

Well its a quite a tad higher than alot of "entry" level positions. and you can make a nice lifestyle from mid 30k, if you have good spending habits.

Some of the higher paid UK jobs ive seen asking for 2 - 5 years experience ranges from 25K - 35K ( thats english pounds ) so roughly 3 times the amount for oz dollar. thats a pretty decent earnings if you send your money home.

Ok, after one years experience working on ut2004 I get over the maximum amount Red 5 specified for a lead artist. Designers I know in Australia work for half that.

quote:What about programmers? Do programmers generally get paid more then artists?

Overall yes, as for entry level maybe not though. I'm probably at the lower scale of entry-level programming wages at ~32k a year (for a ... "38" hour week :P), which is about $2/hour less than one would get working the cash register at woolworths :P. In the long run though, i hear the senior programmers tend to get around 70k, whereas senior artists are closer to 55k.

DaMunkee: Remember to take currency conversion into account :)
CYer, Blitz

This should have all the info for you for USA
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20020715/Salary_Survey_2002.pdf

Da Munkee, you said that in Oz we get paid more!!? I read the gamasutra salary survey posted by Chaos and the average figures for salaries, even for entry level or inexperience artists are still quite higher than Australian figures!
Approx 53K for artists with less than 2 years experience!? And that's in US dollars.

I don't know, maybe that survey isn't correct, but the figures definitely look enticing and much better than Oz. But getting into the American industry is a whole other story...

Blitz: 32K and 38 hour weeks? When you put it into the woolworths perspective I start to worry :/. If you don't mind me asking, which development house are you with?

Also, to anyone else, is there any advice for cracking into the US industry? I've always considered it an impossible target, but the money seems much bigger over there. Ideally, what would one have to do? I assume it would mean a few years experience in the Oz industry first. Though I heard that immigration laws have become tighter so it's even more difficult to get into the US and find a job, settle etc..

Any advice?

im heading to the US. New York to be precise.
yes it is difficult to get in, ive been in the visa process for a few months now. I should have my visa in 3 weeks, all the paperwork was sent back over to the studio and put into immigration last week.
its broadcast, not games but same story....

i dont know about the money being that much more.
after working out living expenses etc of New York, it looks like ill still be living about the same, maybe a little upgrade.

quote:Originally posted by Jason


Also, to anyone else, is there any advice for cracking into the US industry? I've always considered it an impossible target, but the money seems much bigger over there. Ideally, what would one have to do? I assume it would mean a few years experience in the Oz industry first. Though I heard that immigration laws have become tighter so it's even more difficult to get into the US and find a job, settle etc..

Any advice?

Well, it is difficult to get a job in the US without a couple years prior experience. I was just in the right place at the right time and had the skills. Also you really need a bachelors (with honors is better) degree to get through immigration. However if a company *really* wants you, which usually only happens for genius programmers, they can usually find ways to get you into the US.

Yeah, I saw those Gamasutra figures. Mind you, there is a difference between 'no' experience and 1 or 2 years experience. I dont think the survey catered for those with 'no' experience.

Considering the skill that's usually involved with 3d art and gaming art in general - it's rude that they get paid the same as your entry graphic designer (give or take a few thou'). Did anyone else see the other recent Gamasutra survey. Something like 52% of people in the industry dont think they'll be in it in 10 years time. It was a survey on 'quality of life'.

quote:Originally posted by JonathanKerr

Did anyone else see the other recent Gamasutra survey. Something like 52% of people in the industry dont think they'll be in it in 10 years time. It was a survey on 'quality of life'.

[url]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1760[/url]

The IGDA Did a survey/whitepaper on Quality of life. Yeah the numbers definitely show something is wrong with the industry.

We need a union [;)]

Yes I agree!! we need a union! I'm getting paid peanuts at the moment 27k (au) to be exact.. I'm not complaining cause my job kicks ass over what I used to do! But yeah having no union means we are getting shafted...

We should start a thread about forming a union ya know! It's about time we looked after ourselves
lesss hours more Pay!!

yah

But if not everyone joined the union the publishers would hire the "scabs" to make the games for less than what the unionised dev studios were asking :P
And so on down the chain...
CYer, Blitz

quote:Originally posted by Me109

Yes I agree!! we need a union! I'm getting paid peanuts at the moment 27k (au) to be exact.. I'm not complaining cause my job kicks ass over what I used to do! But yeah having no union means we are getting shafted...

We should start a thread about forming a union ya know! It's about time we looked after ourselves
lesss hours more Pay!!

yah

First up - I'm making this shit up from what I can find on Gamasutra and places like that, I have no idea if it's true or not...

Personally I don't see how any US/UK company stays afloat these days, given the wages they supposedly pay.

Lets say a game takes 18 months, has 30 people working on it (mid-sized project)
Lets pay them each, say, AU$75k (approx US $50k) (everyone gets the same money in this example, at the lower end of the average wage in the surveys)
So wages alone cost AU$3.3 million. General business practice says that an employee costs at least 2x their wage, so thats AU$6.6 million to make the game, approx (some say 3x)

so how many copies do you need to sell to break even ?
Best that I can see, you get 5-20% of the sale price as a royalty (approx, from gamasutra) depending on your history. lets say 20%, pretend you're a hero :-)
Game price is AU$80 (ex GST)
Dev takes home $16 per title
So Dev needs to sell over 420,000 copies to break even...
Add to that another 60,000 copies for every million spent on advertising/etc.

and if you only get 10%, then you need to sell close to a million to break even... before advertising...

And thats not a top-level game - the better known games probably cost double that figure... I've seen suggestions of some games costing 4x that figure to make.

so how do they do it ?
My best guess is that we are similar to the film industry... the Publishers fund a heap of games hoping one will make up for all the others (e.g. GTA)
The other thing is that perhaps game companies can run at lower overhead to other industries - but I doubt that (think of floorspace, computers, power, admin, etc)
Also, the lower paid people at most game companies are not attending GDC and therefore less likely to respond to the survey (since thats where it is primarily run from)

hmm - maybe I should have started another topic :-)

Seriously though, does anyone know real info on how any normal company survives in this industry ?

edit: converted some of my sentences into English :-)

quote:Originally posted by Me109
Yes I agree!! we need a union! I'm getting paid peanuts at the moment 27k (au) to be exact.. I'm not complaining cause my job kicks ass over what I used to do! But yeah having no union means we are getting shafted...

We don't need a union. If you're getting paid peanuts then either your area has a very low cost of living, you have a rather unskilled position or you are just putting up with being screwed by unscrupulous managers. If you had good managers then you'd be doing a 40 hour week and getting a decent wage, because they would only take on projects with realistic costings and plans.

quote:Originally posted by Zaph
Personally I don't see how any US/UK company stays afloat these days, given the wages they supposedly pay.

Agreed. There are studios shutting down in the UK, and this is probably why. (See the article on the front page a while ago about Ratbag having loads of people from the UK applying). I wouldn't say that an employee costs at least as much as they are being paid - $50,000 is a lot of extra expenses for that employee! (But what would I know, I'm just an employee too.)

With the sales figures you calculated you can see why developers are abandoning the PC - there just isn't the market to sustain a large number of big-budget titles anymore. On a console like the PS2, there's a much greater chance to sell a million copies and you don't have the associated support nightmare of a million different configurations like you do with the PC.

Thats a really interesting point - i learnt about this a couple years back when i was doing some research on shareware indy based devleopers, and i basically came up with the same figures, it just somehow doesnt work out.

Like you said Kevin, 6.6 million to build a game is quite a high figure and a couple years back, figures of 10 million for titles like RTCW - was almost unheard of. The companies would need to sell some serious SERIOUS figures to even make headway, but like you also said about publishers jumping in for a whole bunch of titles and hoping like hell 1 comes up trumps would probably be near whats going on.

Even though, that kind of squeeze cant be good for the state of the industry, so much money spent on a whim is why forum after forum talk about " why so many companies fail " - it comes down to almost impossible odds, even uberly impossible for the startup guy with no capital, to spit out a game on the other end, drag 30 - 40 workers through hell for 18 months and NOT pay them a decent wage ?

IMO its all backward,.. you pay peanuts you get monkeys, its as simple as that. If you want to buy good genuine hand made goods - you pay for them, a whole bunch more than a production line stuff ( generally speaking ).

So like Zaph, if anyone can shed light on this topic - id be all eyes [:)]

If we think it's bad now, wait till the next generation of consoles arrive.
Some within the industry forecast massive amounts of studio closures due to budgets escalating up to $40 million + for a AAA title.

Think about it, with those figures being touted publishers won't be willing to take a gamble on any unknown developer whatsoever.

wtf $40 million per AAA title - thats obscene... where will that money go ????

im assuming that would be doubling the team size - paying them a decent specialist wage, the dev time would blow out to 5 odd years on average ? but even so using those figures from above that would say blow it out to 20-25 million at the most!!!

C&C Generals, about $13mil US - Marketing was another > $10mil US Crazy expensive games are already being made.

So how do companies survive? Here's one way. Say you're a company and you have a deal with one publisher for 1 game, you develop your engine (which takes a long freak'n time, that's the bulk of your costs) and then when you ship the game, it's time to make a new game. Well if you started from scratch, you would go through the whole process again and surely you'll fail. So, how about you get a publisher for 1 game and as you're working on that, you get a contract for a second game. If the engine was designed right (being almost 100% data driven) you can now develop 2 games at the same time without having to shell out for another engineering team (which is the highest paid group). Sure your team will have to increase as you need more designers and artists for the second game, but provided you did the numbers right, you stand to make a substantial profit by developing the two games at the same time. Continue like this until the engine is tired and worn out and you can actually survive.

The reason why most studios fail (95% to be exact) is mainly because the people running the studio have no clue about managing people as well as assets. Get some good managers on the team, as well as retain the talent you already have (so you don't have to waste money retraining them) and you'll be on the right track to survive.

I jsut heard on sunrise today that 72% of Australians earn below 50,000 dollars so i Guess game developers are in the majority. So it aint that bad when you look at it like that. Plus your gettin that kind of money for doing something that its tonnes of fun.

quote:Originally posted by HazarD

wtf $40 million per AAA title - thats obscene... where will that money go ????

im assuming that would be doubling the team size - paying them a decent specialist wage, the dev time would blow out to 5 odd years on average ? but even so using those figures from above that would say blow it out to 20-25 million at the most!!!

The example I gave was a medium sized project. Transformers had close to double that number of people on it, GPC had similar numbers. External costs like CG movies, Actors, etc, all add up too

I've thin figured out a bit more about how this all works:

Most companies would work on advances from the publisher for that (say) $6million.
So to break even it's the Publisher that needs to make 6mil, not the dev studio - and the publisher takes the studios cut of the sales until that 6mil is paid back. So I guess it's possible for a publisher to break into a profit while there is still money owed on the 6mil for the developer.

this is still guesswork, but sounds reasonable since it's similar to how the film industry works
e.g.

new game: SPISPOPD
Cost: $6mil
Dev takes 10%, Publisher 20% (guessing here, I have no idea)
Publisher starts out at -6mil
Publisher takes $24 per copy (30%) until the 6mil is paid off *using 10%* and then drops to 20%

Sales____Publisher___Dev
0_________-6mil_______0
100,000___-3.6mil_____0 (800k paid off)
200,000___-1.2mil_____0 (1.6mil)
400,000___+3.6mil_____0 (3.2mil)
800,000___+6.8mil_____+400,000 (+6mil paid off)
1,000,000_+10mil______+2mil (+6mil paid off)

So, if I'm right (and this is guesswork) then:
- Developer breaks even from the start, publisher has pissed away it's money :-)
- At some point the publisher starts making a profit on their investment
- At a later point (considerably later) the developer starts getting more money on the sales.

Of course, since most games probably never hit profit for the publisher, it's a big gamble for them. (including cancelled games)

Still, a US$40mil game is going to have to sell a truckload of units to make a profit for anyone! (GTA probably sold enough)

Well, if Alex Seropian (Wideload Games, ex-Bungie head) has anything to do with it, most game services would be contracted out. Have a core team (designers, programmers and artists) and source everything out from there. That way you're not paying artists when you're doing the testing or when bottlenecks build up in the workload.

Makes sense, but not as secure. That's how it is in films tho'.

Personally, I think paid overtime would make producers put more realistic schedules out (if from what I hear is true). Apparently some law in the UK is going to make paid overtime mandatory so it'll either be 'cut the feature out' or 'make a more realistic schedule in the first place'.

Hey Jason, If you read the paper in this post, you'll see why people don't stay in it. They usually leave by choice as well.
[url]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1760[/url]

I know my plans are that I'm leaving the industry really freak'n soon :) Hehe 6 weeks baby and maybe a normal life!!!! Me, I only lasted 3 years/5 games. As for what I"m doing next. Well i'm a software engineer so I can get a job anywhere. I'm also currently in the process of arraging teaching some of the stuff I picked up.

If you're an artist, a lot of my friends leave and do contract work (and get paid bank doing it) or they move onto movies. If you're a designer... you're pretty much screwed. There's not many jobs that require the skills a designer builds when working in video games (or at least that's what my coworkers tell me).

So, In my opinion, Games are great to get into and they teach you a tonne about how not to manage a project which in turn allows you to relax more once you're out of the industry.

Chris

Jason, I'm a perfect example of an exception to the rule.
I began working in the game industry in my 30's and am now in my 40's (yeah, I'm an old bugger with teenage kid's).

I do however think that the industry is geared towards young, preferably single people.

Typically long hours along with relatively low wages can (and often does) put a strain on personal relationships/marriages and family life.
If you really want to succeed and make a good sustained career in this industry it takes a good level of self discipline because the odds are stacked against it happening.
You have to contend with a certain amount of instability within any company, not knowing if you'll still have a job after you've finished your current game, you'll have to be fully aware of job promotion and how to place yourself in a position to be considered, health issues (sitting in front of a computer isn't everyone's cup of tea for years on end), boredom (people move on because they want new challenges) so yes, people do get burned out.

I can still vividly remember my first day when I started work at a game studio, I was buzzing thinking "this is it" I've got my dream job. The guy sitting next to me told me the "feeling" wouldn't last long, complacency and boredom will eventually set in.
I soon came to realise there were a number people working there who didn't particularly want to be there, these were staff that had been working in the industry for quite a few years, some wanted a change of career but either didn't know what they'd rather be doing or were just to complacent or lazy to leave and pursue it.

Put it this way, if I hadn't eventually left and started my own business (doing exactly what I choose to do), I would have moved on to something else by now. (FWIW, I absolutely love my situation these days and wouldn't want to be doing anything else).

This is not meant to be a negative view of the game industry, it's simply a fact of life and people will always get back what they put in, it's a great industry for some and a dead end for others.

Thanks munkee for the link.

It's actually scaring me now to see that so many people want out of the industry. I'm almost at the end of my degree (digital media) and I've focused on getting into the game industry, but now that I realise it's not a very sustainable future, I'm beginning to feel like I've wasted my time at university. Though there are other digital media related areas.

You mentioned going into movies, do you know much about that industry? Oh wait I see you're from the USA.. The movie industry here is still really small. Wouldn't the movie industry be similar to the VG industry? In the sense that it's a lot of contract work that only lasts through the pre production phases then fizzles out later on and you're out of a job again?

Red 5: Thanks for your inspiration! Nice to know that even people with families and life outside of games can still work in the industry. Though, personally, I think by the time I get to that point in my life, realistically, I wont be able to juggle it all in addition, I don't know if the salary for someone working in games will be enough to support a family (though u seem to be doing it!).

You say that you're doing your own business now? If you don't mind, what type of business? Does it incorporate your existing skills you had from the VG industry or is it totally unrelated?

I'm just trying to figure out my options. I graduate at the end of this year and I'm thinking that mayber I should do another degree, something more long term with more stability. I think that doing more study right now is annoying, but I can't imagine ever being able to come back to uni after a few years. I'll just be too lazy by then, better now than never.

Thanks anymore advice appreciated.

quote:Originally posted by Jason


Red 5: Thanks for your inspiration! Nice to know that even people with families and life outside of games can still work in the industry. Though, personally, I think by the time I get to that point in my life, realistically, I wont be able to juggle it all in addition, I don't know if the salary for someone working in games will be enough to support a family (though u seem to be doing it!).

You say that you're doing your own business now? If you don't mind, what type of business? Does it incorporate your existing skills you had from the VG industry or is it totally unrelated?

Jason, working full time for an employer was extremely difficult for someone in my position with a wife (not working) and 3 kids to support... we only just managed to get by for those years we spent in Melbourne.
I'd operated a business (unrelated to games) for quite a few years before I got into games and making the switch instantly cut my yearly earnings in half but it was something I really wanted to do and I looked at it as a learning experience to eventually further myself and family.
Luckily it did pay off in the long run, I'm now earning a lot more than I could if I was working for any Australian based developer, I get to live and work where I choose and also get to see a lot more of my family.

As for what I now do, I operate a contracting business supplying car models for games.
www.virtual-mechanix.com

I think you should still go for it, you'll never know what it's like if you don't try it first hand. You're obviously still young and can get out at any time to pursue something else if you don't like it. I'm proof that you can make a change at just about any stage of your life if you have the desire.

I agree with Red 5, Jason, Go for it, Experience it as there is a feeling of working on something like a game that you just won't feel otherwise. It's a fun environment and a fast pace one were you will learn so much in such a short amount of time. Worry about the feesiblity of a long term tour in gaming later in life :)

As a tester you'll be play testing each build on completion, looking for bugs, advising on gameplay issues, testing collision detection etc etc.
Apart from good gaming skills (and a lot of patience) an important part of being a game tester is to have good communication skills and being able to document all your thoughts/issues in an organised manner. Having some knowledge of how games are made can also help, especially if you have a reasonable understanding of what can/can't be done.

For the interview, try to be as friendly and positive as possible, they'll already realise you love games or you wouldn't be there, show that you have a mind of your own while still being a team player, never come across as arrogant or a now-it-all type of person or you'll have no show of getting the job. If all fails miserably I suggest you take the George Costanza (Yanky Stadium job interview) approach :)

Good luck mate!

Hey good Luck with that interview palantir!!! glad to hear you could have a shot at getting your foot in the door :)

i cant really think of anything to add to what red 5 said, other than make sure you get a good nights sleep before hand, and east some breakfast, perhaps also drink a massive cup of hot milo before you go and eat a chocolate bar just before the interview, thats IF your one of those people who get big ass nerves.

Red's said most of it, and as HazarD kinda mentioned, try to relax. As much as someone who can do the job, they want a person they can kick around with and have a laugh. If you come across as being uptight and reserved (because you're so nervous) you might seem "uninteresting".
Communication skills can be a big deal in testing jobs, so try your best to speak clearly and not mumble or stumble over what you're saying.
Background knowledge on the company can be helpful, particulalry what games they have in development or have made in the past. If you can tell them some things in gameplay of games they have made in the past that you think could be better, and suggest possible improvement that should be a big tick.
Good luck,
CYer, Blitz

Thanks for the comments guys!

-Yeah, I definitely am the nervous type with this kind of thing, so I think having a big feed before is a good idea - provided I'm not too nervous to eat!

-I can't remember that Costanza job interview episode, what did he do? Anyway, even if it all goes horribly wrong, at least it's good experience. I guess most people don't get a job from their first interview anyway [:(]

I was also wondering, what should I wear? I hear games companies are pretty casual, so is smart/casual (like nice shorts and a polo type shirt) the way to go? - I don't want to seem uptight by being over dressed.

It was the episode where George did the opposite of everything his instincts told him to do... he went for a job interview at Yanky Stadium and told the head honcho exactly what he thought of him (basically how much of a loser he is) and he ended up getting the job :)

just a note...ive never been to an actual job interview but I was put through a couple of mock interviews in Work Studies a couple of years back...I would wear pants and not shorts, but I think the shirt you suggested would be ok...

good luck!

and remember...bribey, bribey...[:D]

Know what your position actually is (do you know what a tester actually does?), be friendly, know where you want to be years down the track (do you want to still be testing in 5 years time?), good communication and documenting skills are blingin', be honest and don't kiss *too* much arse, and PLAY THEIR GAMES! I made this mistake once and have made sure never to do it again. Points are definitely won if you can talk about their games, and you'll get a step ahead of the other interviewees (I was surprised in my most recent interview when I was told most of the people so far hadn't played the company's latest game, and since I had, I was able to leap into certain aspects of the interview. So DO EET!)

Smart casual dress is where you want to be. Pants and a collared shirt will do the job. Good luck with it dude @:-)

For testers, I would recommend to play their games as well. (heh of course, if they've never shipped a game, then you're screwed :) Just kidding.) Oh and definitely wear pants. Even if the company is casual, you still want to show them respect, no matter what the job is for.

Other then that, smile, laugh at their jokes, and just give a good "aura" about yourself.

Of course, when you do get the job, pants are optional. [;)]

Good luck with the interview!

I'd just like to say i've never worn pants (always shorts) to an interview as far as i can remember (it was always hot!), and i usually was just wearing a normal tshirt (not polo or collared, in fact i don't even own any!), and i've been offered a job from all except 1 interview i've had (and that interview was very very positive anyway), which includes 2 game companies and 1 software startup (and the one i didn't get was a third game company).
I think your attitude is much more important than what you are wearing (although don't wear rippid up clothes or smelly clothes obviously they won't want to work with someone who smells!).
If you're going for a testing, or entry-level artists/developer job, it's not expected that you will be interacting with the "outside world" much, i think they will be much more interested in your abilities (including teamwork etc.) than in your presentation.
Of course, maybe i've been lucky and only had interviews with very relaxed companies :)
CYer, Blitz
PS. I'm not saying DON'T wear pants and a polo shirt etc. i'm just saying in my experience it is not neccessary so i wouldn't go out of my way to buy new clothes for the interview or anything.

Well, I had the interview. Here?s a fairly thorough review for anyone who?s interested. Maybe my experience might help others in the future going for QA/tester interviews.

Surprisingly I wasn?t very nervous at all, as the guys and the atmosphere there are really laid back. The interview itself seemed to go really well, with the basic questions being things like what do I know about the job and what experience do I have to qualify me for it. Fortunately I?ve studied the testing process with my games Diploma, so I was able to answer those questions quite well (I think). They were particularly interested to know that I know that testing isn?t playing games but testing them!

They also got me to do a small test to describe a certain process (in this case, making a cup of tea) as clearly as possible, which is obviously an important part of testing, being able to document your work. I didn?t have any trouble with this either.

However, it didn?t go so well at the end, when they actually got me to test play the latest build of a game they are working on and see if I could spot any problems in a small time frame. So I ran all over the level, trying silly things like jumping through the background, or dieing in silly ways, but nothing major happened. I saw a couple of really minor issues with the camera views being a bit off and the character not moving smoothly over bumps, but they were such small things I didn?t bother pointing them out ? big mistake! These were the exact things they were looking for. There were a couple of other little things they showed me that I missed, but it?s hard to know what they thought or if I blew it altogether. At least they saw me attempting to break the gameplay, which was exactly what they did, just in different spots to where I did it.

So anyway, it?s hard to know how I went, but I think I did okay. Even if not, it will help with the next interview down the track. They will get back to me next week to let me know if I got the job or not. I?ll let you all know then if I have a new career or if I?m going to be stuck delivering pizzas for the rest of my life!

Definetly not necessary to wear a full business suit to the interview, unless of course you're going for one of the senior "board" type positions or marketing or something...

Yeah, I just wore a collared t-shirt with jeans and boots - and that was over dressed compared to everyone else around there.

Luckily everyone I saw had pants on! [;)] (No artists walking around in their underwear or anything *hehe*)

Where was this job advertised?

i got my fingers crossed mate!!!
be sure to tell us the response you get :D

quote:Where was this job advertised?

It wasn?t even advertised! I heard that they have a QA/testing department, so took the initiative and sent them an email with my resume attached ? with the cover letter stating how great I would be working for them as a tester. About a week after not hearing anything, I sent another email (again with my resume attached) and basically said in the email that they should give me an interview. Anyway, that same afternoon I rang them, to confirm they got my email and remind them that I exist. During that call they made the appointment for the interview.

I think they were impressed by my determination to get the interview, as well as my enthusiasm during the interview. I just hope I didn?t blow it by not pointing out the tiny little problems I noticed with their game during the play test. It doesn?t seem fair to judge my testing skills from a few minuets of testing. Anyway, I should know soon. (Thanks - Keep those fingers crossed![:D])

Edit: to thank moonunit [:)]

palantir, I'm impressed!

People taking your approach will always have a far higher success rate than those who sit and wait around for jobs to be advertised.

Best of luck, you deserve to be given a go.

Good luck with the job. Sounds like things went well on the whole, it's always hard to tell the importance of individual aspects of an interview. The way you did your game play testing may have been more important than finding errors with the game.

Keep us updated on the outcome :)

Well, its been a week and still no word. :(

Here's to hoping that they are too busy with E3 to get back just yet.

What happened to the Job?

Well, I waited and waited (and called them twice but they were still undecided), and after almost two months they sent me an email saying sorry but I didn?t get the job. [:(] So now I'm all bitter and twisted, hence the Burnsy avatar. [:P]

Anyway, I've been seeking other work, and just last week I found a job with Australia Post, which I start next week. It looks like a good job, and should sustain me while I study traditional art part time (that?s the plan anyway). It will be a nice change from delivering pizza?s, that?s for sure!

Actually, I got a phone call from the games studio just yesterday saying that they have a temporary position with the QA department, though it?s only a couple of weeks work, but since I?m starting a new job next week, I can?t really do it. Curse my luck; if they only called me a week earlier, I could have gotten a couple weeks work experience with them.

Oh well, looks like I?ll have to put my dreams of working for a games developer on hold for a couple of years until I have the skills to work as an actual developer.

Thanks for all the encouragement guys! [:D]

That was quite a wait. I assumed that you had forgotten to post the end of that saga or they gave you the cold shoulder. Bad luck on the position, although it's good that they thought of you with the temporary spot.

I Hate to say it - but that temporary position was your shot at getting in there and stabbing your flag into their carpet.

Not to say another opportunity wont come your way, quite the opposite, opportunities are in abundance, you just have to stick at it.

Yeah, I realise a couple of weeks work in QA would have been a great opportunity to ?get in the door?, and even if it didn?t lead to more work with them, it would look good on my resume and be great experience. Unfortunately I had to make a tough decision: either play-test games for a couple of weeks (and probably be back at square one at the end of the work) and miss out on a fairly good job (at last!), or pass on the games and finally earn some real money. Since I haven?t had a real income in over two years, and I owe $6000 for my games course plus a lot more for my various other debts, I had to make the logical choice of taking the permanent job.

I?m not too pissed about it now though, since I realise that given my low skill level with game development stuff, I would have been working as a tester for a good 4 or 5 years before being good enough for a promotion into development.

So my plan for the next few years is to work in ordinary (non-games) jobs for a few years while I study part-time and get ahead financially. When I feel I?m getting close to being good enough for the games industry I might finish up a Bachelors course full time, and then look seriously towards the games industry.

It just took some serious thinking and self-evaluation to work out what?s right for me. For the moment, I?m happy earning real money and studying part time. And I can't wait to take some traditional art classes! I sure need them!

grats, least yur happy

As a general principal you'll find most games companies do not do work experience.

I would suggest having a surf around Sumea and the web to find out which companies are in Brisbane and have websites that do not specifically state that they do not do work experience.

For instance Auran lists on their web site that they do not do work experience.

As i've suggested in other threads of this discussion, go for the non-games related computer businesses when doing work experience. They'll probably be able to teach you more about work, and they'll be more likely to take you on. Some examples would include going to work for a computer shop etc.

I've got work experiance at Wicked Witch in 2 months time :)

Sorry, im just really excited. Anyway Just try and email everyone, thats what i did.

few phone calls wouldnt hurt if you can, forces answers as appposed to emails where they can forget about it and such. Im not suggesting that there terribly evil people who chuckle as they empty there inbox mind, just saying its best for you.

come on moony - you know they are ALL evil people who chuckle as they empty there inbox's [;)]

definately take the up front approach tho - get on the blower or even better, show up for work ala george castanza, but... if you take the george style, be sure to have some amazing work pumping along before the boss gets in [:)]

About six month ago when I checked their website their address is

Level 11,14 Queens Road
Melbourne, Victoria
3004, Australia

I do not know if they change their address, because I heard Atari has bought Melbourne House.

That address is still correct, they just changed all the signs :)
If you're after an email address, nobody knows, you might want to give them a phonecall if you want to send them something via email...
CYer, Blitz

Thanks guys. In particular I was after the email address. Can only guess they are not recruiting if they dont even have any contact addresses on the web, but I shall persevere. Cheers!

Might be an idea to Post RGreen a message on this forum asking him nicely [:)] he works for atari melbourne house i think and might be able to point you in the right direction.

Melbourne House haven't had an email address on their website since they "updated" it about 18 months or more ago. They may or may not have hired people during that time...
I think it's either an oversight, or they'd just prefer people to contact them by phone/mail (so they don't get 100's of emails every day)
Maybe the person who knows how to use the email program left the company and they haven't been able to find anyone since who can handle the intricacies of email...
Who knows :P
CYer, Blitz

" Maybe the person who knows how to use the email program left the company and they haven't been able to find anyone since who can handle the intricacies of email... "

ROFL..

that could be true,.. its an outside shot,.. but nevertheless.

I'd attend AGDC as they most likely have a recruiting drive then.

You could also do a search on the local Carreer search engines:
ie http://jobs.careerone.com.au/search/dsp_show_job.cfm?AD_ID=938636

Though I would rather contact the game companies in Brisbane in person (phone) rather than go through a recruiter.

I'm not a programmer and in that respect am not really qualified to answer your question, but I have worked in corporate Australia, and suspect that the more conservative and mainstream the company, the more they will look at your background with suspicion (regardless of your skill set). They will also probably want to see a computer science degree (not a games oriented qualification). Alternatively, the more entrepreneurial and imaginative the company, the more likely they will welcome your background.

Whatever job you apply for, you will need to sell yourself, your skills and background as being ideal for the position. And don't be surprised if the recruiter/companies you approach are suspicious of your motives. Many view the games industry as being more fun, interesting, dynamic, etc so they might think you only want a normal job until you get a better one in the games industry. So you will have to have a very convincing explanation for why you want to get out of the games industry.

Which is, ofcourse, what I want to know too! I don't know what the industry is like in Perth, but many Australian games developers would probably be keen on employing someone with your (US games industry) background.

well, I have an old friend that got into a non-games related programming field after a very brief stint in gaming and a childhood of hobby game dev background. They welcomed him with open arms, where very keen to get him in... he works in government and sub-military related research [:)]
Haven't talked to him in a while, but we joke that he's doing mech hud's [;)]

quote:Originally posted by spageto


So you will have to have a very convincing explanation for why you want to get out of the games industry.

Which is, ofcourse, what I want to know too! I don't know what the industry is like in Perth, but many Australian games developers would probably be keen on employing someone with your (US games industry) background.

Hehe, why would I want to get out when there's so many that want to get in? Well, how many over late 20s/early 30s year olds do you see in the gaming industry. Not many at all. (at least not in the US) Why is this? Well, my reasoning, which I'm sure I share with others is this, there comes a point when you realize that working is only secondary, the most important things in life aren't attained through money, they are Family, Friends, and exploring your own desires. My time in the games industry has shown me that the industry values your comitment to the company well over any of these other things. As such, you're pressured to work 60 to 100 hour work weeks, thus leaving no time for these outside interests.

My time at EA really wore me out. So much so that after we shipped Generals, I sold my possessions (including my BMW 3 Series) and went backpacking around Australia for 6 months. I took that time to "find myself" again as working after working on Generals, I was either told to stop my hobbies or I just lost interest in them (gaming being on of my hobbies that I now enjoy in moderation as in, maybe 2 hours a week). Also, during my trip, I, to put it simply, have fallen in love with a wonderful girl in Perth. As such, my priorities have changed.

Now of course, EA was the extreme case. Right now I'm working for a kick ass small company that has a different work ethic. Here we don't work over 60 hours a week and we're not _AS_ pressured to put in the overtime. If I had this job before EA, I would probably be happy to stay in the industry, but at the same time, as my priorities have shifted, I'm still reluctant to put in the 60 hour work weeks.

So, this move is not only a chance for me to move someplace new, I'm also using it as a chance to change my job. Idealy what I would love to do is to be invloved with the gaming industry, just not the development aspect. I would enjoy being a resource for people to use to either learn about the industry or to just bounce ideas off of. If WA had a government agency like Victory or Qld, that would be fantastic!!!!

I guess really I don't mind leaving development becuase I already have a True AAA title that has sold over 4 million copies worldwide. If I didn't have that under my belt already, I would probably have second thoughts about leaving the industry. (The minor "Rock Star" status you get from a successful title is like a drug)

So you see why I'm doing the "Unthinkable" and am leaving development :)

Just on a side note, I maintain plenty of contacts here in the US (mainly located in the Southern California area) but if anyone has experience and is trying to make they're way over to the US, I can at least put you in touch with the "right" people :)

I understand where you're coming from DaMunkee - your explanation for getting out of games is pretty convincing! As indicated by J.I. Styles, you may not have a problem gettting a "normal" job at all.

Ironically, one of my motivations for getting into games is to pursue something that I enjoy rather than spending long hours in a job I dislike. While you have been spending the past however many years working long hours in games, I have been spending those years working long hours in various uninspiring jobs. I'm also at the age where life outside work - family, friends, etc - are much more important to me. But if I'm going to work I want to be doing something I really enjoy. That said, working 60-100 hours on some deriviative FPS (no offence but they're not my thing) for a fraction of my previous salary, does not appeal. Having co-owned a business in the past, I plan to start my own company (that will involve long hours and a salary cut too, but ultimately the long term benefits will outweigh the short term costs). First things first though, and I need to develop my artistic (2D and 3D animation) skills, network and learn as much as I can about this industry.

DaMunkee, do you stick around - your insights will be invaluable to all of us here. Also, consider joining the GDAA and contacting some of the WA universities/colleges, as you may also find some work teaching games programming.

I just wanted to chime in an agreement with spageto on the whole educational thing. It would probably be a very significant pay cut from what you're used to, but you can almost guarantee you won't be doing any overtime, unless it's by your own choice (research??). Educational institutions are in very high demand for experienced game professionals, particularly in the coding field. (ie. AIE in Canberra is finding it almost impossible, because industry professionals that are good enough to teach would rather be working in a higher paid job developing games than teaching for a much lower wage :))
Also, in my limited experience, companies that work in the "real-time simulation" field, have high respect for game developers, because often they have trouble achieving the level of detail in their simulations that some games achieve.
Good luck.
CYer, Blitz

quote:Originally posted by spageto


Ironically, one of my motivations for getting into games is to pursue something that I enjoy rather than spending long hours in a job I dislike.

Hehe, that's exactly why I got into games to start with :) I was working at IBM on big ol' million dollar Harddrive arrays and there was just no love there :) That's when I decided to chase a wild dream of mine. I applied to 7 companies, heard back from 2 with one being the "We'll keep your resume on file." But it just so happened my dream job was the one that eventually hired me (well, after 6 phone interviews and then flying me out). Essentially, for everyone out there, If you have a dream, why not try for it, you never know cause you might actually get it :)

quote:Originally posted by spageto

DaMunkee, do you stick around - your insights will be invaluable to all of us here. Also, consider joining the GDAA and contacting some of the WA universities/colleges, as you may also find some work teaching games programming.

I'm a casual poster to Sumea. I've been reading the forums on and off now for about 4 months, but I am sticking around, so I guess you guys should get use it :). Your idea about contacting the colleges is excellent :) In fact, I was planning on dropping the main contact at Edith Cowan for their game department a line here offering my assistance in any way. Wow, how fantastic would it be to help others attain their dreams?!?!!! I'll also look into the GDAA as they seem like a great Organization. Actually, last year at E3, they had put together a fantastic booklet outlining all the game developers and 3rd party solution providers in Australia.

I can understand your reasons for getting out. Either you have the money and not the time, or have the time and not the money. It is hard to keep any kind of life while in the games industry.

quote:Originally posted by Blitz

I just wanted to chime in an agreement with spageto on the whole educational thing. It would probably be a very significant pay cut from what you're used to, but you can almost guarantee you won't be doing any overtime, unless it's by your own choice (research??). Educational institutions are in very high demand for experienced game professionals, particularly in the coding field. (ie. AIE in Canberra is finding it almost impossible, because industry professionals that are good enough to teach would rather be working in a higher paid job developing games than teaching for a much lower wage :))
Also, in my limited experience, companies that work in the "real-time simulation" field, have high respect for game developers, because often they have trouble achieving the level of detail in their simulations that some games achieve.
Good luck.
CYer, Blitz

Thanks for the vote of Goodluck Blitz :)

Hmmm... Educational institutions are in high demand... I wonder what kind of certifications they'll need to allow me to teach? I'll definitely have to look into that. As for the pay, I'm not to concerned about it. If money was really a factor, I would be staying in the US.

Well, looks like I have a few emails to write :) If anyone is currently at these Educational Institutions and they have specific contacts there, drop me a line :)

Thanks again Blitz and Spageto

Im not so sure some institutions will even worry if you can teach or not, im not flaming qantm again - but i know for fact that a few of the tutors there had no clue about how to teach, they were more or less hired & thrust into the role. Dont get me wrong, they definately knew what they where talking about, but being a good teacher to a class of students is something completely different than being a great coder / artist.

But just trying to note that papers in teaching might not be all that neccessary to teach, as you will more than likely be an understudy to an existing teacher and hopefully learn the ropes from them :)

As far as i know, few, if any of the tutors at AIE canberra had teaching qualifications (eg. Dip. Ed), I think quite a few had some sort of tertiary qualification, but i really don't think they care, as long as you have the knowledge/skills. If you have any project management experience (eg. Lead, Producer, etc.) that would probably be a huge plus for any courses that involve a "Group project/game" sort of stream. This was something i personally found lacking at the AIE last year.
Plus, having worked on such high profile titles should give you plenty of street cred./respect from the students :)
CYer, Blitz

My understanding is that you can teach anything that you yourself have the qualification in, + an additional qualification, that can be gained thorough a short course, that gives you basic teaching skills.

Pantmonger

I know at Swinburne all the lecturers have Diploma in Education (1 year), but the tutors are just post grad students. How awesome would it be to be taught by someone who worked on C&C Generals :o

Thanks guys for all your input, just the thought of being able to help others attain their dreams is quite exciting. In fact, today I shot an email off to a contact with the Murdoch BS of Game Technology program. Here's hoping they're interested in someone like me :)

Yeah honestly i have to agree with awf regards the feeling i would get if i was being taught by someone who had ACTUALLY completed work on a AAA title :)

all bar 1 of my former tutors, have no games industry experience,.. i think its great there are people like you munkee that are willing to 'give back' to the industry your experiences. and i for one would be more than enthusiastic to attend your classes [:)]

I think experience counts for an awful lot. Theory is all well and good until you have to actually work on a AAA title.
I'm almost of the thinking that, certainly with the art side of games, people need to either learn on the job or by someone who has actually had hands on experience.

bringing this post back for a second - in my diploma year, an interesting situation cropped up, that when thinking about could well happen here.

Our tutor ( the most experienced person there in terms of REAL games dev ) was finding the government cirriculum rather wishy washy when it comes to teaching games.
He was pretty dissapointed that he had to teach stuff that the government thought would benefit the students most, when quite frankly in his oppinion, alot of it was utter dross.

To combat this he would try teach the classes extra stuff ( from his experiences ) as well as what we already HAD TO be taught. IMO that was the only stuff i found REALLY interesting in my entire diploma.

Just trying to point out that depending on the uni / collage you may end up working for - theres that hurdle of sucking back words when you know somethings not right - and just accepting that you may have to teach stuff that goes completely against everything youve ever learnt. Sounds disturbing, but this situation was a reality.

I'm a full-time software engineer & developer and have been for the last 5 years. I started work in the 3rd year of my degree and finished studying part time.

Experience does say a heck of a lot more than a degree does, but it's coming to the point now where people expect you to have a degree if you want to have a job in the general IT world.

Games companies tend to be slightly different. I can't say from experience because I've not worked for a game developer before, but they tend not to want to take people on unless they've got at least a year's experience behind them. Most of the time they want more than that, plus the accolade of a published title under your belt. The only other times I've seen someone get a job in the industry is where they've worked for a very long time on their demos/modelling and pushed hard to get an entry-level testing job, or perhaps a tools programming job. For those of us who work 60+ hours / week it's particularly hard to find the time to do this.

I personally find it very frustrating that game developers seem to only consider games experience (moreso in Australia) as worthy experience. Sometimes they dont even consider games experience to be good enough!? When are they going to learn that people with strong development in other backgrounds can be just as good if not better? I realise this sounds like a case of sour grapes, and to a point it is ;) I'm not saying that someone who's been building websites or database programs for the last couple of years has relevant experience - but some areas of software engineering and development are very game-like (eg. missile modelling, 3D flythroughs for military systems, mission planning).

I personally think that game developers potentially cut out some serious talent purely because they haven't had any official game development experience. Hopefully one day that will change.

Sorry about the rant :) (esp. since it's a little O.T)
OJ

Fair comments OJ, feel free to rant all you like... i do [;)] - a post i posted on another thread here was a bit forward to people who work 60+ hour weeks but still complain they dont have the time to do much else,

60 (work) + 56(sleep) = 116 hours. thats 52 remaining hours a week, sure a few get eaten up by travelling, eating & chilling out / family time etc - but i think some people need some lessons in time management - theres a crapload of hours there.

i worked for almost 5 years in a high profile graphic design company which expected the emplyees to be there at least 12 hours per day, 6 days a week. more often than not it was 14 - 15 hour days, and sometimes 7 days per week.

After 3 years of complaining i had no time to do anything else, pulling out my hair & much nashing of teeth, i tidied up my act and found there was plenty of time if i stopped procrastinating and got stuck in.

/rant

Can you tell me what design firm you worked for? Very curious [:)]

HazarD,

I can't really disagree with any of those points :p. But, I personally feel that while work is an important part of your life, you have to live life away from work aswell. I have a family, and there's no way I'm going to sacrifice all my time and not spend any with them. If we're going to take it down to hour by hour then I think we're missing the point of the conversation. Some days you get home and the last thing you feel like doing is turning on the computer again.

60+ was a generalisation. Weeks can go from anywhere between 55 and 80 hours. I don't claim to have no time whatsoever, but I do claim to want to live a little away from the computer while still being a professional.

This is really the side issue ;) The main point was to say that experience from other sectors of the software development industry can be just as relevant to a game development role as "official" game development itself. It's a shame that lots of game companies don't realise this :)

Cheers!
OJ

OJ, I agree, if the companies in OZ won't take a seasoned engineer just because he doesn't have formal training in games, they're missing out on some serious talent.

While I was at EA our engineering staff at EA consisted of
2x Electrical Engineers that had no previous Games experience
3x people that had worked for Macromedia on Flash and Fireworks, again, no experience
2x people that they hired straight from college, Computer science degrees
1x person from IBM who had worked on Enterprise storage solutions
2x people from who were from other game companies
1x person who had attended DIGIPEN (a game school) who had also worked for another game company. This person was by far the worst engineer we had. By the end of the project we trusted our Interns more then him.

Anyway I guess I was just trying to proove your point in that Generals, a game that sold more then 98% of the other games out there, was developed by mostly people without formal game development experience. The team was seasoned though as except for the Macromedia/Digipen guys, the rest of us had worked on at least Yuri's Revenge before with a high majority having worked on Red Alert 2.

Oj - sorry i didnt mean to come across sounding like you had to spend all of your time doing more computer time, outside of work, just trying to make a point that whilst most people think they are real short of time, some quick thinking and management can go a really long way, and you can fit in time doing everything you wanted + doing the necessities.

I forgot to comment on the issue about games dev companies missing out on solid background members. and i definately have to agree with you. the same goes for artists as well i think.

For instance someone who has little or no colour theory, or comes from a non artistic background may be a wizz with 3d modelling, and in fact produce some above average results, but i can almost gaurantee the person with the tradition art background, who has an understanding of art / lighting and so forth, will always produce something that sets it apart from those who dont.

Souri - Satchi & Satchi / Harrimans based in NZ [:)]

DaMunkee: Thanks for the interesting stats! It's good to see that those without the background in games can prove that they are just as good if not better than their "experienced" counterparts :)

HazarD: No need to apologise, you weren't being offensive or anything. Your point is a good one and in lots of cases (ie > 95%) I believe that it is indeed the case. Definitely has something to do with lack of motivation. Ultimately there is time in the day before and after work, and it's there to be utilised. How you utilise it is up to you! What you're saying is don't complain if you don't utilise it in the way you should to achieve your goal :)

I hadn't really thought about how it might also be the case for artists, but I can't see why it'd be different. Tis a shame!

Cheers!
OJ

Thats very interesting, DaMunkee.

I have a games-related education (Qantm Dip.IT) and I work as a Software Engineer, developing Civil Engineering technology & applications (realtime 3D graphics systems, terrain modelling, etc).

It would certainly be a shame if I was considered less experienced because I've not worked for a game company.

A lot of game developers like to think they are more special than everyone else in the IT industry, and that they are working on the cutting edge of technology, and the rest of the IT industry is years behind and therefore obviously of no use!
Some companies are much wiser however, and recognise that people outside the game industry have skills too :P
In fact sometimes they HAVE to look outside of the games industry to fulfill vital roles. For instance, how many people who have only worked in the games industry would have experience setting up distributed backend server networks...well, i think you only need about one hand to count the specialists working on BigWorld, and thats pretty much it for australia, when BigWorld tech need to hire someone new to develop their server infrastructure, theres a good chance they will be having to look into other IT industries that have vast experience in the particular field.
So, in conclusion, i think often times developers that won't hire outside of the games industry are just being snobs.
CYer, Blitz

LOL. I totally agree with you Blitz :)

That depends on how experienced you are. If you have a couple years worth of experience on an AAA titles you should stand a chance.

Immigration is a bitch and a plane ticket from the UK is expensive, so you have to be worth it.

I've got over 15 years and mainly only ever done AAA stuff.
The usual thing is that I dont get a response at all.

there's only a small number of companies in oz that will import people -- in order of likelihood, you should be targetting firstly international dev houses with an Australian studio, then secondly the larger Australian developers; since we're all lazy bastards (our global industry as a whole, not just us Aussies [;)]), don't just mail stuff in post or email and sit back -- use your time zone differences to your advantage and call when international prices are cheap and hassle people. Ask them exactly what it would take for them to take you on.

Stress that you're married to show your long term stability in this endeavour, and you want to find a company to be loyal to. With importing people, that's the #1 biggest risk. A company goes to the trouble of funding your visa, sponsoring your immigration, goes through all the headaches and red tape to get you over, then you flake and jump off to the next company that offers more $, 6 months down the track.

Thank's that seems like good advice. It's a bit like groping round in the dark trying to find out info on companies (how long they've been going, reputation etc...).
It's just frustrating, I read a lot of stuff about companies wanting to compete more on a global scale yet very few seem to be willing to make the effort to do so.
I often wonder if its the same with people trying to get into the UK.

I have noticed this myself, many countries seem to be willing to import expertise from outside the country, except Australia. Getting them to just reply to your email can be a trial.

What is your industry experience if you don't mind me asking?

The usa seem pretty good at taking on people from over seas and here in the uk I've worked with a few people from abroad (mainly europe mind).

My experience is as an artist (mainly animation I guess). Been making games since I was at high school in the 80s :o)
But I'm not that old honest.

Well every job ive applied for in the uk ive heard a reply back and on 1 occasion had a willing participant to fly me over to start working, unfortunately this was back when i was doing my diploma and thought it best to finishit rather than fly away half way thru, now i wonder whether or not i made the right decision.

It's definately worth checking out [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1271"]this thread[/url] from a fellow Brit who's also interested in working here.

Yeh, the lack of responses seems to be a general problem with dev companies here. Make sure you are sending your email to their human resources or job email addresses (you can look at all the posts in the jobs section to see what their contact addresses are).

Thanks for that Souri.
It's hard to wade through all the threads when you're new here to find what you want.

From my limited experience, aussie companies will usually only be willing to sponsor international people for senior-level jobs. Generally management type positions (producer etc.), and sometimes senior programming positions (Leads, or specific skills that are hard to find). Possibly lead artists/art directors etc. they may be willing to sponsor also.
Companies won't hire internationally for junior/normal jobs, simply because it is easy and cheaper for them to get the required talent in australia!
So your problem is that you may only be considered for a job when they are actively trying to hire a new lead artist/art director etc.
Of course if you can make your own way into the country with working visa's etc. I'm sure they'd be glad to snap you up (if they are hiring!)
I guess one of the key things to remember here is, no matter how good you are etc., unless a company has a vacant position, it is unlikely they will hire you (after all, it is an extra salary they have to fund).
Good luck anyway, i'd say your best bets to contact would be...
Atari Melbourne House
Pandemic
Creative Assembly (maybe you could get a job at their english studio (if it still exists?) and then get a transfer :))
Irrational Games
Krome
Blue Tongue
Tantalus

CYer, Blitz

Good point there Blitz, maybe it might be worth my while have a "holiday" over there and seeing a few places.
I understand why places are a little reluctant to take people from abroad on. But the utter lack of response it very off putting. A simple "no" reply would more than suffice.
Maybe I'm being a bit to cynical, but I tend to like a reply rather than being ignored.

It is annoying, but it is not specifically you, or overseas people not getting a reply. As joel said, aussie companies in general are very lazy about communicating with the outside world :( For instance, when i sent my resume out to 15 (i think) companies earlier this year, i received 3 replies. 2 were from companies who wanted to interview me, and the other was a "no, not at this time" (yay for the nice people at White Noise Games!). Also interesting to note, is one company that interviewed me, after i said "I hate companies that just ignore you, unless they want to interview you", they said "Oh we do that to". :P
Aussies are lazy, what can i say :)
I'd re-suggest joels suggestion of actually wasting some money on a phonecall to some places. It's a much more difficult thing to ignore :)
CYer, Blitz

Have you talked to the companies about paying for your own visa? If you're that dedicated to moving here, perhaps offer that as an up front on your behalf and you get re-imbursed over the course of 2-3 years.

Also it helps if you're a core person on the team (designers, or engine programmers) anything that would give them an interest in picking you from the local talent.

On another note: If you're from Canada or UK and under 28, there's this little thing called "Working Holiday Visa" that you should check out. Basically it allows to you work and live in Australia for 1 year I believe. This would be a great way of comming here as a trial period.

I'm not too sure about what the rules are for that visa in australia, but often in other countries, it only allows you to do un-skilled labour (such as waiting tables etc.), doing a skilled job such as programming would be a violation of the visa.
Once again, i'm not exactly sure of the australian rules regarding it though.
CYer, Blitz

I think the Aust visa is more like the US where they actually only want skilled labour to come in - so they want people with at least Bachlors degrees.

Basicly from what I understood of work visas in Australia is you really just needed to demonstrate why you are so good that they need to import you from another place instead of hire locally.

The best place to find out about working visa requirements would be the govt site itself. Try www.act.gov.au and do a search there for DIMA (Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affair). That is who you'll need to deal with.

I am not sure what immigration will put you through for a work visa but I know for my residential vias I had to go through a health check (hearing test, aids test, tuberculous *speling, and such) as well as a background check. I would suspect that may be true for working visas.

Oh, that sounds like so much hassle. Can't you just arrange a fake marriage or something instead? [:)]

Actually, having recently been backpacking in Oz with a bunch of Europeans, I can tell you all you need to know about the visas :) The working holiday visa that Grooveyone was talking about is really simple to get. All you need to be is under a certain age (38 I think) and you can come into Oz for a full year (or for 4 months if your coming from the US). You still have to apply, but it is suppose to be straight forward. Anyway that Visa allows you to work with ANYONE that will hire you. It's very different from the visas in the US where they have unskilled labor visas, business visas, etc... Oz pretty much has a tourist visa, this year visa and then one more permanent visa which requires sponsorship. So, if you're that keen on getting a gig here, nothing says dedication like showing up on the doorstep of some developer :)

Chris

I presume that once you're over there and working you can then get the company to sponser you for a long term visa?
I'm going to have a look into this and see what I can dig up.

While sponsoring is a solution, there's no guarantee that the Australian government will agree with the sponsorship. To get sponsorship the company who sponsors you, I believe, needs to justify your prescence in the country via your ability to do something that they aren't able to get an Australian to do. With an industry like games, which is flooded and has lots of people banging at the doors, you'd want to be pretty special ;)

I don't mean that it's not possible, I just think that it's a little more than just asking for sponsorship and having the boss say yes.

Good luck, I hope it works out!
OJ