Robin Lacey of Plain Sight developer Beatnik Games meets Game Careers .BIZ
Mon, 06 Sep 2010Robin Lacey met David Smith from Game Careers at the Develop conference in Brighton, UK. Robin Lacey is MD of Beatnik Games with its first title, Plain Sight, launched on 5th of April (Steam etc), Beatnik is also working with Channel 4 and Sony. Robin’s advice for those who would like a career in games: “If you’re looking for a job in a games studio if you coming straight from out of university, you are only really going to have a chance if you get involved in Mods or indiegames. Go onto a Mod database and see if anyone needs help and go onto ticksor and get involved in that community. CV’s come through and they are straight from university and it says hey I’m a games designer and that’s all they’ve got, also don’t list your grades because nobody cares about that. We want to see which projects you got involved in because if you got your hands messy it means you can actually work with other people and that is the problem with most people straight out of university. If you want to set up your own company, just be prepared to give up your life.”
Rob Precious of middleware technology developer Geomerics talks to Game Careers .BIZ
Wed, 01 Sep 2010Rob Precious met David Smith from Game Careers at the Develop conference in Brighton, UK. Rob is Geomerics Vice President of Sales bringing years of middleware expertise, drawing on positions with companies such as Criterion to drive and develop global sales for Enlighten, Geomerics’ revolutionary real-time lighting technology. His advice for job seekers looking to work at Geomerics: “With Geomerics don’t be scared about what I said about PhDs, it is by far not the only criteria we are looking for. We want a mix of people with all of the skills that we need. That is some deep rooted in academia but then we need highly practical people who have game industry know how, people who have console know how. I would urge people not to be scared by that fact or that the technology is kind of the holy grail of lighting in the industry right now, but not to be put off by that. It is really just putting one foot in front of the other and making things better every day. That is the kind of people that we are looking for.”
A Career in Game Programming – interviews by Australian public broadcaster ABC
Wed, 01 Sep 2010In this series fom ABC, they take an in-depth look at some of the key careers within the Games Industry talking to game developers across Australia. This video shows what it takes to get a job working as a programmer on games.
Adam Levenson Snr Director Audio and Talent at Activision tells all to Game Careers .BIZ
Tue, 31 Aug 2010Adam Levenson met David Smith from Game Careers at the Develop conference in Brighton, UK. Adam serves as Director of the Central Audio and Talent groups at Activision where he oversees original music, sound effects, post-production, audio technology, voiceovers, celebrity talent, and scriptwriters across Activision portfolio of titles. In addition, he is spearheading the creation and implementation of shared audio standards and technologies across Activision’s global studios. He joined Activision in 2006 as the Director of Central Audio. He has more than 17 years experience in video game audio production having contributed to games as a composer, sound designer, supervisor and audio director. Prior to joining Activision, he founded Immersive Sound, a full-service game audio production company where he directed audio production for publishers such as Electronic Arts and Atari, both companies he later worked with as Audio Director. Before this, he worked on the award-winning audio team at Interplay Entertainment and began his career in audio production at Trilobyte. Prior to joining the video game industry, Mr. Levenson worked as a recording artist and performing musician for several years.
His advice to audio people looking to work on the music for an Activision game: “I think the most important thing is, do your homework. If you want to work for Activision, learn about the company, do some research, find out the recent titles, know what they are all about and figure out how you can contribute to those games. That is really critical. A cold call is great, but you need to do your homework in advance so that when you get on the phone with someone like myself you know what you are talking about. The other important thing is to have demo material ready. If you’re a creative person, make sure you have your reel prepared and make sure it shows the best of your work. People often think they are supposed to show X, Y and Z, NO. We want to know what you do best and what your unique contribution is going to be. Those are the two most important things.”
Adam Boyes, former Capcom Product Development head tells all to Game Careers.BIZ
Sun, 29 Aug 2010Adam Boyes met David Smith from Game Careers at the Develop conference in Brighton, UK. He is a 15 year game industry veteran who has specialized in Production and Business Development. He has held positions such as Executive Producer at Midway and most recently he ran the Product Development group at Capcom US. At the helm, he delivered the most successful digital games initiative of the industry. Adam has more recently founded a company, Beefy Media, which specializes in helping developers create identities for their studios and better sell themselves to Publishers. He works with teams from the pitch process through to the Post Mortem to ensure that developers are taking a mature approach to game development, and are taking their initiative seriously. His advice to those seeking a job in video games: “I think getting out there, being persistent obviously, but classy persistence, meeting people, and going to shows like Develop. There are a lot of opportunities around the globe to go to great shows and meet people, engage with them and ask them questions. A lot of guys who are senior in the industry want to answer questions and they want to help and get you placed so you can enjoy the great things they have enjoyed in their careers.”
Ricky Haggett of Brit micro developer HoneySlug speaks to Game Careers .BIZ
Sat, 28 Aug 2010Ricky Haggett CEO of HoneySlug met David Smith of Game Careers .BIZ at the Develop conference in Brighton 2010. Honeyslug are a small, North London dev studio who make interesting, original little titles across a number of platforms. Ricky started Honeyslug in 2008 with fellow Morpheme alumni Mark Inman and Nat Marco. In 18 months they’ve created a number of premium web and iPhone games, a budget PC game called My Pet Dinosaur, and Kahoots – a launch title for Sony’s PSP Minis channel. If you like the cut of their jib, whether it’s about current titles, press, video game jobs or work for hire, why not contact Ricky.
His advice to job seekers: “I can only really talk about my end of the industry which is a much smaller scale and team. I would say there’s never been a better time to get into making games. The amounts of tools out there like game maker, flash, and unity; there are tons of tools that make it very easy east for people to get into making games. And there is a whole world of communities out there to support so if you check out website such as indiegames.com. There are plenty of places to go to find people who can help out an get you started making games.”
Meet Sally Reynolds, a QA tester for Runescape developer Jagex based in Cambridge, UK
Sun, 22 Aug 2010Sally Reynolds is a QA tester for Jagex, “I test the games to ensure that they are ready for release and also post release, if any issues have come up, I track them down and help the developer to sort them out. I love my job, I get to be a big kid!”. She left school at 17 but went back and got A levels and a degree, “people who didn’t think very much of me because of the lack of qualifications… I can absolutely prove them wrong now”. Jagex has over 350 employees. Roughly half the team work on providing players with support, answering queries and assisting with disputes or lost passwords. Most of the remaining half work directly or indirectly on RuneScape – scriptwriting, coding, graphics, audio and testing all make up the giant development effort required to keep RuneScape frequently updated. You can see more women in games at Women in Games Jobs.
Andrew Dayton a Technical Director Pixar Animation Studio talks to GameGareers.BIZ
Sat, 21 Aug 2010Andrew graduated from the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 1998. He started working in the industry in commercials as a freelance artist. Later Andrew, worked on feature film intro, music videos, commercials, architectural visualization, medical animation, print. Then he was hired by Black Logic in New York City as a Technical Director and eventually became their CG Art Director. In 2002, Andrew was hired by Pixar as a full time employee for lighting – modeling. He continues to teach 3D Animation at various schools such as School of Visual Arts, Parsons, AnimWerks and is currently teaching at California College of the Arts. Andrew met with David Smith from Game Careers .BIZ at the recent Develop conference in Brighton, UK where he gave an overview into Pixar’s production pipeline. He discussed how Pixar connects up each department such as Story, Art, Sets, Editorial, Characters, Layout, Animation, Lighting Effects, and Render. Check the video to see his advice on getting a job at Pixar.
Hannah Crosby, Game Character Artist, speaks to Women in Games Jobs
Fri, 13 Aug 2010Hannah Crosby, Character Artist with Rare, met with Antonia Cullum of Women in Games Jobs at the Develop Conference in Brighton. Her advice on the qualities needed seeking a job in the games industry. “I think persistence; there are sometimes a limited number of roles, especially in character art out there so you might need to be prepared to go into a slightly different role. I started out in environment art even though character art is what I wanted to get into. There are a lot more roles in environment art, so sometimes you need to get into a parallel role or into a similar industry. Basically doing your own work. If you go as an artist and having a portfolio of art you can present that shows you know how to do this stuff and that you’re passionate about it and do it on your own time.”
Dajana Dimovska CEO Copenhagen Game Productions speaks to Game Careers .BIZ
Tue, 10 Aug 2010Dajana Dimovska is CEO and Producer at Copenhagen Game Productions, currently producing physical spell-duelling game that aims for players to look at each other, rather than at the screen. She is one of the founders of Copenhagen Game Collective, network of game companies, non-commercial projects, and creative individuals with the agenda of developing and promoting experimental games. Dajana is also a Vice Chairman of IGDA Danish Chapter and co-organiser of Nordic Game Jam. She met with David Smith of Game Careers in Brighton at the Develop Conference. Her advice for both men and women think of working in the video gaming industry: “What my advice is very much based on where we began and we became. Job seekers who are not very experienced, I would suggest to just go out there and activate yourself and do projects before you finish your studies. Have something that can prove your skills even if it is a model, just prove what you can do. Even if it is team work, it is better because team work is what we are focusing a lot on. We want the team to click so we are interested in people who can work together with other people and not alone in an office.”
