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When I worked for EA Canada I was sent to EA Tiburon (Florida) to work for a while. One night I left work late and decided to pick up a Pizza on the way back to the hotel EA had put me up in.
After driving around for a while in the dark I happened across a small dingy looking Pizza place. So I stopped, went inside, ordered the Pizza and sat down to wait for it. A few minutes later a person walks in who was the type that you called 'sir' in case they took an instant dislike to you and decided to tear you a new breathing hole, i.e. the type of person you would most likely cross the road to avoid.
He stood there, turned his head slowly and stared right at me and his eyes just grew larger. My time was up. My mortal coil was about to shuffle.
What happened next was a bit of a blur due my heart-rate having doubled and my lungs deciding that they needed to stop working - your basic panic attack scenario. However, I do remember roughly what he said and it went something like:
'You work for EA? Man, that must be great. I've got some game ideas, want to hear them?'
Needless to say my ignorant 'judging a person on their appearance' fears were un-founded but whenever I come across somebody outside the industry and they find out what I do they think it must be the best job ever and to some degree it is but the biggest irony of this job, which is all about entertaining people, is that it can also be incredibly stressful.
I've seen a lot of things happen in this industry from marriage break-ups because one of the partners was having to work all hours to get a game completed in time to a punch up over some trivial matter.
I've seen people explode and just rant at their boss and I've seen bosses ranting at their employees over nothing. The burn out rate is incredibly high and the employee turn-over rate in some companies was equally high. In one company I worked for 15 people left in my first month there.
Yet, despite all of this game developers are some of the most dedicated workers you will ever come-across. I can't speak for everybody but I know that because my job is mainly work from home I find myself starting at 9am and finishing at 1am most days. Why do I do that? Part of it is loyalty to the company and part of it is a desire to see the game completed.
I am not advocating long hours, this was a personal choice made by me because I am a workaholic. I do not in any way think this should be the norm in our industry and I think that the long hours with no relaxation is a massive factor in the stress.
It would appear that stress is not only restricted to the games industry if the Christian Bale rant is anything to go by but it would be interesting to compare stress levels across a range of jobs to see where we rank in the overall scheme. The banking sector used to see suicides - has there ever been a game development related suicide?
I don't have any answers on how we should deal with the stresses and strains game development put on our lives and health but something needs to happen. For me it's my hobbies that keep me sane - well, for most of the time anyway.
How long before we see a dis-gruntled employee walking into a a studio with a weapon and start shooting people? It's happened in other industries.
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The best that anyone can do for themselves is to find a company that supports their wishes to have a family and/or live a normal life and not assume that some video game is their sole reason for living. Easier said than done, I know. You have to go home, sit on your couch, and play games every now and then. It's a reminder of why you got into this industry. A company that doesn't at least give you the time to do that is clearly not looking out for your best interest.
Besides, how can we make fun games when we don't have fun making them? Free hours for the employees might contribute just as much to the product as working hours.
40 hour weeks should be enforced so performance can be measured rather than time. At the moment time is variable so it is impossible to work out who can get more done in a day without having to do all that extra time. Once we can work this out then schedules can be more realistic, people won't be made guilty for not working all the time, and the most important reason ...stuff goes wrong and you need time for emergency overtime.
I agree with having fun with game development. I try all the time not to make the job stressful and spend a lot of time finding new games and looking for different ideas... you know, to make your brain think of something different to work but still make a contribution to your learning and awareness of game development. But the fact is that having your time being consumed by the game development job and having fun while doing so is all part of the commitment you take when you start in the business.
It's not just a question of hours here, its productive hours. The problem is that management can not separate the people who want to work a solid 40 and go home from the people who like to dawdle through their work day by playing games in the break room and hanging around the water cooler, or chain smoking every 15 minutes. I personally am someone who comes into work and sits at his desk for a solid work day. I don't appreciate it if I am asked to work late with the rest of the team when a good number of them are dawdlers. I like to find the joy in games as well; from the comfort of my couch at home, or lounging on my back porch with my DS, not sitting in a cubicle under the florescent lights and the watchful eye of some employer.
There's an old saying, "work smarter, not harder". If there were less dawdlers, I personally feel that the quality of games and life would improve overall. It's not likely to happen because of the broad array of personality types A and B, etc. Some people are still living the college dorm life and others just want to provide for their families and have fun doing it.
If you want to get into the industry but can't, then you just aren't good enough. There are a bunch of average artists coders and designers making games, that doesn't automatically mean you have a right to be in just because you are also average. But if you are GOOD you will definitely get a job, if you are really good you can even be a goddamn asshole and still get the job.
It's very simple like that. Now, everyone who has their life somewhat together has the ability to get better. If you can't handle the stress of working on getting better on top of your normal job/studies then you definitely wont hold up through a bad crunch once you get into the industry.
Seeing as you have a fucking final fantasy icon I will guess that you have a financially good enough standing to buy and play the game once it's out. This means you also have time to get better, how will you spend your time? Shut up already and get better.
That's the way it should be, but it isn't. Actual skill has nothing to do with it when you're not even given a chance to begin with. Getting better causes no stress at all, it's great to learn new things and improve. If I was given a chance I already know I would do just fine and I wouldn't complain about work stress or crunch time. I'm a person that needs something to work towards, maybe all people are like that, I don't know, I'm anti-social, but anyway when there seems to be no way to actually get in then it's hard to see the point in getting better. Once I'm in I can actually see the point of improving because I have connections at that point and I have the all mighty "experience" that everyone is looking for.
Seeing as you have a default gamasutra icon I will guess that you live in a shack and steal internet from the shack next door, am I right? No? Go figure, seemed like a perfect science at determining how well off people are, how mentally healthy they are. Truth be told FFXIII is one of the only things I have to look forward to at the moment which I guess could be considered sad. When you go to school and get a degree to do something then you aren't able to even get a chance to do it, it makes you feel pretty bad, and makes you look like a total idiot to your family. If a company could just clear out a cubicle for me I know I'd be alright and I'd improve in more ways than just technically. I guess I just wanted more than life could ever grant. I'm not one to get something then be bored by it, or stressed by it, like you guys. If I got it I'd be happy, and you guys should be too. It isn't like I'm begging for hand outs, I'm just wanting to work at the only thing I know.
Some people doesn't have the opportunity to get better at making games because they may have to work double jobs to feed their kids, they reside in a warzone, have no access to hardware etc etc etc.
My remark about the FF icon was just to note that if you have a ps3/360 and the time to play a probably long final fantasy game, then you DO have time to get better. A luxury lots of people don't have.
As demonstratable skill not having anything to do with chances of getting a job, can you elaborate on that?
Our best gameplay coder, after 9hours at the office he goes home and works a few hours on his crazy rendering project because he wants to get more into that, and he will probably be moved around to graphics programming for the next project because he is getting better at that.
Our art director who works a lot because he enjoys it, also has a show opening in a few weeks with a bunch of his awesome analogue work that he does after office time.
How many hours in the last two weeks did you spend writing code or working on your art portfolio?
How many hours in the last two weeks did you spend playing games or hanging out on game-related sites online?
If the first answer isn't at least 10 times as big as the second, you need to shape up if you want to get better.
Nobody cares about degrees, they don't mean shit in this industry. "Game schools" can be good because they allow you to build your portfolio, but the only thing that matters for getting hired is how good you are.
"The next guy" you are competing with doesn't just have a cover letter and a resume. They will have the most important part (for someone trying to break in) which is a portfolio, it's just as important for a coder as it is for an artist, though the presentation is a bit less straight forward and may differ depending on which company you are applying at.
You will need to show examples of games/projects you have made, its good to have those as flash videos up on your website so ppl can simply click and see what you are capable of. Random code samples are probably not too interesting, but its always cool if you allow the source and binaries to be downloaded anyways and it shows that you are confident in what you have made. If you have something cool enough viewable/playable you will probably get a coding test from the place you are applying that you will have a few days to complete.
You shouldnt worry too much about fear of public speaking and shyness etc, this industry is really used to handling some pretty awkward people as long as they seem competent, we are fellow nerds after all :). As long as you are polite and not terribly annoying you will be okay if you have the skills.
If you are really sure you have the skills, you need to think about how you are presenting them, is it easy for people to view or run the stuff you have made?
Can you tear out a specific part of some project you worked on and polish it up to better show what your strengths are? etc etc.
If you are applying with just a resume, you have to get visual stuff up and running if you want to get a job.
Make a game, there are plenty of engines and middleware that you can use for free noncommercially to give you a good ground to build on. Make something really simple but that has got one feature that can stand out a lot, that you can polish and show off in a way that people can understand and see exactly that you have some kind of skills to be able to pull it off.
What I'm saying is that if someone can directly see that you are really good, they will call you.
How are we supposed to change the industry's attitude to the people that it still uses, abuses and spits out with alarming regularity when people treat it like some mythical state of being? It's not. It's a job....one that we should be passionate about, that we should be putting 110% of our creativity and dedication to during normal working hours.
That's not to say we should refuse to work long hours when the need arises, but these times should be short and only appear at milestone or other important dates on the project. If I mess up or if something unexpected goes wrong, of course I'm going to get in there and do whatever I can to fix the problem.
But that doesn't mean I expect to be in the office until the wee hours, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year. I've been there and done that, and you know, after 10 years your body just sin't up to that kind of continued punishment.
So if you're attitude is "you should be thankful" then either get out of the industry or don't bother trying to get in. The industry doesn't need your attitude to hold it back.
What are your particular skills? There are plenty of other students/recent graduates who frequent these blogs. Maybe you could start up a project with them and help build both your portfolios.
@ Michael Rivera
I'm a programmer. I feel that I can do any game industry job that doesn't involve making 2D/3D art, I'm not an artist. I don't have time to create a portfolio, I need a job now, and I know I can do the work.