The Game Industry

tysonrss

How would I break into the game industry? What are some tips?

Sentry

There's a thread full of helpful tips here: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/161285/is-devry-worth-the-career

It might look familiar to you.

tysonrss

Which is why I posted this thread, so I can get direct answers.

Deebaser

Make games?
Apply for jobs in the game industry?

tysonrss

Getting jobs in the industry.

Deebaser

Most websites have a section for "Careers". Apply to those jobs. If you find yourself lacking in the skills to do those jobs, go to school and work on the skills necessary to do what you want to do.

Sentry

The last thread had several people who worked in the industry and their advice was a unanimous "make games."
It seems like you have the best advice you can get here, you just want different advice.

tysonrss

No. I need clarification on some things.

I don't mind working on a small game as I started a community project over at Picceta involving GameMaker. I want clarification on what to do on the college side of things.

Esh

tysonrss wrote: »

No. I need clarification on some things.

I don't mind working on a small game as I started a community project over at Picceta involving GameMaker. I want clarification on what to do on the college side of things.

This thread pops up every couple weeks. Here's another one with the advice you need (though the original linked one would provide you with what you need as well).

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/22615762#Comment_22615762

EDIT: And didn't you just make a thread asking this exact same thing in regards to DeVry?

TychoCelchuuu

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/137770/need-advice-for-making-games/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/153372/getting-into-the-game-development-industry

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/96975/redirect/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/97766/redirect/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/143384/getting-an-edjumacation

Wassermelone

Basically:
If you want to do art, go to college for art.
If you want to do programming, do programming at college.
If you want to do design, do some programming, and start making games.

TychoCelchuuu

Wait hold up I got more

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/129909/redirect/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/120035/redirect/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/31773/redirect/p1

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/2864450

edit: every time this happens I have to spend 10 minutes finding all these links. I have to encode some sort of phrase for this post so I can find this thread really easily later. Note to self: "TychoCelchuu game design links." That should work.

tysonrss

Thanks.

Maybe have a section where people can see a sticky thread with all those links bunched together.

Rye

Another very common and acceptable option is to do work in a non-industry job and be very analytical and be able to abstract that info to anything. At the place I work, we have Architects who are designers, Nuclear engineers who are support specialists, and NASA scientists as platform engineers.

Also, not to poo-poo on your thread, but one of the key features of any desirable hire is being able to ask the right questions.

bowen

@tysonrss what do you want to do with your life.

Do you want to program, do you want to write, do you want to draw/model, do you want to compose, do you want to advertise/sell ?

Tell me what your passions are and I'll tell you which route to take.

Know this though, this career path is terrible until you've "made it" in the business for a few years, or, unless you're an idiot savant and just fucking amazing at one of the above talents.

Esh

tysonrss wrote: »

Thanks.

Maybe have a section where people can see a sticky thread with all those links bunched together.

Or just use the "Search" function so that the top of the boards don't get cluttered.

tysonrss

I want to be able to write the story, program some things and maybe even draw.

TychoCelchuuu

tysonrss wrote: »

I want to be able to write the story, program some things and maybe even draw.

Then go make an indie game.

Seriously read those threads I linked. I can't be bothered to type all this shit 8 times.

Gilbert0

tysonrss wrote: »

I want to be able to write the story, program some things and maybe even draw.

Unless you are a small Indy developer, no one does all 3. You do one job. You are a writer. You are a programmer. You are an artist.

Yes you have the skills to do more than that but so does everyone at these companies. It's a question of what the company is PAYING you to do.

bowen

tysonrss wrote: »

I want to be able to write the story, program some things and maybe even draw.

Well that's nice.

But what do you want to do. What is your passion in life, what do you aspire to be?

Gilbert0

Just to give you an example, here is Capcom Vancouver's (made Dead Rising 2) page. According to their Linkedin profile, they are 200-500 employees.

They have very clear job responsibilites and positions that company has whether it's Art, Audio, Management or programming.

http://capcomvancouver.com/careers/

Read what each position is, and see which you like. YOU CAN'T DO IT ALL.

amateurhour

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_game_engines#Free_and_open_source

That's a complete list of free and open source game engines

http://www.moddb.com/engines

That's the same list, with pretty pictures and a little more description in case the wiki doesn't have a link

Most of those engines have a RICH forum community that works on games, amateur or professional, full time.

If you want to mostly write and do some art, look at Adventure Game Studio. It's a free to use engine which can be used to make free games that you can charge for, it's got a large community, it's C++ based, and fairly easy to grab a hold of.

It's also slowly being ported over with some iOS/Android capability.

tysonrss

Thanks everyone, it's all looking great. I'll definitely check everything out.

I think I want to be an animator/modelor.

ceres

You have a thread for this. You do not get to make duplicate threads, nor does the forum have a sticky suggestion box. Use the thread you have open. If you don't like the advice you're getting, well.. it's still the advice you're getting. You either need to ask better questions or rethink your worldview.