28 Jul, 2014

Since interviewers are increasingly becoming non-social, they want to read who you are upfront and basically stalk you before they even give you a chance to talk to them in person for an interview. What this means is that they are going to read what you show online with your portfolio and resume to figure out an idea of who they think you are, even if it is incorrect. This is why you can't give them any wiggle room and must align what you show with exactly what type of project you want to be

30 Jul, 2016

It has been increasingly known that negotiation, rather than sheer talent, is the main factor in a person's pay at a job. Recently, I had an interview with a company and received an offer from them, and accepted! One thing that should be noted is that I made sure to negotiate as much as possible for my salary, but looking back it has become clear that negotiation only goes so far. It must be paired with years of experience, to determine your final offer and salary. Sure, some people have tons of

25 Mar, 2016

Not too long ago, the book information for How to Get a Job in Video Games was updated to include my co-author and partner in crime. His name is Jonathan Armstrong, and he is another environment Artist working in the video game industry. Well, there is a new tutorial that he just released and I would like to share this information with everyone. These tutorials should be useful for the artists out there who are looking to upgrade their skills. This is the link to the video, and also another link

11 Mar, 2016

GDC 2016 in San Francisco is just around the corner. To celebrate this important event in the game development community, I am selling the digital version of my book at a discounted price for the entire week of March 14th-18th. The price will be the lowest on Monday and raise each day until the end of the week, when the price will go back to it's original retail cost. The starting price will be just 99¢! Get the book here: https://www.amazon.com/How-Get-Job-Video-Games/dp/0985377801 If you are

The best book about gaining a sustainable and fulfilling career in Game Development just got better. This book was released three years ago and  has finally got its own ebook from the publisher, MODogma. Now, more people than ever will be able to enjoy the priceless information of this volume and at the convenience of reading anywhere. Also, the ebook version is much cheaper! So, if you want to boost your progress and get hired faster than other students or colleagues for your next game

06 Oct, 2015

I got a post on LinkedIn recently from someone I used to work with at Disney, who now works for EA in Los Angeles. It is an article from an HR representative at EA giving basic advice for people who may not know why they are not getting contacted back from HR. It is an insightful article and Carrie points out that if you want someone to add you on LinkedIn, you must write an introduction statement in your comment section. This is also advice that I provide in my book, which is covered more

I was talking to a colleague this morning, and I had discovered that his wife is an HR manager. I made the joke saying "well, you must know all the tricks then! You probably don't have any problems finding a job!" He agreed that his wife had helped him out with his job search, and that when they were first dating that she had revealed to him all of the information that he would need to know to be successful in his job search. What he said next blew my mind. He revealed only one trick to use

10 Mar, 2015

Following up with my last article on negotiating your salary once you have been given an offer, I will discuss further the best method for estimating your target salary. First of all, factoring in cost of living differences and moving to a different state drastically changes the salary figures for your job title. Essentially, you will want to become an expert with each of the major hub states for the game industry, and understand why they pay what they do and what type of living conditions you

03 Mar, 2015

Face it: knowing an exact figure of what you should be paid is required before you even submit your first job application. Why? Because one of the first questions you will be asked (usually after "are you a citizen of X country?" and "are you willing to relocate?") is "what are your desired salary requirements for this position?" I have done a multitude of research on this and have my own theories and opinions on whether or not you should answer this question and if a game studio should be

17 Dec, 2014

The current trend of the video game industry is to be hired on a contractual basis. These are usually shorter contracts, ranging from six months to one year, although I have seen laughable contracts for only three months. My first advice to you, is that you are offered a short-term contract like this, and you already have a little bit of experience, then ask if it can be extended and wait. Sometimes, waiting silently is your best negotiation tactic. Many times studios may not contact you back

29 Aug, 2014

It seems hard to find information about what video game studios are looking for, on the internet. The industry is fairly hush-hush and it seems that every single one has their own opinion on what they are looking for or who is the perfect candidate. There are a few people who have twitter accounts and may share occasional helpful advice, but it is not concentrated into one webpage with updates that are relevant to truly getting you hired. Well, it seems that from all the studios, Insomniac seems

13 Aug, 2014

I have been doing a few small tweaks here and there to my resume, and eventually came across a link for a website that turned out to do what far too many services cannot: it delivered on it's promise. And, it's free! Want to know what the website was? Hold on just a second...I will tell you a little bit about what it can do for you and how to use it, first. If you have ever submitted your resume online, you must know that for studio after studio, you are required to enter your work history and

Recently I applied to a new job and everything went really smoothly--which is often not common in an interview and hiring process. I sent in my application to a start-up studio, had a Skype interview with, what seemed to be, the whole art team, and they got back to me a few days later with a job offer. Unfortunately, the offer was lower than I expected for the area (the job was in Los Angeles). I used the tactic that I teach: negotiating the salary after the offer had already be granted. As a

02 May, 2014

"Shipping a title" could be construed as actually having played a part in any part of the development for a game that gets released publicly. So, for instance, if you had started the project in it's beginning and concept phases, were working full time for most of the project, and left near the end, you should be granted your name in the credits, right? Not exactly. In fact, there are a lot of politics that dictate who's names get put into the credits and where. So, like the above example, you

03 Apr, 2014

I've got great news! I know that April fools day just happened but I'm not fooling about this update: How to get a Job in Video Games has just had a massive price drop. The book was $20.85 and now has dropped to $14.50 on Amazon. That is a savings of 30%. The book has been selling much better than expected and the publisher has decided to celebrate by offering the book to a larger audience and keep the momentum going! Don't mess around and there is no reason to not start taking your career

24 Mar, 2014

Punctuality is something that is important to any industry. It seems a little more lenient in the video game industry, though, because there are usually core hours from 10AM-4PM: this means that you can get in any time before 10AM as long as you stay until at least 4PM. Well, from my experience a majority of employees at game studios usually opt for the later option, arriving a few minutes before or after 10AM. If you want to make a good impression and give the boss/studio less reason to fire

I am not sure if I have covered this before, but if you head over to CreativeJobsCentral.com you will find a wealth of free job listings at your disposal. The website itself is a bit intimidating, as it has a bunch of paid plans that it wants you to sign up for and also, once you do click on a job listing, it asks you to switch to a paid subscription in order to get the job details and apply. To make it easier for you, I've included the email alert sign up link here:

05 Mar, 2014

Read this book, and if you practice its principles it will change your life: How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie. It is the same course that Warren Buffet took when he was twenty years old and he still has the certificate of passing the course on his office wall. The reason that this book is so powerful is because it teaches you profound ways of dealing with people that you won't learn in school because it's generally something personal and each person goes about it their

18 Feb, 2014

A common issue that I have found in being a game developer is that when you are brought on to a new project you expect to be working on all sorts of new types of work that you are not used to but you would like to have a chance at creating. This is a problematic mindset, since most of the time when you are brought onto a project the game is pretty far along and the types of work is segmented and more specialized. This is why if you "typecast" yourself (a term used in the film industry for actors

05 Feb, 2014

Recently, we have been getting closer to finishing a project and I have been noticing more and more that the Rockstars on the team are those that do what they want regardless of what their peers aka coworkers think. For instance, if you are constantly given tasks that feel under-rated and lower-profile then there is a likeliness that you will continue to be given those types of tasks unless you take initiative. The best method of doing this is finding an area of the game that you feel you can