The Long Journey To Making Games.

Once upon a time, we were all young and full of hopeful dreams and endless passion. We set foot upon our journey in a state of gleeful bliss, unaware of the perils ahead. Perhaps, just as in parenting, none of us would have gone on the journey to begin with if we knew how hard it could be. Regardless of where you are in this journey, I have some words that I hope you can take with you out there.

At a certain point it’s hard to tell if you’re just unlucky, not experienced enough, don’t have good enough skills, all of the above, or even just have a silly typo somewhere in your resume. I’m here to say that first of all, this feeling is completely normal, and also there is almost certainly something you can do to increase your chances of getting hired.

Let’s start off by going over the perspective of the employer.

1. The employer doesn’t have a whole lot of time. What does this mean for you? It means that your reel/content better be quick and to the point. No more than 2 clicks away and you have about 15-30 seconds to impress until they move on to one of the many other applicants in line. Put your best right up front! Also, make sure mobile works too.=
2. You aren’t the only person applying! Wherever you apply, there are at least a handful of people that can already produce work that could be used in a final product. You need to be one of these applicants for any chance at a job. Why? Because employers know your student work most likely took weeks to months to complete...which is entirely too long. If the quality is there, they can overlook this and assume you can learn to get faster. If the quality isn’t there, it is literally impossible to tell how long it will take someone to reach the expected bar of quality. A company cannot indefinitely allocate resources to training up someone; it’s usually a few weeks tops, and most likely just days.
3. The employer is looking for the right fit, not only the most technically executed work. This means they are looking to see if you can think, not if you can perfectly copy something else. Does your work stand out from the pack? Have you thought outside the box? It’s hard to do this starting out, but it’s very important to show you know the pipeline and what it takes to make something great.

So you’ve slaved months over your portfolio and you’re shopping it around. Time to sit back and rest on our laurels right? Wrong! Let’s go over the most common mistakes/misconceptions when trying to get that first job.

1. Resting on laurels is NEVER a good idea! Until you’ve secured a job you should be updating your portfolio. If you wait 6 months, you could get rusty and fail the dreaded test anyways. After you’ve contacted at least a dozen or more potential employers and have not heard one word back in a few weeks, I would assume your work needs some love.
2. Graduating is not a right of passage to a job. Unfortunately, the expensive piece of paper you graduated with means very little to potential employers (though needed for out of country work Visas). Employers are entirely results based. If you can get a great portfolio website together without a degree they won’t bat an eye. The best thing you can do is create things that are game ready or build tools for games. Game engines are readily available (and free!) so there’s really no excuse these days.
3. You don’t need to be good because you’ll just take a job that doesn’t require quality work? This is a nonexistent role in the industry. When you see something that has low quality, chances are it was made extremely fast. So if you can’t make things extremely fast or top quality then there just isn’t a job out there for you...yet. Keep practicing!
4. Apply to all job openings, even if you seem unqualified based on the description. I’m here to say that you don’t need 3+ years and a shipped title for that job. If your work is better than someone else you always have a chance. Experience helps, but doing what I mentioned above will help with that (note that if you lack experience your work might need to be a very close example of the work that the company does).
5. Put yourself out there! Don’t work on everything in a vacuum by yourself. Put early WIP work out there, be active on social media. You are more likely to get a job through a social network, network event, or forum than you ever will by just sending a job applications out.

Ok, so things aren’t going as planned. Let’s say it’s been 6 months, or a year, or maybe a couple years? If this is you and you aren’t getting responses, there’s one thing you need to do...find out how to market yourself! Stop sending out applications immediately until you’ve identified the problem AND solution. Don’t spend months or years on end banging your head against a wall. Here’s what you can do.

1. Let’s start with the most obvious thing you can do. Make your portfolio better! Your work might not be up to par with other applicants out there. Employers can rarely afford to wait for new hires to get up to speed. Because of this, if your portfolio isn’t showing almost exactly what they need, they will wait for someone that does. This includes skill level, tool knowledge, pipeline knowledge, if you’ve worked on similar projects, etc. Take a look around at portfolios of people with the jobs your looking to get and start to get an idea of where you need to be.
2. Cut the fat. Don’t show off anything that isn’t professional grade quality. What does this mean exactly? Anything you show will be judged, this includes: logos, websites, resumes, and anything on your portfolio (even if it’s not your main skill set). If you are not a logo designer, do not design a logo. If you are not a web designer, do not design a website. If you are not a modeler, do not model characters! While these skills might be handy, if the results aren’t up to par they will hurt you badly. Your reel, website, resume will get shut off before you had a chance to show your best work. This is the number one mistake I see. You have to remember that anything you show off is your stamp of professional approval. It’s ok to download a template, or leave something a little vanilla if it means that your real skills have a chance to be seen.
3. Invest more time. After graduating it can be tough to keep slogging on new work. You must keep up after school. There are many thousands of other people out there working every single day to get better. If you haven’t touched a project in months how are you even going to pass an interview? If you’ve run out of steam just start something new...don’t go back and try to hold onto something old. It can really wear you down.
4. Apply like you care! Don’t copy and paste cover letters, triple check everything, even tailor your portfolio to fit that employer better if possible. All in all, don’t come off like a robot or just plain desperate. Even if you don’t feel it, just try to act as genuine as possible.

Things might seem bleak at times, but all you can do is position yourself to take that opportunity when it does arise. At the end of the day the number one ally you have on your side is perseverance.

About the Author

Sterling is currently the Lead Animator at funkitron and formerly of Zynga and other companies no one really knows. He has spent the last decade Rigging, Animating 3D, 2D, FX, and doing whatever else can move on a screen. He enjoys helping others see their way through this crazy world.