How to get into gamedev? The specialists of gaming companies are responsible

Where to start if I can’t do anything?

Consider a classic story: you do not have a profile experience, you have just graduated from school or are studying at an early university course. At the same time, you want to enter the industry, but you don’t even know how to approach it. What to do?

Sergey Meleshko

In this case, says Sergey Meleshko, HR director of 4Friends studio, it is necessary to decide which specialty of game dev is most interesting to you: narrative, level design, art, programming, sound or something else. “To do this, you can watch YouTube videos or podcasts on selected specialties. This way you will understand how the development takes place in general terms, as well as what is closer to you,” the specialist explains.

“You can also go to the website of a game dev company and look at the requirements for the position you are interested in. After that, there may be an understanding of which way to move. Now you can start learning. Read books, enroll in courses, go to university and look for internships,” Sergey clarifies.

According to Oleg Dobroshtan, Director of Training and Development at 101XP, when you have decided on the desired profession, you can immediately get a job at the starting positions, like QA or technical support. “Before the device, specify what are the chances of growth within the company in the chosen profession, and what is needed for this. Feel free to talk about your plans at the interview, it’s usually remembered.”

Oleg Dobroshtan

After that, Oleg advises to collect as much information as possible about the chosen specialty — and try to be as useful as possible inside the company. “In parallel, you can go to study in your chosen profession, but first it is better to collect feedback on the courses where you are going to go. Also ask about the chosen profession in the company where you work — how this position is represented in your office. Do not hesitate to offer your help and generally try to be as useful as possible in terms of the chosen path of development. In growing companies, those people who know what they want and learn from their chosen specialty are noticeable.”

Vladimir Pranov

Vladimir Pranov, who holds the position of HR Director at Chillgaming, also suggests that the applicant act proactively. And gives an example of artists with coders: “Let’s say a person wants to draw. To do this, he can register on ArtStation, an excellent platform for game dev artists. There you can watch other works and post something of your own. A similar story with programmers. It is advisable to know the minimum language in which the engine is written — for Unity it is C#, for Unreal it is C++. You can watch something on YouTube, try to do something yourself.”

At the same time, Vladimir notes that they almost do not look at profile education when applying to game dev. “HR looks at knowledge, skills and the ability to apply them. The diploma is not particularly interesting, except for the profession of an artist. This is one of the few industries where specialized education gives a plus — usually a person with such a background is a year ahead of another Jun.”

What should I do if I already have experience in related fields?

According to Oleg, the above path is suitable not only for beginners without education, but also for older people. Those who managed to build a career in related industries, but realized that they wanted to make games. However, it’s still better to pump up the skills relevant to game dev, Sergey Meleshko clarifies.

“Let’s say you have experience in related fields. For example, in IT, where you programmed in C, but now you want to go to gamedev. To do this, it’s a good idea to learn C++/With # and deal with the game engines, which Vladimir said a little above. Also here it will be necessary to remember the course of linear algebra, trigonometry, and so on. If you were engaged in testing, it would be good to tighten up your knowledge in testing on consoles and smartphones,” says HR Director of 4Friends.

What should I do if my current employment is formally far from the game dev? In this case, Sergey explains, you need to understand which area is closer to you. Perhaps your experience can still be adapted for the industry. “For example, if you are engaged in texts, then you can switch to narrative. If the web design is in UI/UX. Etc. The main thing is to determine your competencies for yourself and where they can be applied in game development,” explains the HR director.

But, according to another interlocutor, they usually take junior positions from foreign markets to game dev. “In general, the gaming industry is trying to look for people inside. Game Dev is a dynamic environment, so recruiting people from outside is often costly. But the demand for people is very high, it exceeds the offers from candidates, so we look outside. Basically, developers, analysts, financiers and those who work with people come “from the outside”. Sometimes — traffic specialists, artists and project managers (although this will be a junior position). Extremely rarely — game designers, producers, brand managers, PR managers. Well, we almost never take managers from outside,” explains the Director of training and Development at 101XP.

There are courses, events and hackathons. Will they help?

One of the easiest ways to join the industry is to enroll in courses. There are a lot of such offers on the market now: from the training center at MSTU to educational forges like Skillbox and GameFactory. The authors of the courses promise almost one hundred percent employment, but how much does this correspond to reality?

Experts say that the courses in the resume are a plus. Sometimes they really open the doors to game dev. “There are people in our company who came to us from the course “Game Project Management” from the HSE Graduate School of Business Informatics. More than 10 people in total. The reason, first of all, is that in this course there is an opportunity to immediately meet with a potential employer, offer him your candidacy. Plus, the amount of knowledge is very good. I am not ready to give an assessment about other courses, but I think they will definitely not interfere,” Oleg Dobroshtan shares his experience.

Sergey Meleshko also says that the courses generally help — 4Friends employs several people who have been trained. “Specialized courses give an additional plus sign to a candidate for the position of junior. In addition, many companies conduct internal bootcamps for their needs — participation in them also increases the chances of your employment. If we talk about external courses and schools, we often hired people after GameAcademy, Unit City and ArtCraft.”

Another way to get into the industry is to participate in all sorts of hackathons and open—source projects. For example, Azur Games recently held a hackathon, after which several participants managed to cooperate with the studio. According to Vladimir Pranov, such cases do happen: “In general, this is a working case — to arrange a hackathon for further hiring of employees.”

In general, experts note that having such experience is useful, but you should not rely on it completely. “Game studios often sponsor hackathons — this allows you to communicate directly with company representatives. Participation in such events will be a plus in your resume, because it means that you have experience not only in development, but also in teamwork. However, it is not necessary to rely only on hackathons, because the competition for the position of a beginner is very high,” says Sergey Meleshko.

How to choose a specialty that will not become obsolete?

Game Dev is changing fast — especially in terms of business. For example, until recently it was customary to bury games in social networks. Now, on the contrary, they are on the rise — for example, in the first five months of 2020, Odnoklassniki paid 360 million rubles to mobile developers. This is 80% more than in the same period a year earlier. But this does not mean that it will always be like this — the market may change, and with it the demand for popular professions. Therefore, according to Oleg Dobroshtan, it is necessary to constantly study.

“In game development, constant improvement in the chosen direction is more important now, and at some point you can radically change your profession. The main thing is to stay inside the market. For those who are just starting their way into game dev, I would advise them to get a job in primary positions right now. And from these positions to study in more detail the internal structure of companies, to begin to get acquainted with the professions that are represented in companies,” comments the Director of Training and development at 101XP.

Oleg notes that right now there are not enough mobile app developers. Vladimir takes a similar position. In his opinion, the demand for programmers, artists and analysts will remain in the next 5-7 years.

“Good coders will always be needed, their salaries will always grow. Unless, of course, some super-university suddenly appears, which will start producing programmers in batches and create an oversupply of supply. But in the next 5-7 years, this is extremely unlikely. A similar story with good artists, 3D modelers. There are quite a few of them, the demand is high, I think the trend will continue. Well, right now the demand for analysts is growing, especially with experience in game development. Their salaries are growing cosmically, because they directly affect the profits in their companies,” says the HR director of Chillgaming.

However, this does not mean that such a disposition will remain forever. In the future, according to Sergey Meleshko, specialties related to AR/VR, esports and 5G development will be in demand.

What personal qualities are important?

It is not enough to be an excellent specialist — it is also desirable to have a set of skills that will help you work effectively. Our interlocutors assure us that one of the central personal qualities is the ability to interact in a team. “Communication. At all levels, in all positions. Start learning how to communicate and formalize the results of communication right now,” says Oleg Dobroshtan.

Oleg also notes the ability to think critically and the ability to build workflows. “Launch enthusiasm is like fuel putting a satellite into orbit. It ends quickly, then other laws begin to work. Well—established principles of work should become your orbit,” the expert sums up.

Vladimir identifies four qualities that he looks at when hiring people in Chillgaming. “The first is businesslike. This quality is rarely found in employees, but it seems important to us. A person should understand how his contribution to the work affects the overall project, the product, the company. And depending on this, they will distribute their priorities. The second is proactivity. We are still a startup company, and we need people who will not go home when the build falls, but will offer something, do something. The third is flexibility. Everything is changing fast, the employee must be able to adapt to the impending conditions. If you are some kind of ultraconservative, then first of all it will be hard for you. And the fourth is openness. It is necessary to be able to share problems at work, to be able to give and listen to feedback — including negative ones.”

Among the disadvantages that can break your career in game development, Vladimir highlights the inability to work in a team. “In my practice, there was a case when a specialist worked with one pipeline, then came to another place, there was another pipeline, and he tried to teach the whole team to work in their own way. Of course, no one listened to the newcomer.”