Emma Schaale - How Games Get Made: The Stories of the People Who Make and Play the Games We Love

Todays just another one of those days. Your mother is badgering you about becoming a lawyer or a doctor. Or maybe sticking with finance is the way to go, she suggests. Your father warns you about the grades for your calculus class, in which youre dangerously close to falling past a C minus. You know, the usual. Giving lifeless nods and noncommittal answers in response, you wander back to your bedroom.

Ah, your bedroom. Your safe haven. Your small paradise within the grueling desert of daily life. Your gaming console of choice rests under the TV your parents got for you after several years of begging, and your headset that promises professional-quality sound rests in its charging stand. You grab the controller, put on your headset, and pick up the bag of snacks you were eating before you headed downstairs for dinner. Popping in your favorite game, you check the time. Sweet. Its 8 p.m. on a Friday, and the weekends ahead of you. After five weekdays of exhausting work, relaxing with some games will be nice for a change.

You might enjoy playing games. In fact, you might spend more time gaming than doing actual work. But what if your actual work was working within the gaming industry?

This thought didnt even occur to me until I took my first video game development course in college, at age twenty. Despite the ridiculous number of hours Id spent playing and watching games, I didnt realize I could make the stuff until far later.

I originally went to college to study biology and astronomy. Before the end of my first semester, that became photography, another hobby of mine. However, finding that too restrictive of a medium to express what I wanted, video game development became my salvation after two years of unrelated classes.

Video games constitute a large class of software. From Candy Crush (2012), the mobile smash hit, to Counter Strike: Global Offensive (2012), one of the most popular online multiplayer games, to Nancy Drew: Interactive Mysteries (1998), a kids education game, when I discuss video game development, I mean it as an all-encompassing term. It includes the games your eighty-year-old grandmother plays on her iPad as well as the games that eighteen-year-old eSports players engage in.

Maybe you picked up this book because you like playing video games, or youve never considered making games as a professional career path. Or maybe youre reading it because you want to work in the game industry but are nervous on how to do so. Or maybe you already work in the industry and wanted to hear some other perspectives. Perhaps you even considered becoming a Twitch streamer to play games in front of an audience, but you have no idea where to begin.

Im here to share with you the ins and outs of the gaming industry and answer questions, such as:

How, exactly, do people get into the gaming industry?

What does working in the industry even mean?

How do I become an industry leader?

What is it like to build your own business in this industry?

With those questions in mind, I should note the video game industry is unique. Its volatile and often requires overtime, and most of the people who work in it do so for passion rather than career stability or pay. The industry is so new that finding a clear-cut base pay rate for any single role is difficult. Your hours and pay are so dependent upon the work culture of the company, your job, and the progression of the developing project that it is almost impossible to give a clear answer.

Take, for example, the job position of 2-D/2-D Concept artist. For a junior/mid-level role, here are the pay rates I can find at a quick glance, including the artists location and company:

Roxie Vizcarra, @roxination: $75,000 in 2009 working at Rockstar Games in New York City

Marc Brunet, @bluefley: $41,000 (CAD) in 2007 working at Behavior Interactive in unknown location