"Full Cycle" development expierence

Meloncov

So fairly frequently job posts will ask for a certain number of years of "full cycle" experience, but I can't find a definition of the term anywhere. I'm guessing it refers to long term work on the same project,instead of brief freelance or contract work, but is there anything more to it?

ZacD

Don't worry about job posting "requirements". "Requirements" is a companies wishlist for future employees and is mostly there to scare people off that don't have any experience from applying.

But I would take full cycle to mean working on a game from start (start of production worK) to finish.

LMP

Yeah, don't worry about the requirements when it comes to "experience"

I've worked on 3 games or was it 4? 2 of them have been released, 1 of them was a R&D prototype that never went anywhere and the last one was just barely in production before I was laid off with at least a couple others on the project, and the other part of half the artists were moved around.
But, I'd say that I have 1 full cycle of experience, the other completed title was just a really minor thing that I did on the DLC, and I mean really minor... like, 1 thing.

Eric Chadwick

For Lead or Senior jobs, it does matter that someone has seen the full cycle of a game, from pre-production all the way through to final polish. You learn things that you really can't learn otherwise. What to avoid next time, mostly

But yes, for entry level positions, don't worry about hitting all the bullet points. We will hire you if your artwork rocks, regardless of experience.