What's expected to be seen on a Resume for an individual coming out of Uni into Game Dev

CommanderJoJo

Hi,

So while I feel I have a proper resume I don't really feel its geared towards or even right for game development. I would link it normally but it contains personal information such as address and phone number as of right now. My resume lists thing such as my education, work experience, awards (collegiate and highschool level). Skills (3DS Max, Blender, Adobe Illustrator, etc) My clubs within college and highschool and projects like game projects and community service and even my volunteer works. All this is good and well but...do they even care about any of these things. I am unaware of what to cull but I feel the need to do so with all this fluff. I have 3 pages as of right now and I am afraid they will feel it is all Fluff. Also with skills should I somehow indicate a proficiency level or no? sorry if this is hard to explain with words, but I would appreciate any advice on what is really looked for in a resume. Thank you for your time.

-JoJo

Alex_J

Think about if you have a studio with employees and want to finish a commercial project and make a profit. What would you want to know about a person? How would you determine where the value is and reduce risk of hiring a useless person?

Other people can give specifics and pixel masher has written a couple lengthy articles explaining relevant details. I just want to ask the question because it seems students are always too focused on looking for rules and checklist to follow - not enough critical thinking which is what really going to elevate you from being low-pay grunt to a force multiplier that can make a real impact.

BagelHero

Working on responding to your other post but, in the meantime, carefully consider what Alex J says. It's important.

For questions like this, always check the polycount wiki first. The portfolio page is great too if you haven't already read it: http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Portfolio

More reading, some more relevant than others but that should help give you more information:

https://80.lv/articles/artist-resume-common-questions-about-artist-resumes/

https://twitter.com/Sam_Catamaran/status/979757321365618688

https://twitter.com/ArcaneRoboBrain/status/1279186551935610881

Notes.

1. Keep it short, 3 pages when you have 0 experience is wasting time. I don't subscribe to a specific page-count, but right out of Uni experience I'd expect 1 page.
   
2. Try to keep it relevant. Do they NEED to know about your high school awards? Are any actually relevant to the job? Do they need to know what high school you went to, for that matter. Personally, I didn't even graduate hs. It's not relevant, really. Game projects vs club activities, which do you think a games company cares more about?
3. Probably don't include your address...?

Zi0

When a studio receives your portfolio + resume they most of the time will look at your portfolio first and only if the quality of your work is up to studios standards they will take a look at your resume. 3 pages is waaaay to much, since you will be fresh out of uni the only relevant information you can have on your CV is: your education, contact information and maybe a short objective statement. Dont add any skill bars and your proficiency level stuff, your portfolio will show how skilled you are.  Also dont add work experience only RELEVANT work experience, a game studio doesn't care that you had a job at your local supermarket or KFC, only relevant work experience matters.

Brian "Panda" Choi

1 page resume

Work Experience first

Then Projects

Then Skills

Then Education

in my opinion, that's the priority order.

Take care to explicitly write in filterable buzzwords so you get the attention of recruiters and whatever data scraper tools they're using.

Meloncov

Brian "Panda" Choi said:

1 page resume

Work Experience first

Then Projects

Then Skills

Then Education

in my opinion, that's the priority order.

Take care to explicitly write in filterable buzzwords so you get the attention of recruiters and whatever data scraper tools they're using.

So I'd agree with that order if you have experience in the industry--an internship or the like. If it's like, a summer job at McDonalds I wouldn't even bother to list it. If it's something that's not in the industry but does demonstrate some transferable soft skills--say you managed some people--I'd list but put it at the bottom.