How can my friend get into the biz?

Justin Meisse · Oct 2005

A friend of mine is a really good Dungeon Master, he crafts really exciting stories and situations and also creates some cool custom rules for his campaigns. Is there any way for him to get into the game industry? He's a pretty good traditional artist, his style is kind of a cross between Shirow Masamune and Akira Toriyama.

He's currently writing up a design for an RPG and he wants me to make some fake in-game shots.

Mark Dygert · Oct 2005

I think the offical company line at many studios is "everyone has a game they want to make, get your foot in the door somehow and then we might listen to your idea". But what they are really saying is, "he who has the cash tells the others what to do" If you want to design a game either work your way up from the ground up. Or have enough cash to tell everyone else to stop talking about thier game ideas and make the one they are hired to do (yours) or you will fire them.

It has been my experience most places doing hiring are looking for people to work on a game they have fully conceptualized. Rarely do places hire someone with ZERO industry expierence based on a good idea they have for a game. Even if its a really good idea, they will more than likely steel the idea and chanage it slightly.

The only way to shape the future of the next game they are making is to have been around for a while. Even then you might not get much of a say. Also it's true everyone even non-gamer types have a game they want made. Want to test it out, just tell someone you make video games and wait for the next words out of thier mouth to be "oh I have this idea". Or they constantly remind you about making a game out of stupid things that happen. Like a pigeon craps on a car as you walk by and they blert out, "OH that could be a game, you could be this little pigeon who flies around and craps on cars!"

Normally if they won't shut up tell them you are too busy working on your game ideas and they should draw up a design doc and get a demo ready for E3 if they want it made bad enough. They normally shut up after that...

It sounds like your friend has some strong art skills, so he might be able to get in as a concept artist. Or if he puts the time in and learns a paint program he might get in as a 2D texture artist.

Paul Jaquays · Oct 2005

To paraphrase Napoleon Dynamite, Companies love guys with skillz. People entering the game industry enter with professional, or near professional level skills in some area relevant to game development. If you believe your friend has strong DMing skills, suggest that he should investigate things like scenario design for computer games. He should try his hand at developing game scenarios for games like Neverwinter Nights or Morrowind, neither of which specifically require art skills. However, since your friend also has art skills, those also apply to FPS type level development. Have your friend try his hand at map design for Quake or UNREAL engine games. The tools are no more complex than modeling tools (but different) and both games have active development communities that can help him through the basics.

Essentially, see if he has a knack for dev skills and encourage him to bring them to a level of polish where he can compete for entry level jobs.

jzero · Oct 2005

Your friend may be good at story ideas and cool custom rules, but he needs to be working in the 'medium' of games to get noticed. Has he worked on any mods? If not, he should.

I'm thinking, you guys get together, he does some art and gets a great little story together, and you help him get it into a game environment. Doesn't have to be fancy or a complete workable TC, just show off what he can do.

I always use this guy as an example of good game ideas put into nice concise game environments: Blended.
Look deep there and see how many cool ideas and funny backstories there are. Esp look at 'Barista 2' and 'Bugstompers'. He's even got a LucasArts-style pointnclick game('Pilot Light'). That guy works as a level designer at Neversoft now. As well he should.

Wish I had time to work on stuff like that.

/jzero

Justin Meisse · Oct 2005

thanks for the suggestions, it made me realize that he should concentrate at what he's already good at. He hates 3D, never modded a game before and his computer struggles with photoshop. I'm going to buy him one of the Feng Zhu dvd's, his marker rendering is pretty good and I see the potential for Feng's level of skill, he just has to stop drawing anime girls all the time.

aesir · Oct 2005

tell him to start posting on conceptart.org

They don't really like anime there very much...

skankerzero · Oct 2005

the industry in general doesn't want to see anime style art. He needs to diversify.

hawken · Oct 2005

has your friend tried the back door? IE: DM'ing for online gaming companies like NCsoft? I know a lot of community managers that got in from being avid MMORPG players. Once you're in, your ear is to the track so to speak.

Rick Stirling · Oct 2005

Leave £100 in a brown paper bag at my desk, and I'll get you an interview.

How can my friend get into the biz?

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