I covered this topic a little in my book, How to Get a Job in Video Games, when I mentioned that the best colleges were the ones that were the closest to where video game development studios are located. Well, I just wanted to demonstrate how living and going to school in such an area is a huge benefit. The industry is a small one and it is only located in a few cities. You will undoubtedly run into industry professionals whenever you are out at public places. If you are not where the industry is, though, you can forget this happening.
This past week I went to the Seattle Mini Cooper dealership to get a new power steering pump and fan, because it is a known issue that those parts fail on the model and year of my car and thus I was taking it in to get fixed. I already had to cancel and push back the date, once, because I slept through my alarm one day. I am glad I did, in retrospect! So, I was in the dealership lobby waiting while work was being done to my car. I happened to bring a book with me that was related to video game development and it was loud and clear on the title. I had put the book down while I was walking around and viewing the various decor around the showroom, because I was tired of sitting.
When I got back, There was someone sitting really close to my chair. He pointed out the title of the book I was reading and asked if I was interested in making video games. I told him that I was already working as a developer at Monolith Productions. At first I thought he must be some student or someone who was merely a fan of video games. No, he turned out to be an artist for Valve Corporation. I couldn't believe it! I had been joking with some colleagues just recently how hard it is to meet any of their developers, because for one they are a small studio and secondly, they don't really appear at major conferences frequently. They are also one of the most highly regarded studios in the industry and they probably try to hide themselves as much as possible so that people are not begging them for jobs left and right.
Anyway, we got to talking about art and the Dota series, that he had worked on, and other intricacies of game development. I told him about my previous employers and some people I knew. I specifically avoided asking about job opportunities there but hinted that I was interested in the studio and indirectly wanted to know how someone were to get hired there. I can go on longer about that in another article...He related and we were talking for a long time until it was broken up by a dealership employee who told me that my car was ready. This could have been the end, but I didn't want to let the opportunity go away! I make sure to keep emergency business cards in my wallet for such occasions and I probably haven't used one for almost a year. I happened to have a few and gave him one. He said he didn't have one on him, but right when I got to my studio that day he had emailed me from his company email and said that it was a pleasure to talk to me and wanted to let me have his email. I had also invited him to connect on LinkedIn.
Now, if ever there are jobs he may let me know about them, although I know myself that I will need to work on my portfolio some more until more developers there consider it worthy to get in. But who knows, maybe I made a lasting enough impression on him for that not to matter as much. At any rate, it is good to have a new contact there and who happens to be in the same exact field--art--as me. I thought that everyone would enjoy and be inspired by this story of a chance encounter, and to prove that just living in a city that is booming with game developers is a great way to eventually get a job yourself. I would like to add that having a job already is probably a more desirable situation, as the other person will feel more comfortable sharing insider information with you.
-Ken
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