Weekly Inspiration from Will Smith

I figured that I would try something new this week by posting to you some of the same motivational videos that I surround myself in. Motivational material is extremely important and will keep your desire burning even when you are on your last limb. You are listening to the same great advice that I am listening to, so therefore you are practically getting a dose of the same lifestyle that I have!
This week I found a great video that focuses on the hugely successful career of Will Smith. Note: in the video, he makes it blatantly obvious that he is a workaholic and spends most of his time training and perfecting his craft and getting better and finding opportunities. I also have mentioned this in my book, because when you think you're working too much and everyone else doesn't understand you, that's when you are on the right track!
I know, it's sometimes hard to swallow but there is so much competition out there and tons of people are trying to get into video games because it's seen as a fun career. If you are busting your ass more than the other person and doing your best to push your limits as far as forcing yourself to do bigger and better tasks than you've done in the past, networking and talking to as many people as you can and sharing your work with them and letting your work and your words speak highly of yourself (without gloating, of course), then it is inevitable that someone will notice and you will seize opportunity rather than sitting aimlessly hoping for it to come your way (hint: it won't!).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfWGoLj1JCM&noredirect=1

-Ken

Why All Game Developers Should Understand Programming

I'm an artist and I have a technical knack. This is because I spent time taking programming classes in school which used C++. Artists are agreed to be the least programming-savvy members of a given game development team. This is why technical artists are so important--because someone has to bridge the communication barrier between artists and programmers. But, just like a producer is not going to enable you to do better work but rather give you a good amount of time to be able to do good work yourself, a technical member on the team may be able to water-down technical information and processes about your workflow but you ultimately must pay the price in not understanding the information yourself.

In this recent article on Gamasutra an editor and former programmer, Chris Heckler, speaks of the benefits for all game developers to learn programming. He is not advocating that they be amazing at it and is mainly stating that at least understanding the concepts and limitations of programming would be essential to helping when communicating ideas to a programmer to implement.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/200155/Yes_you_should_understand_code__even_if_youre_not_a_programmer.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GamasutraNews+%28Gamasutra+News%29&utm_content=Netvibes

For artists, this means having to do grueling and tedious work copying all of certain type of prop, like a lamp post for instance, and then scaling them by a certain amount and making sure every file that was using the specific lamp post material is updated to use a new material in a different directory. For a normal artist, this would mean hours of tedious work. For those that are more technical, though, this task could simply be solved by writing a simple script that completes the desired commands instantly for the artist, in a short amount of time. The planning is where the time is spent but the actual work is very little and will take less time and effort in the long run. Most artists will chose what they know rather than learning to be more technical, and from an artists perspective--they are too busy learning new tools like Zbrush and dDo to make the art look more convincing for next-gen capable hardware.

For designers, knowing programming is a lot more essential, as the premise behind creating systems or events is more logical. Many modern engines, like UDK/Unreal, contain visual scripting packages which make scripting for designers much easier and faster. The issue is that these systems are limited and the designer is not able to create pure freedom in their designs. They will ultimately require help from a programmer who can make a new mechanic or gameplay feature possible for them. If they took the time to learn U-Script, though, they would be able to create their own custom functions that would be accessible right from the vis-script editor. I know, because I have toyed around with this myself for the Unreal Editor but did not get very far as I was losing time from focusing on my artwork. Each time you do something your brain becomes more used to it and it is more familiar and easier the next time, though, so as long as designers are practicing their coding skills they will eventually be able to expand their own arsenal of design tricks. For older game engines, they require heavy coding such as using LUA. I worked for Disney in the past and the whole design team was always writing lots of text all day. This was different from what I expected, but they had to make the tools let them do things that the tools were not originally built for. Also, the tools were pretty simple and did not have a bunch of pre-built packages like visual scripting. So, the more a designer knows about programming, the more polished their ideas will be from conception in their head to execution in game. It is like a race car driver knowing about car mechanics. If you take a driver who does not know about mechanics, they will have to pay a mechanic to do work to their car and be limited by time and cash and also may not know what will effect their driving the best. The driver who knows about mechanics, though, will be able to tune their car to exactly what they want and be able to drive the hell out of it and the more they do each, the better they become at both because the skills compliment each other and accelerate the progression of their talent.

The biggest complaint I've heard from programmers is that designers tend to ask for too much and not consider the repercussions that a somewhat innocent idea will have on the entire project. Designers like to not be limited and want to force the programmers what to do, but programmers only have so much time and at the end of the day a designer must choose what is the most feasible rather than what may be the coolest or most interesting design. A lot of time will be spent from the designer and programmer communicating back and forth as to the best way to implement a certain feature or gameplay idea, but it may not result in what the designer originally had hoped for. So, it is definitely best if designers know programming and I suggest that all developers know their share--from artists to sound designers. The more technical everyone becomes, the more plausible a game will become and won't end up being a disaster or a water-down version of the original vision. Programming is the future and we should all know it anyway, so why not sooner rather than later?

-Ken

7 Tips For Young Graduates Starting Their First "Real" Job

An interesting top is knowing how much different a real job is compared to an internship or school. What worked in school may not necessarily work in an actual professional role, and an internship may be a stepping stone to realizing the discipline and organization level that is required in a real job, but it is still like riding a bike with training wheels. I just read an article recently on Glassdoor on this topic, and I wanted to share some key points that I agree with and that I think may have not been covered in that article.

1. College may have been a faster-paced work environment than you're used to, but it wasn't as much of life-changing experience as a real job. In college, you can still go out with your friends and skip a certain class or be late on a project if you want to.  In a real job, you won't be able to be going out to movies every day or sleep in late. You will be on a strict schedule and will, at many times, have to sacrifice your personal life for long hours working to finish a deadline. This is why it is good to start making friends with other professionals or people who have real careers, as they will understand how busy your schedule is and choose activities that will work around your schedule.
2. Nearly every studio has it's own tools and game editor. This is troublesome when most of the time you've spent in college was using the Unreal/UDK editor or Unity or some other popular and streamline toolset. There are many bad and convoluted and archaic editors that some studios still prefer to use, because it is cheaper for them to develop them in-house and programmers prefer having ownership and knowing the tools better than having to learn one of the other mainstream packages. So, much of your time in a new video game job will be learning to troubleshoot issues and how to access features that you know are in other packages. Your workflow may have been catered around a specific set of features that will not exist in a proprietary toolset, so you will have to change your work practice drastically and learn new hotkeys and methods to do your work. It is basically reinventing the wheel.
3. There is not as much pressure to please your professor like their is to perform well for your boss/lead, so you probably didn't have your professor constantly telling you to finish your work or making sure you knew when you made a mistake. You have to expect this from a boss, especially if you haven't work an "real" job before (meaning service industries like a grocery or technology store). The best way to deal with this is to double and triple-check your work, even if it takes a little bit longer to turn in. It will look better in the long run that you didn't have to be corrected every time and your work has a reputation of being clean. One of the worst things you can do in a big AAA development project is breaking a build. If your check-in is so bad that it prevents other developers from doing their work, then it costs the studio a lot of money and makes those people unhappy and you will be put on high alert and will probably be given less important tasks until you can prove that you won't break another build in the future.
4. When you enter a full time job the intensity of working is cranked up about three levels. The work is faster, you have to learn skills that you probably didn't even consider as part of your job description, and everything you do is put on a time limit. This means that prioritization and problem solving are two of the biggest requirements of your daily routine. Problem solving is more important than being creative, since the people who are more veteran and the leadership is usually in charge of coming up with the ideas, and most of the time you will be solving problems with tools or making sure a quest is not broken with the latest code check-in or that the existing art isn't over the memory budget, etc. You want to add your creativity when you see a solution when others don't, but you shouldn't be opinionated and trying to run the show at meetings or complaining about aspects of the game that you don't like openly. The general rule is to provide solutions, not complaints.
5. Get ready to take full responsibility for your work. You can't use the excuse of "I don't know how to do this" as frequently as when a student or intern. People understand if you don't know how to use the tools, but if it is an essential skill that you should know (like Zbrush for an artist or scripting for a designer) then you should be researching online yourself to find out the solution. It's great that a lot of information is free or even on Youtube now, so leverage this and learn things that you know you're weak at. This will look even better upon you because those around you will think that you've known the skill the whole time rather than having to learn it on the spot. Also, this is a good example why developers should be doing practice work at home, because you have a lot of time to fail and use trial-and-error, that way you can sharpen your sword and be prepared with heightened-efficiency at work.
6. You have to take initiative in order to meet people. In school, there are introduction classes and team projects when you are encouraged to work with others. In a big studio, there are tons of busy people with their heads down and comfortable doing their job the way they have without interruption. You have to introduce yourself or find a common ground with them or invite them to lunch. This means that you have to be more social than you have been in your life. If not, you will easily be ignored and eventually when you find yourself jobless you won't have a very big network to leverage or use for inside job information.
7. You can't pick your boss or the people you work with. Additionally, if you talk badly about someone it may mean trouble for you and also affect your career or the amount of opportunity you have. In school, if you didn't like a professor you could easily pick a new one for the new semester. If you didn't like a classmate, you could just avoid and not talk to them. In a professional environment, you have to be able to get along with anyone, no matter how annoying or demanding you think they are. You can pick a different place to work, but this is complicated and will take a lot more time than waiting for a new semester to roll around, so you should not be complaining about people and just deal with your boss. Your boss will be used as your first reference when seeking a new job, so you want a good review or it will be difficult to keep momentum in your career. This is why "butt-kissing" is so effective, and you may not necessarily agree with this style of working, as I don't either, but you should still be friendly and pleasant around your boss instead of demanding and hard to deal with.

I could probably add many more points here but I think that this is a good amount for now. I hope that is helpful and make sure check out this article also:

http://www.glassdoor.com/blog/10-tips-young-professionals-starting-real-job/

-Ken

Producer Advice from Blizzard Entertainment

There was an article released recently on Gamasutra about the anatomy of a good video game Producer. Although I don't know much about production myself, I have found this article to be very informative and have learned a lot from it. I figured I'd share it with all of you so that those that are aspiring to be, or are actively working as, a producer will gain some useful tips.

Here are some key points I've taken away from Ernst ten Bosch (the producer at Blizzard):

• Producers should know the actual process that their team members undergo in order to better understand the amount of time it will take to impact the project and to know when an idea is outlandish and needs to be prevented from becoming a production task in order to save unnecessary work by the developers. This means that they should understand what works with design or art in order to schedule tasks and make projections of how long a particular new workflow will impact the entire scope of the project.
• They are forward thinkers: they must be able to see the big picture when the rest of the developers are focused on their current tasks at hand. This means knowing which are the most important tasks and being able to prioritize them and reminding everyone what they should be working on.
• They are social: you can't be shy as a producer, and you must know how to run meetings and round up people to get everyone on the same plane as far as viewpoints or making sure key players are all in attendance for important decisions to be made.
• They must take notes in a professional manor in order to present them to the publishers and have them easily understandable. There can't be any personalized notes or similar as it would just be confusing to clients.
• Producers should be actively be looking for ways to improve the project. I find this the most important, as the article even states that a production job is such that it is intangible and not able to be tracked like the other disciplines. Therefore, a producer can survive for a while by being lazy but it won't help anyone else or the project in general. If a producer is keeping in the loop and being able to find the best person for each task and not just mindlessly taking notes, they will be able to make the entire process more efficient. This, in essence, is the necessity of a producer in the first place.

I hope all of you fellow producers and aspiring producers will be inspired by this information!

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/ErnstTenBosch/20130919/200659/What_Makes_a_Good_Game_Producer_Part_2.php

-Ken

What Not To Do When You Get Hired in Video Games: Jumping Ship Early

A recent story that I thought you would like is about an ex-coworker of mine. They were hired at the same time as me for the current studio I work for as a contractor. The contract was for nine months and there was possibility of extension although no guarantees (like with most contract positions).  This person decided that they would leave the studio for another contract/temporary position at a former studio that had wanted them back. This story sounds usual, although the person left merely one month, or a little longer, after being hired. They gave three weeks notice to their current employer, which means they must have only been working for a week or so before they had to give their lead the news.

I have seen people leave studios pretty early before--especially for contract and temporary positions--but the previous record holder that I had witnessed left after three months. I suppose that this could end up being a good move for the employee, as they went to work on a studio for the Halo franchise at a well known studio. Their stated reason for leaving was because the opportunity for contract extension seemed likelier there. This was a political and proper response indeed, as I'm sure they liked the Halo project better and were already used to the production pipeline. It would have only made them look bad if they gave away too much information like saying that the current studio did not give them cool enough tasks to work on or that they didn't see as much opportunity for promotion, etc.

So, the person technically upgraded their resume although they have burned a bridge at the studio they quickly left. I don't know if I would make this maneuver personally, but also have never been presented with it. With jobs increasingly becoming temporary it seems more understandable, but I would still like to see what contacts and performance history I could develop at my current studio. I asked a senior employee on the person's team what they thought about the employee leaving. He said that the person won't be hired here again, because now he has a track record for being a jumper and there is a high possibility that he will do it again when hired ("jumper"=jumping ship). This will most likely make it difficult, by raising a red flag, for any future job search they have after they leave their latest studio. So, it may end up being a hindrance in the long run. It is very high risk tactic, high reward tactic (although the reward is not really proven unless they are hired full time eventually). I would recommend against this strategy. If you get hired in the game industry, know that your reputation will follow you everywhere, so make sure to guard it and groom it endlessly.

-Ken

Proof that Living in the Best Locations is Best for Your Career

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

Avoid the Trap of Negative Questions During an Interview

As a commenter has pointed out in an article about common mistakes made during an interview, interviews have increasingly become psychological and try to gauge how your personality can handle an intense situation rather than trying to find out your job qualifications and if you can do the job. Like it or not, folks, the main interest in the business world, where most projects are team-oriented, is how nicely you can play with others. The managers want an easy time themselves and don't want to be fighting fires from people with bad attitudes or rumor-spreaders. There are more important things to focus on, but if people are having a bad day or are at ends with another employee, it throws a wrench in the entire process and is unnecessary hardship when the game projects themselves are complicated enough. Most online websites will have you practice the same questions over and over again, but most do not prepare you for the unexpected and "curve-ball" questions that many employers actually prefer. They will try and set you up for failure, and expect you to escape tastefully.
A common example of a tough question is "tell me what you thought went wrong at your last studio/what you didn't like about your last studio." Like it or not, the interviewer does not expect this question to be answered. The best response to something like this is a direct: "I prefer not to speak badly about my last studio." If they try to act like your friend and say something like "come on, you must have something that you didn't like. You can tell me." Bull! They will constantly try and diffuse you to make it seem like it is not serious to speak honestly but they are looking for people who won't. Reiterate and say "I told you already, I am not going to speak negatively about my last studio." You would even benefit from adding something positive like "I learned a lot from that studio and I enjoyed the people I worked with and we worked our hardest to deliver the best product/game that we could." Your new potential employer will be impressed that you defend your last studio and are not easy to find the flaws in the new studio. They are really looking for someone who will not ruin their reputation or will be a complainer that will lower everyone else's moral.
Once you are at the studio, you will find that the same people that interviewed you will be quite open when they have something unpleasant to say about the studio, because they are already hired and know they are "safe." I believe in not complaining in general, unless you constructively see a problem and you are willing to fix it. I know, it sucks and it's unfair that employees feel that they won't be hired if they are not open, but some questions are expected to be dodged in a polite manner. Think of politicians: they are paid to escape tricky questions and to spin all details into a more positive outlook.
The employer mainly wants to see that you can handle these types of questions and know that sometimes it is better to not answer something than to be open about it. They are mainly looking for someone who can grow and who is pleasant to work with. These days, with large teams, and so much competition, there are a lot of people that can do the type of job you do. So, know that your personality will be closely scrutinized and you have to put on your Sunday's best for these people.
I've seen people drastically change once they are hired somewhere because they know how to play this game and can get jobs left and right but then always get fired or don't go very far in their current role. They are making it hard for everyone else who may be able to do a better job than them. You have to be realistic and know that this happens, though, and that you can't beat them bust must join them in being able to make yourself look as good as possible during an interview (this does not mean lying about your skills).
For me, it is difficult to not be truthful but I have found that sometimes keeping my mouth closed is better than revealing too much. Try it sometime: see how people don't have a problem if you don't say a lot when they ask you questions. Do this with new acquaintances to see if they like you or not: and I assure you that the whole conversation will go better if you don't say that one thing on your mind that you feel is really true but you know isn't the most acceptable.

Here is the article, but know that the questions you should be ready for in the interview are not the common ones that everyone expects: http://www.glassdoor.com/blog/6-mistakes-job-interview/

-Ken

P.S. I am convinced that the more difficult your job description and requirements, then consequently there is less competition and thus less difficult questions being asked during interviews. So, if you are an artist or programmer--where there is tons of other people who want your job--then you have to master how to interview...think of yourself as a newscaster or someone giving a demo at a conference. Also, this might not be said anywhere else but I went down the negative path on a question in an interview in the past and I caught myself in the middle. Since I was already revealing a lot, I figured I might as well stay consistent and keep answering the negative question. You will find out, though, that once you light a spark the interviewer will keep wanting to give you fuel to see how far you can take a negative comment. So, if you do find yourself answering something that you shouldn't have in the first place, take charge and show them that you still have power as an interviewee--by not finishing the answer. Say something like: "I don't like where this is going and I would prefer not to continue talking about that subject. I feel that this is not relevant to this interview and would like to get to more objective issues. This would also subtly tell them that you don't want to be harassed anymore with those exploitative questions. Make sure to do this politely and don't raise your voice or use too much emphasis in your wording.