List of Jobs You Can Get In The Gaming Industry

The gaming industry has developed from a small community of people into a large pop culture sensation in the past 20 years. People have been playing video games more than ever, especially during 2020, as quarantine has cornered everyone inside of their homes. While other industries such as films and sports have been crippling, the gaming industry is booming. As vast as the industry is, there is an even greater number of jobs that you can find in this industry. Here are some of the jobs available in the gaming industry that you can start your career in. We will be dividing this article into two parts, jobs directly related to game development, and jobs that are related to games but not the development.

Part 1: JOBS RELATED TO GAME DEVELOPMENT

Game Designer

Game designing is a dream job for anyone working in the gaming industry. These people are those in control of the projects. Their gameplay ideas and storylines are what make the games so interesting. Because of their vision when it comes to games, they are usually the leads on such projects. They are in charge of collecting all the pieces from the artists, the sound design team, programmers, motion capture studios, and everything else that is needed for the project. Game designers often do jobs such as game director, lead designer, and level designer. So, if you ever find yourself struggling to pass a level in a game, these are the people to blame.

Animators

Animators have the tall task of bringing to life characters and worlds that are featured in the game. With animations needed for characters to walk, talk, run-and-gun, environmental factors such as trees moving in the wind, and special effects such as explosions and fires and water simulation, these animators are designed to do it all.

Artists

Artists have the main job of putting the game designers’ vision on display for the animators to begin their work. These artists design the way the world should look and feel, they choose the colors and the shapes of its trees, the way the main characters in a game should look, and how the side characters should look as well as the non-player characters. You can thank the artists for designing your favorite cosmetics.

Software Developers and Programmers

These developers and programmers are in charge of the health and polishing of the game, they are meant to design specific software and programs that encompass a neural network of codes that convert the game’s gameplay designs and animations into instructions that the video game systems can read. Basically, they make sure the game runs the way it’s supposed to. If they fail, you will experience a lot of glitches.

Writers

Writers in the gaming industry are some of the most influential, especially in certain genres of video games that focus more on individual stories. Games such as The Witcher 3 and Detroit Become Human have some of the most complex narratives branching and being formed by player decision making. Writers create these immaculately in-depth scripts and bring the character’s personality to life. There are many writing jobs in the industry such as Narrative Lead, Lead Quest Designer, and Story Writer, etc.

Game Testers

Video Games Testers usually work for the QA (Quality Assurance) department of a game company; these people have the pivotal jobs of playtesting video games to flush out any bugs and discrepancies within the game, along with any game breaks or just visual glitches. These people playtest the game and make sure the game is good to go for the final release.

Part:2 JOBS IN THE INDUSTRY, UNRELATED TO GAME DEVELOPMENT

MARKETING MANAGERS

Marketing managers are the team that coordinates the video game developers and publishers' marketing activities. They design the advertisements and strategies to sell the game to potential buyers. These are the people responsible for getting you in front of an ad for their game.

Market Research Analysts

People with this designation will design surveys that they will use to interact with people, in order to determine what kind of game customers prefer at any given moment. These people are important when it comes to releasing new games especially when it comes to multiplayer games. For example, the Battle Royale genre was voted the most popular type of game in surveys. As a result, there are hundreds of games in the genre and they are still being developed to this day.

Sales Representatives

Sales representatives represent the games to retailers and wholesalers. Sometimes sales representatives are hired to sell the developers’ games to potential publishing studios that might be interested in buying the intellectual property and dish out more sequels as well as sponsor the marketing cost. Sales representatives require extensive knowledge of the games that they represent as well as the developers, publishers, and the gaming industry in general. These people put games on the shelves in stores or online.

Streamers/Content Creators

Streamers and content creators are people that play video games on different platforms such as Twitch, YouTube, Facebook, and others. These people entertain hundreds and even thousands of people with their content that they gain from playing video games. Most content creators prefer to play multiplayer video games where they flaunt their skills with other players or content creators. Some prefer making funny moments videos or compilations of their favorite moments from single-player games. Aside from this, they also engage in speaking to their viewers with live chats. This allows them to interact with their audience while they are playing games.

Game Journalists

Gaming journalists are people, who are responsible for reviewing games and criticizing them if necessary. Game journalists usually work for big companies such as IGN, Gamespot, Kotaku, Rock Paper Shotgun, and GamesRadar+, etc. These people often have degrees in journalism but that isn’t required to start your career in this profession. They are entertainment journalists that write about the hottest news in the gaming industry. They also write how-to articles and game reviews, etc.

Conclusion

These are some of the many jobs that you could definitely make a career out of in the video game industry. With games becoming widespread modes of entertainment and the gaming industry booming the way it is, these career choices are bound to make for great careers for people who are interested!