Submitted by Alexandria Ducksworth
YouTube gamers and eSports competitors have been making a fortune creating careers out of their hobbies. Can you?
Perhaps, you’re more interested in game creation. There are many ways you can get a video game career:
1. Video Game Artist/Animators
Are you an avid gamer with an extensive art portfolio fit for the next virtual world? Video game companies need you!
But first, many gaming companies require you to know how to use software such as Maya, Adobe Photoshop, and ToonBoom. There are many artists and animator jobs you can apply: character modeler, concept artist, weapon artist, 2D/3D artist, and environment artist.
Artist Samwise Didier became the artistic director for Blizzard Entertainment. Many of his works include the games World of Warcraft, Warcraft III, and Heroes of the Storm.
2. Video Game Programmer
Alexey Pajitnov was the programmer behind Tetris. He created code (computer instructions) to make the game tiles move, switch places, and disappear. To be a programmer, you must gain knowledge in Java or C++. Programmers code what animations are supposed to do. If not, the entire game would be all over the place!
3. Video Game Tester
A video game tester’s job is serious business. It’s all not fun and glamorous playing video games all day. Testers look out for any bugs in developing games. If they find any glitches, they send issue reports to programmers to fix it.
Nobody wants to play a faulty game. Video game testers make sure games are high quality before they hit the shelves.
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Are you ready to start gaming career now? You can find jobs through our digital resources: Reference USA and Job and Career Accelerator.
You can upgrade your drawing, programming, and animation skills in Lynda. All you need is a library card to get started!
Book recommendations:
– Career Launcher: Video Games by Lisa McCoy
– Careers for Tech Girls in Video Game Development by Laurie LaBella
– The Crazy Careers of Video Game Designers by Arie Kaplan
– Drawing Basics and Video Game Art by Chris Solarski
– How to Become a Video Game Artist by Sam Kennedy
– So You Want to Be a Coder? By J.M. Bedell
– Video Game: Design and Code Your Own Adventures by Kathy Ceceri