Bethesda Roundtable: Getting Into Game Development

Recently the team at Arkane Austin sat down with a handful of LGBTQIA+ students and scholarship recipients selected by the Gay Gaming Professionals (GGP) organization for a special roundtable discussion.

During the conversation, the participants covered everything from getting into the games industry, the importance of finding a mentor, and what the team at Arkane Austin looks for in new team members. Read on for some highlights.

Learn more about the Gay Gaming Professionals and how you can get involved here. Interested in joining the team at Arkane Austin? See all open positions here!

Getting Started

Geneva Heyward (GGP – Senior at New York University studying Game Design): What was your first game dev job and what was it like getting that first job?

Robin Todd (Senior Producer): I went to Texas A&M and got my degree in computer science and I was intending to get my master’s at UT. I applied and was accepted, but I realized I had to actually pay my tuition, so I ended up looking for a summer job.

Back in the day I played Ultima, and development for that was ongoing here in Austin at a company called Origin. I thought maybe I could call them up, see if I could get myself into some kind of summer internship position and then prove to myself that I’m useful. Then I could go to college and work there half-time. The catch with that was during the interviews they were asking me questions about C++, which I had never programmed in. I had to make up a lot of my answers on the fly, and somehow I actually got hired to work on Wing Commander 3! Then it turns out the person who had vacated my office left an old Turbo C++ book there, so I taught myself C++ on the job.

Then at a certain point I was just like, “This is what I really want to do.” I got to take my love of narrative and my engineering background and apply them both to my job, and I never ended up going back to college. I can see Heem laughing at me, faking my way through a C++ interview…

Heem Patel (AI Engineer): It’s actually funny because I have a very similar story for my first job. I mean, I didn’t fake my way through a C++ interview…

One year into my master’s, I was looking for internships. I wasn’t getting anywhere and I was just sending out mass resumes at that point. Then I got a call back from this small studio in Troy, New York, that used to work on games for Leapfrog. They set up an interview and I swear, I failed that interview. Like, the super basic questions, I absolutely got it wrong. But they gave me an offer. It was a super small studio and I’m actually still best friends with the person who interviewed me, and he was also my mentor at that point.

Once I started working there, I kind of realized how much I didn’t know or how many assumptions I made in college when I was working on projects. It was really eye-opening and that internship really helped me figure out what I needed to do to make myself properly industry-ready.

Honestly, having that person as a mentor was incredibly useful. Any basic question I had I could ask him without worrying about being judged. I never had to worry that he was going to say “Oh this person is so bad. He doesn’t know this?” Personally, I believe there are no bad questions and anything anyone asks me is a great learning opportunity.

Finding someone like my mentor is so incredibly important. At the end of my internship, I asked him why he hired me. He knew my interview was crap. His response stuck with me. He said “You felt like someone we could go have a drink with. Someone we could mentor.” At the end of the day, when it’s your first job, that’s the kind of person you want to be. You want to be willing to learn and grow and be mentored. Having an ego and thinking you know better just acts as a roadblock.

Karen Segars (Art Director): For my first job in the industry, I moved to Austin and started attending all types of industry events to meet people. Getting your face in front of people can often be just a step better than just your resume going across someone’s desk. Just a side point that is super important, be friends with all of the other students you’re currently studying with, because that first job I got I ran into a friend of mine from college. He was a year ahead of me. We met at an Autodesk event and he said the company he worked for was hiring, and that’s how I got into this place called Acclaim and I was so excited. I was incredibly positive. When they didn’t have stuff for me to work on I was immediately reaching out, seeing where I could help elsewhere.

I didn’t understand why so many people I worked with were negative, and six weeks later the company folded. Although at the time I was a little devastated, it was my positive attitude and my excitement to be there and be part of the team that from that point forward, the people that I met at that company helped me get my next job, which helped me get my next job, which helped me get my next job. That was truly the start of my career in the industry. I just loved being part of it. Just being authentic and excited and caring about the project you’re working on and being fun to work with, man… that goes an incredibly long way.

Kelly Ferry (Lead Campaign Designer): I actually started in high school. I always knew I wanted to make games and I love writing. But I just took the first internship I could get in New York. I was just an office assistant, but I was so excited to be around developers that I was idolizing. We were making mobile and social games for way back. I’m talking like Jojo’s Fashion Show.

From there I just took every kind of little internship I could up until college where I double majored in writing and game studies. Eventually I ended up getting my first full-time gig by entering a competition to be a designer, and somehow, I won that. From there, it’s like Karen said. You get to know people, you land a job, you work with people, you meet other people that are in their networks, you make friends, you prove what you’ve got, and then it just keeps going. That circle gets bigger and bigger. So don’t ever burn your bridges and do your best all the time.

Making Your Way

Emma Reynolds (Senior at University of Southern California studying Cognitive Science and Consumer Behavior): How did you all choose the paths that you’re currently on? How did you figure out what you wanted to specialize in?

Heem Patel: I knew I was going to get into video games, I just didn’t know what I would be doing. I liked programming, so that was kind of an obvious choice, but I dabbled in everything. I learned 3ds Max. I actually did a six-month course on 3ds Max in my master’s program. But I didn’t want to be a tech artists, and I kind of wanted to be involved in game design, so I thought maybe gameplay programming would be a good fit. Then I learned that gameplay programming is extremely fun, and that just seemed like where I wanted to be.

Karen Segars: I was always into art, and when I was little I watched this show called “Movie Magic” with my dad. Back then it was kind of more about animatronics, and I didn’t necessarily want to go into the robotics part, but I wanted to do the sculpting and the artistic application to those robotics, to kind of see these creatures come to life.

As I was getting to college age, that’s when things like Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 and 3D graphics were starting to hit, so my parents encouraged me to look into 3D colleges. I got a degree in computer animation. Anyway my sister had moved to Austin and she discovered quickly that there was a pretty decent video game industry here, so I moved here and that’s kind of the end of the story. I hit the ground running and it was the environment art that drew me in.

Robin Todd: My career has been kind of weird. When I’ve gone into interviews I’ve always told people I come from a background where I’ve got engineering experience and narrative experience and now I have production experience. When I started off, I really wanted to be a programmer, but I was also fascinated by stories. I had gotten into anime at an early age, and once I figured out that I couldn’t draw, storytelling became the next thing. So when I worked on Wing Commander 3 and they put me in charge of game flow, I was pretty much the person who was writing this whole system that took the player’s choices and extrapolated them to what happened throughout the rest of the game.

And that felt really great to me. From there, I started my own company, and as happens a lot of times, we were able to develop for two years and then our publisher went out of business. So I spent some time doing contract writing for Deus Ex and some other games like Freelancer, and I kind of came to this point where I was like, “Do I really want to go back into programming?” After a lot of debate, I decided to switch over to production, and the first production job I had was at BioWare on Star Wars: The Old Republic.

And I won’t lie, it was a difficult transition for me, but at this point in time I feel like I’ve really found my profession. I’ve found my home. This has been really the best job I’ve ever had, just for the fact that I’m now in a position where I can use all of my different skills. As a producer, while you may not have as much knowledge in one particular area, you do see a lot more of the larger project.

I do feel at this point that, despite all the difficulties and hard decisions, I found myself in the career that I think brings me the most happiness and that I’m the most suited for.

Kelly Ferry: I’m a very big storyteller. I love writing stories. I love to publish books. I like to publish D&D modules. I run so many D&D games. It’s, like, a problem. I knew that I always wanted to tell stories in games and have some kind of level of control over the flow of it. So for me it was a choice between game design and narrative design.

But my first break ended up being in game design and I did writing on the side, so I got to have the best of both. I did eventually at a previous studio transition to being a narrative designer and I was writing their story for a bit, but I realized I loved the design aspect of it more because as a designer you are dabbling in all of the things. You’re part artist, part writer, part modeler. You have to think about all of the aspects that build these environments, and to me, that was the fulfilling part. Being able to have an understanding of everything that went into our missions, our stories, our games, our characters. So I didn’t limit myself to writing because I could do a lot of it as a designer, and for me that was kind of my calling.

What Does Arkane Look for in New Hires?

Morgan Hamilton (Senior at Rochester Institute of Technology studying 3D Digital Design and Creative Writing): Are there any particular skills or motivations or passions any of you would like to see in a new junior employee?

Kelly Ferry: Heem had an amazing point earlier when he told his story about allowing yourself to be mentored. When I look at the people I want to work with, I care that they have the instincts and the enthusiasm. I don’t need you to know everything. That can be taught. I learned half of what I know by being throwing into the water and having the people around saying, “Go ahead, swim.” People will work with you. They will teach you. I want to see you succeed and help you learn. So it’s just the enthusiasm and the passion for the job and the personality that will make you a good teammate.

Karen Segars: I want to build on what Kelly said. You know, as you start to interview and go out, care about the company that you’re doing your interview with. Know information about the studio you’re speaking to. One thing that I always appreciate… Yeah, you can get a task done and you can put your headphones on and get work done, but actually get to know the game you’re working on. Play the game. You can make your prop and contribute your thing, but it’s important to actually understand the game and be involved in playing it. We really encourage people to play test all the time.

Harvey [Smith, Studio/Creative Director] and Ricardo [Bare, Creative Director] and several of us play along, too, twice a week. We’re watching because we care about the players’ final experience, so you should too. It’s all about collaboration and caring about a project and the team you’re working with. I look for someone who actually wants to be a part of this team. Not just “A recruiter told me about this job so I applied.” That’s fair, but it’s not necessarily what I want to hear.

Robin Todd: I will echo what Karen and Kelly have said. Technology, design… all of those things can be taught. The biggest things I look for are enthusiasm and passion for what people are doing and what they’re about, and I’m also looking for people who want to work with other people. People who want to reach out and communicate and build something communally. I completely value people who are willing to engage in the give-and-take of communicating with the rest of the team on a daily basis.

Harvey Smith (Studio/Creative Director): I definitely agree with all of those answers. It’s important to find people with good team skills. People who build others up instead of tearing them down. Who offer criticism, but do it in a way that makes you feel good about your work and where you’re at. That stuff is just so vital.

I love when people come in and I can just tell they’ll be good teammates. I can risk doing something dumb or making a mistake because they’ve got my back and they’re going to help me course-correct without making me feel like a fool.

I also always tell people that if you come talk to me, I assume you’re already a good programmer, or a good artist, or a good level designer, or whatever you are. But what I want to see is that you’re broader than that. I think the thing you can actually do to really help is broadening your horizons. Maybe you like dance or architecture; or you spent a summer traveling in Asia; or you cook on the side; or you lift weights and you know all about Olympic weightlifting; or maybe you carve little wooden figures on the weekend. Having other interests so you can come to the team with new perspectives.

On a final note, I hope you want to do meaningful work. I hope you don’t just see it as a job. We make games that people still talk about 10 years later, and I’m not bragging about that. I’m just saying because sometimes I’ve fallen on my face. I’ve gotten fired before for making bad games, but I’ve also made games that people are still talking about, and it’s so meaningful to them and to me. So you should aspire to make meaningful work.