" Hey Chris, could you tell me what type of degree you had to get into this type of career, and what company it is you work for? A friend of mine is wanting to get into video game design, and would love this info."
I get this question pretty regularly so I figured I'd blog my response for others to read.
I have been at Epic Games since 2005. You can read the story about getting my Stormtrooper foot in the door below, or at TK409.com
In my experience, there are three different kinds of people who make games: Designers, Artists, and Programmers. Everyone wants to be a designer, each company has very few. Epic only has about 2 or 3 designers. These are the people who come up with the ideas for gameplay. They can be from either the Artist or Programmer background, it doesn't matter - what matters is only that they consistently have ideas to make better games. They've usually been around a while, are well known in the company for past accomplishments, etc. It's typically a position you work up toward. What your friend needs to decide first is whether he wants to start as an artist or a programmer, which are two very different crowds.
I'm an artist. I actually majored in graphic design, and eventually found a spot at Epic as a graphic designer, an artist who designs heads-up displays, user interfaces, game environment pieces like posters, holograms, etc. I've since added texture artist and prop designer to my duties. Something I absolutely love. Other artists at Epic went to standard art school and studied all kinds of digital art: 3d modeling, animation, effects, etc.
We have regular playtests where you play the games and find bugs, figure out what is fun, what's not, and what could be better. Being outspoken with good gameplay ideas or improvements in these playtests will get you invited to more playtests and establish your reputation. The way to develop this strength is to be an avid gamer. Play all types of games and bring ideas from a wide range of experience. Things like, "I liked how Unreal Tournament had an alternate fire on the rocket launcher that shot three spinning rockets. Maybe we could do that with a cannon mounted on a vehicle and when they hit a rock face, the rockets drill a spiral tunnel into the building where you can drive the jeep through."
If you're lucky enough to get a job at a studio like Epic, you'll be asked to share your ideas for new games that your studio will be creating in the future. I've done this and it was a lot of fun. Basically, simplify your game idea to an "elevator pitch". In other words, imagine you're in an elevator with CliffyB and he asks what kind of game you'd like to see. You should be able to articulate your idea in the amount of time it takes to get between 4 floors.
1) Concept:
"It's like Gilligan's Island mixed with Flatout" or
"Gears of War mixed with Lord of the Rings" or
"It's like a zombie circus version of Portal"
2) Art Direction:
"It looks like it's set in 300AD, but with curious weapons and technology." or
"The bad guys look like armored lizard men and the good guys look like skinny skateboarders with football padding"
3) The Technology Hook
"You can deform the environment using weapons" or
"Destructable beasts can be shot apart into smaller half-animals that you can ride"
You can be a Game Designer on your own. Take a copy of the Unreal Engine (it comes with any PC version of Unreal Tournament III or Gears of War) and modify the game elements in the engine to make new games. See YouTube for an awesome Snowboard mod for UTIII. Use these to present in your portfolio. If you can do this, you're already a Game Designer, but to be one at a studio it will take a few years before you can reach actual Studio Game Designer status. It takes a lot of fun work in the trenches to get there. Personally, I love what I'm doing as an artist and enjoy any chance to share ideas.
Hope that helps!
- Chris
[Trooper TK409]
