I see everyone posting about getting into the game industry and I just wanna call out one thing that I want everyone to remember, and that is that you are in the games industry the moment you are in the company - no matter the team. Non game dev is still in the games industry.

So give folks advice on getting into the company. Not getting into a company and then getting a job that THEN puts you in game dev. Because imo the first hurdle is just getting IN. Once you're in you can often navigate the networks to get to your goal.

AND. If you're goal isn't to be on dev omg that's OK. Being in the industry for 15 years the number of times I was asked "but don't you wanna be on dev" for so frustrating. This idea that one can't possibly be happy not working directly on a game team. That's not for everyone!

The people supporting video games work just as hard as the people making them. I will shout this at everyone as often as I can. When shits broken it's not just the dev team working to fix it. The community and PR teams are staying up with them, working on messaging,-

Updating regional teams, players, LEADERSHIP, all while the devs focus on fixing shit. That is all just as much of the experience for players.

I remember the time ranked was down for 36 hours and how I had to sleep with my phone on my chest so that every hour I could get an update if it was fixed or not, and having to send a note to the regions with either post 'WE GOOD' or 'not yet' but the community doesn't see that

Anyways now I'm going off I just have a lot of FEELINGS ok

Maybe it's a little lingering ptsd from two years ago when there were people who actually said "well it wasn't game dev laid off at least" while I sat under my desk crying

OH HELLO everyone hi uh i guess i should also say that if i had any advice on getting into the game industry based on my own experience it's [1] get a foot in the door however you can [2] establish a network of people throughout the company [3] be open about your career goals

I'd like to extra caveat this that I got into the industry *right* out of college, summer after I graduated. So my options for how to get into the industry were limited, plus the games industry wasn't my intended career path, I honestly just needed a job while i figured shit out