Hi! To what extend are people working remotely in the gaming industry? – Also in your experience, which job platforms are mostly used for either a desk or remote job in this industry? – Once again, many thanks for what you are doing to this community.
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Under COVID, remote work has exploded. I don't have access to any specific statistics, but almost everyone I know is working remote right now. Here's an article from this summer talking about it: https://venturebeat.com/2020/06/12/how-the-pandemic-has-transformed-work-in-the-...
What I do know, is that many people are already expressing a desire to continue doing remote work after the pandemic is over. Some want to be 100% remote and others want a healthy mixture so they can still spend time with their coworkers. (Personally, I wanted to be 100% remote LOOOOONG before COVID happened.)
Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean by "job platforms". Do you mean which positions work remote (ie: do coders work remote and sound designers work in studio)? Are you asking what remote software people use on the job (ie: Slack, Zoom, Discord)? Or did you mean something else?
Ah! I recommend starting with Gamasutra.com, it's the main go-to for devs to keep up on industry-related stuff.
Beyond that, I'll be completely honest. There are two main ways devs are hired these days: Friends and LinkedIn.
Surveys have shown time and time again that most industry jobs go to those who already know someone inside the company.
The other way most devs get a job is by having recruiters reach out to them over LinkedIn. Sadly, the best time to get a job is when you already have one. Most recruiters would rather "snipe" a currently employed person from another studio than take a chance on an outsider or someone who is currently unemployed...even when it is clearly not their fault (eg: layoffs).
So if you want to get a job as a game dev, hang out with game devs and build up a great online profile.
As a side-note: This is actually one of the issues that significantly contributes to women facing the aptly-named "motherhood penalty" that is part of the gender wage-gap. Women are often situationally pushed into taking a break from their careers when they have kids. If that necessary break lasts longer than their maternity leave (assuming they have any), it means becoming "voluntarily" unemployed - which makes them less attractive to future recruiters and hiring managers. And that's before taking into account the persistent stereotypes that moms are too distracted to be good/competitive employees or the fact that I have seen hiring managers both suddenly end a female employee's contract after hearing she is pregnant and refuse to even interview a potential hire they knew was pregnant. [/rant]
Like most professional devs, I'm not well-known, so it isn't a big reveal.
Had I seen your question earlier today, I might have said, "Sure, I'm so-and-so". Unfortunately, I read today that a major game company just fired an employee who was harassed online for not being a stereotypical "cis-hetero-white-male-under-40" (CHWM<40). The claim is that the company fired them "for their own protection" against the harassment. Whether or not that is the real reason the person was let go, the fact that the online harassment occurred is not in dispute. As a fellow non-CHWM<40, I'm feeling reluctant to be open about my identity in online spaces right now.