Welcome to Large Animal Games

Posted on April 29, 2009 by Paul Teall

Big welcome to Large Animal Games (follow them on Twitter) – they posted several ads today, and pushed us over the 100 job mark! Large Animal was founded in 2001, and is located in Manhattan. They’ve published and developed a BUNCH of casual games over the years, and they show no signs of slowing. They actually just had an article written about them in the NY Times about how they get direct player feedback. Interesting stuff.

We’re also excited about getting over that 100 milestone. Since launching the updated site, we’ve seen a steady increase in both traffic and job ads. Thanks to everyone who has been using the site, we’ve got a lot of interesting things planned in the near future!

Welcome to Longtail Studios

Posted on April 22, 2009 by Paul Teall

I want to welcome Longtail Studios (follow them on Twitter) to the site, as they just published a few ads today. I have a few friends who work in their New York studio (follow producer Miguel Molinari on Twitter), so I’m excited to have them posting! They’re working on a variety of games for mobile, Facebook/web and more, and it looks like they’re looking to hire two people in the Quebec City studio.

They just finished a nice looking TNA wrestling title that’s getting solid reviews. Check out their ads!

(Re)Welcome to Black Lantern Studios

Posted on April 21, 2009 by Paul Teall

I say re-welcome, because Black Lantern had actually been using our old site. They posted two ads today on the new site, so I wanted to take this opportunity to welcome them to GameJobHunter.com. Looks like they’re hiring for a couple of positions in their St. Louis studio. They just opened in 2003, and they actually now have 2 studios – the aforementioned in St. Louis, and another one in Austin. They’ve gone from just 7 founding employees to over 60, so it looks like theirs is a nice indie success story. They’ve got a long list of Nintendo titles under their belt – GBA, DS and Wii.

Make sure and check out their ads!

Top North American Cities for Game Development – Part 2

Posted on April 18, 2009 by Paul Teall

A while back, I did a post that attempted to paint a rough picture of which cities had the most game development going on. The idea behind the list was that knowing where the studios are at = knowing where the jobs are at. It’s been several months since I put that together, so I figured I’d do a follow-up post to see how much (if at all) things had changed. Studios open and close (and occasionally relocate) all the time, so I think it’s worth examining again.

As a reminder, this isn’t a scientific research project meant to stand up to any intense critical analysis – I’m simply checking out the number of companies in each city on www.gamedevmap.com. Last time, I just clicked on each city and looked at the total number of entries. Each city seems to have several dead links or are missing a studio, so I’m doing a little internet digging of my own to figure out the city company count. It’s tough to be totally accurate, but I’m trying to get a little closer. Remember – each city includes surrounding suburbs. I’ve also decided to do the top 22 cities (thanks to a tie for 20th) this time, just because I feel like it.

Here’s the list:

20. Pittsburgh – 6
20. Orlando – 6
20. Eugene – 6
19. Phoenix – 7
18. Denver – 8
17. Minneapolis – 9
16. Salt Lake City – 11
15. Raleigh – 12
14. Atlanta – 14
11. Dallas – 17
11. Washington DC – 17
11. Montreal – 17
10. San Diego – 18
9. Toronto – 24
8. Chicago – 25
7. New York City – 30
6. Boston – 37
5. Austin – 40
4. Vancouver 45
3. Seattle – 58
2. San Francisco – 97
1. Los Angeles – 99

Local Video Game Companies – Salt Lake City

Posted on April 13, 2009 by Paul Teall

For those new to the series, here’s the standard refresher: the idea behind these profiles is to help people get a better idea what various local game scenes look like. If you know where the companies are, it makes looking for jobs that much easier.

As you can tell by the headline, I’ve decided to go with Salt Lake City as the next local profile. SLC is definitely a hub for game development – not a mega hub like Seattle, San Francisco, Vancouver, etc., but it’s no slouch.

Game Studios

7 Studios – These guys are based out of the LA area, and have worked on a bunch of movie IP. Looks like they also have a SLC office, although I don’t see it referenced on their site.
Avalanche Software – Acquired by Disney Interactive in 2005, they had previously worked on several Midway and Sega titles.
Chair Entertainment – Chair released the XBLA title Undertow, and then was acquired by Epic Games in 2008. They’re actually down the road a bit in Provo.
Eat Sleep Play – First time I’ve heard of these guys, but it looks like their team members have impressive resumes. Veterans of God of War, Twisted Metal, Calling all Cars and War of the Monsters on the team. They’ve got a 3 game deal lined up with Sony.
EA Salt Lake – Not hard to find info on EA, obviously, but I’m not seeing much about this specific location. I’m going to follow up with a few leads and see if I can get some of the deets on the studio.
Fall Line Studios – Another Disney Interactive studios, working primarily (exclusively?) on titles for Nintendo systems.
React! Games – their site says they’ve secured the rights to the classic title Archon
Sensory Sweep – They’ve done some DS and Wii work, and it looks like they’re working on an upcoming title for XBLA.
Silverlode Interactive – Founded in 2005, and it looks like they’ve put out an RTS, and MMO and have an iPhone title on the way. Also located in Orem.
Smart Bomb Interactive - They’ve developed their own internal engine, and have used it to put out some family-friendly titles based on some familiar IP (Snoopy, Bee Movie and Pac-Man).
Wahoo Studios – Responsible for two well-known XBLA titles – Cloning Clyde and Outpost Kaloki X. Another Orem studio.

Other

IGDA Salt Lake City – Looks like an active chapter, several meetings over the past year.

Well, that looks like everyone! If I left anyone out, let me know and I’ll update the list.

Canadian Jobs!

Posted on April 10, 2009 by Paul Teall

Wow, lots of Canadian postings this week! They all came from two Ubisoft studios, and it looks like there’s a lot of opportunity in Montreal and Quebec City. If you’re a Canadian company and you’re looking to post, we’ll be adding a bunch of Canadian cities to our database in the next few days. You can post right now – you just have to select “other” next to the location drop-down and type in the city name. A bit annoying though, and we’ll have that fixed soon, I promise.

We doubled the amount of jobs we had listed this week, and we’ll look to continue that progress next week. If you know anyone hiring or hunting, please pass us on!

Upcoming Video Game Conferences

Posted on April 10, 2009 by Paul Teall

As I’ve mentioned before, video game conferences are fantastic places to try and land a new job in the game industry. Some conferences make a career pavilion a showcase element of the show – GDC is the obvious one. Even if there’s not a dedicated career pavilion, conferences offer you an incredible chance to network with a high concentration of game company employees. These are inherently social events, booze is usually flowing at evening mixers, and there’s plenty of opportunities to make new contacts.

http://www.scad.edu/events/gdx/2009/ – GDX, Savannah, GA, April 16-17. “Sponsored by the Savannah College of Art and Design and now in its fifth year, the Game Developers eXchange brings together game developers, educators and students with game development experts who share their behind-the-scenes knowledge of the game industry.”
http://www.2009.loginconference.com/ – Login, Seattle, May 11-14. From their site: “LOGIN is the conference for leaders and innovators of the online game industry. This annual conference hosted in Seattle each May brings together industry leaders to discuss, collaborate, and share advancements about technology, design, business, community and legal areas of online game development.” Login is on Twitter!
http://www.gdc-canada.com/ – GDC Canada, Vancouver, May 12-13. “The Game Developers Conference® Canada covers industry-leading methodologies in game design, production, programming, visual arts and writing for big-budget multiplatform games.”
http://www.e3expo.com/ – E3, LA, June 2-4
http://seattle.casualconnect.org/index.html – Casual Connect, Seattle, July 21-23
http://www.pennyarcadeexpo.com/ – PAX, Seattle, September 4-6. PAX has become one of the biggest fan-focused conferences in the industry. “PAX is a three-day game festival for tabletop, videogame, and PC gamers.”
http://www.gdcaustin.com/ – GDC Austin, September 15-18

I’m sure I’m leaving out a few – I’ll post as I think/hear about more.

Welcome to Ubisoft Quebec City

Posted on April 7, 2009 by Paul Teall

I want to give an extra special welcome to Ubisoft Quebec City, who posted some jobs on the site today! Why so special, you ask? Well, they now hold the distinct honor of being our first Canadian company to post. Emile Gauthier (follow him on Twitter) works for the studio, and he contacted me today about getting their ads up. The Quebec City studio has been around since 2005, and has worked on a variety of titles across all major platforms. They’re a mid-sized studio, right around 200 employees. I haven’t actually been to Quebec City, but it looks like it’s got a very European flair (do I smell a new city profile? ). It apparently also has a low cost-of-living, so definitely check out the new ads!

On a related note – we’re in the process of adding some Canadian cities to the database, but you can currently enter any city we don’t list by clicking the “other” button next to the “location” drop-down.

Welcome again to Ubisoft QC!

Welcome to thatgamecompany

Posted on April 5, 2009 by Paul Teall

We had a few ads posted on Friday by thatgamecompany – we’re pumped they’re posting on the site! This is exactly the kind of company we want to highlight on www.gamejobhunter.com. While we encourage all game companies to post, our mission is to make sure job openings at some of these smaller, unique studios get the same exposure as ads from the larger studios. thatgamecompany is definitely both small and unique. Their site shows just 7 employees, but they’ve already put out 3 compelling titles. Nice to see that they’re now able to grow a little bit!

The GameJobHunter Blog – Video Game Jobs

Video game job hunting tips and observations

Monthly Archives: April 2009