QA Relocation

Crastin · 03-25-2008, 01:20 PM

Is it worth relocating to another state for a QA job? It sounds like QA is imperative to getting a career in Game Design and from what little searching i've done so far, wherever the QA jobs are is where the developer jobs are. Mostly everything I find is in California or Seattle.

yaustar · 03-25-2008, 03:48 PM

QA is a A way of getting into games design, it isn't the only way.

Also the question of worth varies from person to person. Is it worth it to you?

Crastin · 03-25-2008, 06:22 PM

It's more than worth it to me. QA is the most commonly mentioned way into the field that i've heard of aside from internship work but i'm not eligible for that until my second year apparently. Are their other ways I can get involved in lower end positions within Game Design?

yaustar · 03-26-2008, 02:41 AM

Considering you are still at University/college, you be hard pressed to one that suits you now, even with QA.

Otherwise, Level Scripting/Design is also a common entry point for Games Designers otherwise others come from programmers/artists/sound moving sideways to a different role.

Crastin · 04-03-2008, 12:41 AM

Well, the most highly saturated area of QA jobs and developers/publishers I can find is near San Francisco, California so guess where i'm moving in three months? I want every edge possible to get into this field. I took a week to research and drew up a four year plan because i'm a freak for making lists of things (Rainman?) to hopefully provide some direction.

yaustar · 04-03-2008, 03:22 AM

The question is are you planning to take a QA job while you are attending college and if so, how are you going to attend both at the same time?

Crastin · 04-03-2008, 04:51 AM

I already work full time and attend college full time. It's daunting but I still manage. My classes don't actually take up much time but what i'm noticing is that Game Design requires a lot of "out of school" work. For instance, I read Game Developer Magazine, Gamasutra.com, IGDA.org and many other forums every day. I'm also participating in some free beta testing at the moment and trying to get into testing of any sort. I was also told that writing game design documents is a major part of my future job and to try and constantly be working on one so i've been writing them on already existing games to get the hang of it. Very soon i'll need to start attending industry events like GDC as well and actively modding. In all, this outweighs my schoolwork by double usually and is sometimes hard to keep up with.