[gameprogrammer] Re: Gaming industry - how prevalent?


it seems to me that alot (most?) gaming companies are young and kind of
"start up" - ie you get paid 1099 style etc.  Is this true or have I just
seen an unrealistic sample of data?


I would have to do a bit more digging into my notes regarding 1099
practices, but I can definitely tell you that many companies are younger
start ups.

Do alot of gaming companies fail often? 


Yes. Those that succeed (are profitable or release critically acclaimed
games regardless of profitability) are in many cases acquired by publishers.
There are some pretty cool independent (and profitable) studios out there.
However, many are being run by people specifically interested in NOT being
acquired.

Are titles which the average gamer has not heard of profitable enough still 
to keep a company afloat generally or do you have to be big like world of
warcraft, halo, quake, mario, etc to make a profitable company in this
industry?


Very small niche markets are tough to cater to it seems. Depends on the
demand of that market. I think while those games you list are indeed big
money makers, you'll also want to look at the sales numbers for games on the
GBA/DS aimed at that uber huge demographic of younger kids. Not the stuff we
are necessarily playing, but they can be good sources of bread and butter
funding. A lot of studios have their "big original IP project" that is
ongoing, and several other smaller projects that provide a revenue stream to
fund that other project. Cell phone games, web games, all spaces that
require less time/resources to develop for.

Also how difficult is it to get into the industry compared to other 
programming industries?  I've heard it's really difficult to get in but
while I have no shipped games or professional experience, I've written a few
games, written multithreaded servers, dabbled in encryption and compression,
written scripting languages, done both 2d and 3d graphics programming, and
some other random coding projects, as well as have 12 years C++ experience,
although only 5 years professional programming experience.


It's hardER to get into than other industries it seems. The key I think if
you've not got professional game experience (titles) is to include demo
work. Make some stuff. Send that out. I went from 3D scientific
visualization to game development, because it was easy to sell that as very
related. After that, I went more tools side. Make something and send that on
a CD along with your resume.

And really, my comments are pretty generalized.

I think the best advice for people looking to get into the industry is to
start making stuff now.

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