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My standard advice to every graduate CS student is to stay the hell away from professional video game development. If you want to make games, turn it into a hob
by ashtonkem 5y ago
My standard advice to every graduate CS student is to stay the hell away from professional video game development. If you want to make games, turn it into a hobby instead.
- ttul 5y agoI dunno. My friend is making $250K working for Roblox. He’s 15yrs into his career - all game dev. Doesn’t seem too bad.
- dbish 5y ago15 years in software could get you a lot more outside game dev
- Thaxll 5y agoMost dev in the US don't make 250k after 15years.
- xvector 5y agoMost devs in the US don’t care about maximizing their career.
- ashtonkem 5y agoPay isn’t even the main reason I’d avoid gaming, it’s the tendency of game companies to grossly abuse their workers via crunch time and sudden studio closures that worries me. The same dynamics that suppress game dev salaries also lead companies to treating their workers as replaceable, which is a pretty bad situation to end up in.
- dbish 5y agoYes, but I think of Roblox like a FAANG in terms of success and money. If you moved to a FAANG with that experience you would likely make a good chunk more
- the_only_law 5y agoI was shocked at the pay at Roblox. I was on levels.fyi the other day and came across a list of companies with the highest pay for new grads and it was in the top five I believe.
- martincmartin 5y agoSo is he making games, or making a game platform? There's a big difference.
- ttul 5y agoThis is a good point. He works on the platform.
- rawtxapp 5y agoThat's great, but most FAANG eng make more than that by their 2nd or 3rd year. With 15 years of experience, they could be making at least 500k+. edit: for the skeptical, this is what an L4 makes at Google[1], L4 is easily attainable within 3 years, pretty likely in 2 years, that's assuming you start at L3 (straight out of college or very little experience). 1: https://www.levels.fyi/company/Google/salaries/Software-Engineer/L4/ https://www.levels.fyi/company/Google/salaries/Software-Engi...
- daniel-thompson 5y agoMost FAANG eng in their 2nd or 3rd year are not FAANG anymore by their 15th year.
- wikibob 5y agoInteresting hypothesis. Where do you think they go? I’d say it might seem this way because of the hyper growth. Most people at FAANG haven’t been there long, because they haven’t been big that long.
- xenihn 5y agoIn my network: - early retirement - founding their own companies - landlording - teaching for fun/enjoyment/fulfillment, not because they need money Some have done all 4 of these.
- rawtxapp 5y agoI've had plenty of coworkers who've been at Google or Apple for longer than 15 years, but what I've seen is people will usually jump after 4 years for even more comp or go the startup route. So those FAANG salaries are like the lower bound for most. Of course, some people will just save/invest and retire after 6-10 years, that's fine too.
- ironmagma 5y agoCitation? Even in the Bay Area the median is considered somewhere around $150k.
- ashtonkem 5y agoAnd some college athletes will eventually end up in a Tom Brady situation, that doesn’t mean I would recommend anyone bank on getting drafted as a career.
- johnnyanmac 5y agoweird comparison since even a regular 3 year professional will make millions in their short career. 250K is not unusual money if you are regularly advancing on oppurtunities (and for the people around here, it wouldn't even be seen as impressive). Whether you want to wait a decade to move to that point or 5 years at FAANG is up to the individual. But the topic here seems to assert that you can't make good money at all in the industry, not how fast you make it.
- hu3 5y agoGood for him. But that's an exception. How much does the average roblox dev make?
- wikibob 5y agoYou can see for yourself here: https://www.levels.fyi/company/Roblox/salaries/Software-Engineer/ https://www.levels.fyi/company/Roblox/salaries/Software-Engi... IC1 Software Engineer (Entry Level) $221k IC2 $249k IC3 Senior Software Engineer $285k IC5 Principal Software Engineer $422k
- hu3 5y agoI'm not sure how Levels.fyi work but those are great despite being paid in part with stock grants and bonuses. However, Roblox itself is an exception. I'd guess the average game developer income to be much lower.
- kilbuz 5y agoI love levels but the self-selecting group who reports their comp there cannot be used to reliably estimate the average, since they are not a random sample. I would guess propensity to report is correlated with higher TC.
- jmcgough 5y agoFriends at blizzard are paid well too, but a lot of them didn't start out in games - they started in devops. Lots of need for that skillset for big MMOs.
- DubiousPusher 5y agoRoblox is a very different kind of game company though. I've noticed the more service oriented game companies have better wages and work life balance. The more old school, content heavy ones have lowe pay and longer hours.
- Impossible 5y agoUltimately it's working on game tech and companies like Roblox also hire for other roles that don't have exact equivalent in web or mobile development (art and game design roles mostly). Limiting your definition of "game development" to content heavy games with low pay and longer hours, especially when the industry is moving away from that type of game with a few exceptions, doesn't make sense.
- stale2002 5y agoRoblox is an exception. I am in a similar situation, at twitch, where I work, but these companies are the exception and not the rule, for game dev stuff. Epic games probably pays highly, as well as riot, and value. But I can count on maybe 1 hand, the number of actual good "video game" companies that I would want to work for.
- pgt 5y agoI say the same about art and music to my nieces and nephews: when you make art, people will really appreciate it, but you won't earn much financial currency - you will earn a different kind of currency...a social currency, which you can exchange for other things, but not rent. So make art as a hobby or as a way to meet people, but not for money. The same applies to game development, which is art.
- Taylor_OD 5y agoEh. It depends on if you want to make art or be an artist. Artists make art. People who make art make art. But if you want to be an Artist you cant really do something else full time and do art on the side. Maybe at the start but eventually you have to be an Artist full time. Otherwise the other thing will take over. To be fair I give people the same advice. Just that the people who want to Artists look at me like I'm insane because nothing I say would stop them from living that life. The people who just want to make some art realize that it's not that bad to get paid well in a career and do art on the side.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- BurningFrog 5y agoThe more unsexy a software field is, the better the pay and work conditions are. Sewage treatment plant software is probably an awesome field to have a career, aside from when you want to explain what you do at cocktail parties. Video game development is the most glamorous showbiz part of the industry, so working there is, on average, really awful.
- granshaw 5y agoReally? I think FAANG, which is generally the highest paying in software, is percepted as sexy, at least to the layperson and to recruiters. If there are really sewage industry jobs that pay better than FAANG, please tell me more cause I'm interested
- ashtonkem 5y agoSeems like FAANG is seen as less sexy by industry insiders nowadays. Amazon in particular seems to be a “see you in a year!” Kind of situation.
- idiotsecant 5y agoAs someone who does industrial controls wastewater treatment is one of the worst industries because it's so low-margin. It's a 'barely pay for it the first time and run it until it breaks down' type of industry because municipalities and rate payers are usually quite cost sensitive, but pedantry aside your point is largely accurate. As a side note - In my experience the best paid but most mind-meltingly dangerous industrial controls work is in oil refining. The most low-stress (and somewhat less well paid) work i've experienced is in designing control systems for hydroelectric facilities for private utilities. I wouldn't consider either glamorous but the hydro work does have a more environmentally friendly image and does have a correlating lower pay!
- rhodozelia 5y agoI’ve done private and Public hydro and the private projects were still stressful with liquidated damages hanging over my head if i caused a delay in the project and all of the environmental considerations which dramatically complicated the machinery and the controls.
- myfavoritedog 5y agoSame here. At very least, understand the tradeoff you're making. If you love the creation of games so much that it's worth the stress and lower pay, go for it. Money isn't everything if you're doing something you love. But if you want better compensation for your time, look for something more corporate.