BACK TO WORK

I almost forgot to mention to you, my loyal readers, that I’m going back to work next week. As most of you know, I have been enjoying my time off since December. I began my job search in earnest after I got back from sunny San Diego. The job search took about two months but I was able secure a full-time position with Koolhaus Games. Before accepting, I contemplated taking a few contract offers but after doing two contract jobs, I decided to focus on re-acquiring a full-time gig. The two contract offers I received were from some really cool studios and the work would have been interesting but in less than four months, I’d be back on the unemployment line again.

While theoretically more stable, a full-time gig isn’t really immune to the volatile nature of the video game industry. A colleague of mine has said the only difference between a contract and a full-time job in the video game industry is that in one case, you’ll know when you have to leave the company, in the other case, your company decides. As an example of such volatility, just today, a local studio, Relic Entertainment laid off 39 full-time employees.

So while I’m happy to be full-time again, I know anything could happen. Having said that, this new job will be a bit of a departure for me. First, Koolhaus is the smallest studio I’ve ever worked for. I believe they have around 30 employees, possibly less. Before that, Backbone Vancouver was the smallest place I’ve worked at, with about 100 people at the time that I joined them. The small nature of the studio should lead to less red tape and quicker decisions being made. The second item of note is that I’ll be learning about developing games in the mobile and tablet space. They’ve made games for iOS and Android, both for phones and tablets. The development environments for such games are very different compared to console games so I’ll be learning some new skills. That’s not to say I’ll be abandoning the consoles entirely. Koolhaus is also involved in some work for both the Xbox 360 and the PS3. So it should be interesting. Koolhaus is located in Yaletown so it will be quite convenient to meet up with my all my other friends in the industry, especially those at Microsoft.

I start Monday so I just have a few more days of freedom to enjoy. Bring on the unlimited taco beef.

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