Sign in to view Alexander’s full profile
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
Pulborough, England, United Kingdom
Contact Info
Sign in to view Alexander’s full profile
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
32K followers
500+ connections
Sign in to view Alexander’s full profile
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
View mutual connections with Alexander
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
View mutual connections with Alexander
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
Sign in to view Alexander’s full profile
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
About
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
Articles by Alexander
-
Why Security (still) matters for SaaS Companies
Why Security (still) matters for SaaS Companies
SaaS companies usually offer a lot of flexibility when it comes to their software to B2B or B2C spaces, and they have…
1061 Comment
Contributions
-
You're a mid-career game developer looking to level up. How can you find new opportunities for career growth?
Connections, especially on LinkedIn and similar networks used by people in your industry is a wonderful start to network. Make it a two-way connection though, engage with their content, provide feedback, share your own thoughts.... and don't be afraid to just reach out of the blue to people, inform them why, tell them you are looking for advice or thoughts on your progression - you would not believe how often people are willing to support each other in the same industry!
-
You're developing a new game concept. How can you balance innovation with market demands?
Please remember, however, that not all player feedback is equal: think about the target audience when reviewing feedback: - Are they actually your target audience, or is the feedback from players who spend less than average time in your game? - Does the feedback come from a vocal, but tiny, part of your audience? - Are they engaged? Are they passionate? Are they that sweet spot of both? - Does the game data you're getting align with the feedback? Or is there a misconception somewhere that you need to iron out first?
-
You're collaborating with a diverse global gaming team. How can you bridge the gap in communication styles?
Respecting time zones can be difficult, especially when individuals have Teams / Slack or similar communication tools on their phones - ensure you are clear with your teams that you respect their core hours, and while the times where you respond to messages or emails may be suitable for you, it should absolutely be important to your recipients to respond at a time that is suitable to them, meaning ideally in their work hours. If you can, schedule messages so that they arrive at a time that would be in their respective time zones. This may not always be possible - especially when you have teams from multiple timezones in the same chat or email thread - but making the effort will ensure you are doing your best to being respectful.
-
You're facing technical hurdles in game design. How do you navigate innovation and timelines?
Once you have clearly identified what the key technical challenges are, focusing a "strike team" on two areas can help: 1) Identify the must-have items you absolutely have to have to make your core loop work and ensure your vision remains intact 2) Prioritise these features based on urgency - what can you test early to get the most value out of feedback, and what can be delivered over a longer period (or later in your milestones) to still ensure you can launch on time. This will require transparency with your leads and the studio leadership, so that everyone will be able to buy into the new plans, and provide assistance where possible
-
You've encountered a miscommunication with a gaming influencer. How can you rebuild trust effectively?
Maintaining integrity is not as easy as it sounds: it will require time and effort on both sides, and you as the developer need to remain pro-active. Remaining professional and respectful is not often easy, but rewarding in the longer term.
-
You want to boost player purchases in your game. How can you do it without resorting to pay-to-win tactics?
Player feedback is crucially important, especially when you need to grow your audience engagement: - Identify your key players, those who still are engaged actively, but also those who have stopped playing recently - Open a dialogue with those players: be open and honest, inform them that you want to learn more about what makes them continue to play, or what made them stop - Listen, actively: what is working and what isn't. Be open to hear harsh truths, especially when you had a different direction in mind - Review and respond, clearly: what is it you are going to do and what you aren't. And inform when you are likely going to implement that feedback. Engaging, actively listening and acting will help improve player engagement
Activity
Sign in to view Alexander’s full profile
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
or
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
-
Palworld developer Pocketpair, Inc. has responded to news that Nintendo and The Pokémon Company International have filed a patent lawsuit against it.…
Palworld developer Pocketpair, Inc. has responded to news that Nintendo and The Pokémon Company International have filed a patent lawsuit against it.…
Shared by Alexander Rehm
-
Sony has announced a limited edition classic-coloured console range for its 30th anniversary, with versions of both the newly-announced PlayStation 5…
Sony has announced a limited edition classic-coloured console range for its 30th anniversary, with versions of both the newly-announced PlayStation 5…
Shared by Alexander Rehm
Experience & Education
-
People Can Fly Studio
******** ** **** ***
-
*****
******
-
************* **** ********** *********** (****®)
****** / ******
View Alexander’s full experience
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
Welcome back
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
View Alexander’s full profile
Sign in
Stay updated on your professional world
By clicking Continue to join or sign in, you agree to LinkedIn’s User Agreement, Privacy Policy, and Cookie Policy.
New to LinkedIn? Join now
Other similar profiles
-
Oliver Vlaytchev
COO at Live 5
West MidlandsConnect -
Ross Hamill
GlasgowConnect -
Andrew Munden
Greater LondonConnect -
🚲 Charlie Allen
Operations Director at Dootrix
ManchesterConnect -
Nick Boyce
LondonConnect -
Kirk Potter
Operations Director at C2 Software Limited
Greater Dundee AreaConnect -
William Slater
.
BramhallConnect -
Neill Jones
BristolConnect -
Scott Edgar
Operations Director @ M2M Cloud
Greater Dundee AreaConnect -
Bryan Stanley
bet365 // Systems Development Manager
CulchethConnect -
Petronela Murgu
Operations Director at imedia8
LondonConnect -
Chris Moore
Greater Guildford Area, United KingdomConnect -
Trevor McGahan MBA
Greater NottinghamConnect -
Daniel Thut
Chief Operations Officer
StockportConnect -
Ed Raynham
CTO, Product Lead, Fullstack Developer, UX & Business Automation Expert
PlymouthConnect -
Rebecca Sampson
Greater Brighton and Hove AreaConnect -
Philip Anderton
Operations Director at TAKE 2 INTERACTIVE SOFTWARE PTY LTD
Greater Oxford AreaConnect -
Paul Aspden
ManchesterConnect
Explore more posts
-
Alexander Rehm
Terrible news this afternoon with Lively Studio having had to do a small number of layoffs. As announced by Gamesindustry.biz (link: https://lnkd.in/eK8bD7Bn), Electric Square had to carry out a small number of layoffs to "streamline certain areas of the business" following a recent strategic review. Big or small, layoffs suck. To those impacted by this, please find a comprehensive list of resources, below: 🥇First, reach out to us at People Can Fly Studio, we have many roles open right now in Canada, the UK, Ireland and Europe, please check them out here: https://lnkd.in/eWpV5PbA 🥈Next, Discipline Games Jobs Resources: Over the past weeks I have created 9 (at time of writing) Games Jobs Resources to find jobs in a wide range of disciplines: 🎨 Art, Animation, VFX and UI This resource contains around 1,400 jobs worldwide across all links. Link: https://lnkd.in/eH-yWEms ⚙ Engineering and Programming This resource lists just over 2,300 jobs worldwide across all links. Link: https://lnkd.in/eMYuN-zV 🕹 Quality Assurance This resource lists over 400 QA jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/ecHRqMnN 📑 Game Production This resource lists around 390 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/erVSuNwi 📢 Marketing & Community This resource lists around 330 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/eDmmXtP6 🎶 Audio and Sound Design This resource lists around 120 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/e9vpruEY 📠 Studio Support, HR, Recruitment and BizDev This resource lists around 340 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/eDeasJYj ⚙ IT This resource lists around 100 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/eTpRYvy2 🎮 Game Design This resource lists around 660 jobs worldwide. Link: https://lnkd.in/eXuJA9Vq 🥉 Third, the Ultimate list of Video Games Career Resources: This should be your one-stop shop for all information. My dear friend Amir Satvat maintains these documents, he is a legend for doing this - please check them out: https://amirsatvat.com/ 🎖 Finally, do not give up. Ever. No matter how dark things may look right now, I KNOW you will get through this, you have got this! 👊 Remember you are not alone. If you need help, advice, or even an ear to listen, we're here for you. Always! ➡ A request to my community, please can I ask you to repost this post to your colleagues and friends, so that we can get as many into jobs as possible! And please comment if you or your studio are currently hiring - let's help each other! Much love ❤️ #livelystudio #layoffs
451 Comment -
Stephen Scott
Years ago I hired a HUGE localisation vendor for game trailer voice production but getting them to respond to our emails was so frustrating. It got pretty intense. Client chasing us for info. Schedules to be kept. Budgets to be updated. Story time... We needed help with a particular language. We didn't have the internal resources to handle it. We didn't have the time to pull together a team to deliver it. We needed focus on the aspects of the project that aligned with our strengths. I had to make a decision. 1. Find a smaller, in market partner 2. Keep waiting on replies from our current vendor Waiting is a sh*t strategy so I made a u-turn. Sacked our vendor. Found a new partner who could make us a priority. No checking the inbox only to hear crickets. No stress of having to hold off on updating our client. Our new vendor: - Treated us as the priority, not just another project - Weren't trying to feed the machine - Had fast, reliable and efficient communication with us - Were independent and owner operated Just like us. We were aligned. When we needed an answer, we got it fast. If we wanted to jump on a Zoom. We got it. We got regular updates, even when we didn't ask for them. And most importantly. They connected us to great actors and did a brilliant job. I made the right decision. I had learned a valuable lesson. Find a vendor who is uniquely suited to solve our problems. Don't just go with the vendor you assume will be the best. Don't know where to start? Ask yourself what issues, problems or frustrations you have had with vendors on previous projects. And prioritise finding a partner who uniquely solves these issues. #gameaudio #vocasting #innovation
381 Comment -
Alexander Rehm
Not a great weekend: Ballistic Moon (who are currently working on the rebuilt and enhanced Until Dawn) and Toadman Interactive (who have been working on titles such as EvilvEvil, Immortal Unchained, Everquest, Planetside 2, Vermintide 1 & 2) have both announced layoffs in the past few days. I am truly sorry to hear about this, as both studios are amazing. Those of you who are affected by this, please make use of my resources below: 🥇First, reach out to us at People Can Fly Studio, we have many roles open right now in Canada, the UK, Ireland and Europe, please check them out here: https://lnkd.in/eWpV5PbA 🥈Next, Discipline Games Jobs Resources: Over the past months I have created 9 (at time of writing) Games Jobs Resources to find jobs in a wide range of disciplines, and I would urge you to check them out, if anything just to see what would be available to you: https://lnkd.in/e2qSeKk6 You can find over 5,600 jobs there. 🥉 Third, the Ultimate list of Video Games Career Resources: This should be your one-stop shop for all information. My dear friend Amir Satvat maintains these documents, he is a legend for doing this - please check them out: https://amirsatvat.com/ I urge you to check out the areas in particular about CV support and mentoring, as these will help you no matter what industry you are hailing from or are looking into going next. 🎖 Finally, do not give up. Ever. No matter how dark things may look right now, I KNOW you will get through this, you have got this! 👊 Remember you are not alone. If you need help, advice, or even an ear to listen, we're here for you. Always! ➡ A request to my community, please can I ask you to repost this post to your colleagues and friends, so that we can get as many into jobs as possible! And please comment if you or your studio are currently hiring - let's help each other! Much love ❤️ #ballisticmoon #toadmaninteractive #layoffs
741 Comment -
Brian Baglow
We're releasing all the data from the #workshops we held earlier this year to build Scotland's National Games Strategy. I'll be breaking it down, prioritising it and using that to create the recommendations for the final action plan. We have 11 topics from What are games and where do we fit (sounds simple, but it's SUPER important) to funding, finance, education (that's a biggie) and more. Follow along and make sure you're a part of this. #ScotlandsGamesStrategy #games #Scotland #videogames #ecosystem #data
273 Comments -
Bill Young
No squatch sightings last weekend...but wow...what a week since. A massively productive one for The Glitch (on all fronts), and apparently some other things happened around the industry as well...huh. Alright...let's-a-go: OMY@C 🤘 ⛏ - Metallica will be in Fortnite soon. The event is called "Metallica: Fuel Fire Fury," and it will kick off on June 22nd. The San Francisco band got on the Fortnite Festival stage yesterday - so if you're curious...hop on in there. RIP Cliff. RIP Eddie. 🍎 - Apple's WWDC was this week...and their formal entry into Ai was the big takeaway. "Apple Intelligence," was the name they landed on. Essentially, it's Ai integrated through every aspect of their various OS's...adding personal context to everything. My first reaction was...do I want that though? On one hand, this feels like the first real indication of where consumer Ai is headed...on the other: privacy? A big part of Apple's presentation of their Ai is "setting a brand-new standard for privacy in Ai." So...they're well aware of the line that's being crossed. Apple's 5-minute video overview (on their site) shows you how "Ai for the rest of us" will work...and it's easy to be cynical about it. A squirrel DJ...cool. Custom emoji's...neat. Still...you should watch it. When app devs finally start building for this though...look out. PREDICTION: iPhone 16 will be the best selling iPhone yet. The 6 sold 222M units total...71.5MM units in it's first 3 months...so we'll know by year's end how this crazy statement is trending. 📺 🎮 - Mike Verdu will soon be leaving his role as VP of Netflix Games (and starting a new role with the company). Speculation is rampant about what this means for the games unit. It's possible that it means...nothing at all. I'm still massively bullish on the gaming opportunity for Netflix. My personal opinion is that transmedia is the biggest, most exciting play here...but I've also heard there are internal headwinds on that. 🤷♂️ 🍷 ⛵ - I'm not going to Cannes...again. Maybe some day. I'll drink rosé and look important at home...again. I'm not bitter. 📺 🎮 - Follow Friday: Two nerds with a webcam...that you absolutely should be following if you're in the games business: 1) Chris Melissinos (Principal Evangelist for Amazon Web Services (AWS) - Video interviews with games industry legends, deep retro dives, and discussions on the top news. 2) Alexander Seropian (Founder/CEO of Look North World) - Host of "The Fourth Curtain," is always a headliner event. 📺 - Palm Royale (Apple+). Kristen Wiig as a social climber in 1960's south Florida. So good. Save a grasshopper for me. 🎵 - Spotify's "Daylist" - pull the throttle back a bit with your list names though. "90's Indie Twee Friday Afternoon," might be accurate...but it's embarrassing. 🎮 - It's been 2 weeks since I picked up Hogwarts Legacy and Vampire Survivors...haven't started either yet. THAT's how busy it's been.
438 Comments -
Alan Jack
The Sumo Group closures really have broken me a bit, and I need to rant about the state of things. I'm sorry if it seems I'm glossing over all the closures before this one, but so many ex-students went there, so many ex-colleagues passed through there, and so my timeline is just filled with people looking for work. We keep talking and talking about the economic factors involved, Brexit and Covid and this and that ... the thing I can't stop thinking of is that in my life I've watched the world slowly pitch into a place of despondent capitalism. Art has become more about making stars and fame than helping people escape and reflect. A drive for "truth" and objectivity has resulted, paradoxically, in people putting more stock in spreadsheets and numbers than people. I can't help but feel that if you're bleating about finance and trade deals and business decisions, you're ignoring the fact that general support for artistic and creative endeavours has declined sharply and is still declining, even in the so-called "art world". Games are ultimately always going to be the first to fall in a culture war against creativity, because games are ultimately and profoundly pointless things. That's the whole majesty of the medium: they make us feel profound feelings, they help us explore our existence by being separate from reality, but to do so they MUST bring us nothing tangible in return. The truth is that our industry will probably bounce back to some degree, but it's not any financial structures or cost systems that will save game development as a medium and an art form - it's a cultural shift to recognise the importance of expressive and explorative subjective art in the world today, and the need to support creative endeavours without the pressure of financial recompense.
918 Comments -
James Batchelor
Back from seeing a lot of great people at Develop Brighton, which was busy enough to distract me from doing the usual daily recaps. Let's continue, shall we? Today on GamesIndustry.biz... (Thursday, July 11th 2024) 1. Your must read is Chris' opinion piece on yesterday's Xbox Game Pass price hike announcement, exploring how the move reflects the need for profitability, the strength of Xbox's first-party line-up, and how determined Microsoft is to make Game Pass work https://lnkd.in/e5-rqs5R 2. In the news, Shift Up - the South Korean developer behind Stellar Blade - raised $320m with its IPO, which was the largest for a games company from that nation since 2021 https://lnkd.in/eUQzGTNf 3. Splash Damage is the latest studio to face layoffs, with the studio telling us a "small number of roles" will potentially be made redundant following a review of the business. These are said to be mostly operational roles, with development largely unaffected https://lnkd.in/ejA-f6Ri 4. GAME has reportedly dropped yet another part of its offering. After ditching pre-owned, its loyalty scheme, and Xbox All Access, the retailer will now apparently stop taking in-store pre-orders from August 1. The reason? According to staff, it's because the tills have to cope with too much so parent company Frasers Group is making it so GAME stores (or rather concessions) can only sell and refund products https://lnkd.in/ehMY4sg3 5. Tencent is shutting down free-to-play shooter Synced after just one year of it being available to play https://lnkd.in/e4r3C-kP 6. And Embracer has secured a new €600m ($652m) revolving credit facility with a two-year tenor, replacing the existing €420m ($456m) one, due in May 2025 https://lnkd.in/eGNwZC3g There's more news over at www.gamesindustry.biz and make sure you're signed up to the GI Daily to get it all delivered to your inbox: https://lnkd.in/eAkx_zen
14 -
Amir Satvat
Splash Damage has confirmed, to several news outlets, that a "small number of [its] roles" may be at risk of redundancy. If your role is affected by this news, please make use of the support available across our three platforms. Specifically, I recommend checking out the Games Org Support Posts in Home 1. These resources are highly effective, with ample data to back their success. I won't pretend there are easy solutions but our community's only goal is to make things a little easier for as many people as possible. We have a ton of data showing that, for all candidates, your chances of finding a games role double (from 5 to 10%) over 12 months if you regularly use all our resources versus not. I'm so sorry to hear this report and I will, as always, do my best to do something about it rather than just talking. Home 1 - 🔗 AMIRSATVAT.COM: Our main hub provides 18 resources to assist you in finding work, featuring a fully updated design. - 🔗 Games Org Support Posts: Find a template at AMIRSATVAT.COM (Category 4, Resource 10). If you can provide information from your team (with their consent), I’ll help edit and disseminate the final product, reaching 100,000+ people. These posts are highly effective in increasing visibility, and we've done 99 of them. Home 2 - 🔗 Discord: Join us at discord.gg/amirsatvat, our live extension of community resources. With over 4,500 members, we are currently in an open-join phase. Home 3 - 🔗 LinkedIn: Our community here includes nearly 92,000 members, with 1-3 daily posts offering support and career assistance in the games industry. How the Broader Community Can Help: - Spread the Word: Reshares and comments on this post amplify the visibility of these resources. - Offer Support: Utilize the 16 ways listed on AMIRSATVAT.COM under "How You Can Help" to assist, or simply lend an ear or advice on our Discord server. - Join Our Movement: Volunteer with us at AMIRSATVAT.COM to support our colleagues in the games industry. Our network has facilitated over 2,200 jobs and 41,000 coaching conversations to date, the largest impact of any games organization on earth, and has been visited by millions of gamers lifetime.
11316 Comments -
Justin Eames 🎮
This is an interesting one: UK PETITION TO ‘STOP PUBLISHERS KILLING GAMES’ EMERGES For context, in the UK anyone who gets more than 10k signatures on a petition has the right to have it debated by the government. This petition gained 27k signatures very quickly. It didn't get the response they wanted (and got closed early because of the UK's upcoming election). However, it's an interesting one, especially in the detail. Essentially it highlights that when players buy a game the terms state that the game can be cancelled at any time. That applies to both games as a product or service - and there is debate over the definition of those two. And this happens a lot. The petition references Ubisoft's The Crew servers being taken down after 10 years. It's perhaps hard to totally get behind that. But the point is interesting. What the petition actually asks is: "Require publishers to leave video games (and related game assets / features) they have sold to customers in a reasonably working state when support ends, so that no further intervention whatsoever is necessary for the game to function, as a statutory consumer right." https://lnkd.in/ems4fd7z
23 Comments -
James Batchelor
Today on GamesIndustry.biz... (Monday, July 29th 2024) 1. Your must read today is Chris' piece (with some analysis from Piers Harding-Rolls) on why PS4 may be the biggest problem facing Grand Theft Auto 6 https://lnkd.in/e8heMfXD 1b. Speaking of which, GTA 6 is one of the games that is exempt from the SAG-AFTRA strike, which only counts games that began development after September 2023 https://lnkd.in/e-N5qH-k 1c. The CWA has said it stands in solidarity with the strike, thus enabling me to link three separate stories together rather nicely https://lnkd.in/e2NZnUDY 2. Your must listen or must watch is this week's Microcast, which discusses the Humble Games restructuring, the state of indie publishing, AI at Activision, and the SAG-AFTRA strike https://lnkd.in/eEF6b_mF 3. Activision has been experimenting with skills-based matchmaking and finds that, despite gamer protests, more players would actually play less Call of Duty if they turned it off https://lnkd.in/etergsRy 4. Lively Studio is the latest to face redundancies but sister studio Electric Square is unaffected https://lnkd.in/eesq5xXQ 5. And Skydance is teaming up with Plaion to publish Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra or, as many people remember it, that Captain America/Black Panther game led by Amy Hennig
22 -
Guido Schmidt
2nd Book Progress – Industry Convictions Last week’s progress was good. I am closing in on the end of the theory chapter. Producer Angelo is explaining a lot of the basics to the team clearly and respectfully, since they must unlearn some outdated and unhelpful behaviours. One aspect of what I am exploring at the moment is the convictions one can find within the games industry. Firm beliefs of people in decision-making positions. Things like: 🥵 Crunch is necessary for success. 💰 Bigger budgets produce better games. 🏆 Good games sell themselves. 📊 Metrics over intuition. ❌ Failure is not an option. 🤝 Multiplayer and social features extend game life. 🥇🥈 There are only two types of teams, those that deliver and those that do not. ❤ Passion is the only thing that matters. For each of those beliefs, there are compelling arguments for and against. For example, that crunch is definitely not necessary for success if you approach your development in the right way. Or that failure should be an option if you want to have any originality in your game. Or that intuition is often what makes a game commercially viable in the first place rather than a market analysis. Now I am wondering if I got a good list here or if I missed some more obvious ones. Maybe LinkedIn hivemind can help me out a bit? #gamedesignimpossible #writing #gamedevelopment #gamedesign
173 Comments -
Kelly Bender
⚠️SCAM ALERT⚠️ Please be aware that scam recruiters using the email domain "jobs@studiogames.ca" are impersonating Hinterland and other Canadian game studios. If you receive any correspondence from this email address, please report it. SCAMMER RED FLAGS 🚩 AND ADVICE‼️ 1) NEVER send MONEY‼️ NO RECRUITER WILL OR SHOULD EVER ASK YOU FOR ANY‼️ 2) NEVER include PERSONAL INFORMATION without verifying the SOURCE, the COMPANY, or the REASONING. An application should be enough, and NO applications should include passport, ID, or BANK INFORMATION. 3) RUSHED. SCAMMERS like to get in and get out and don’t like taking more time than needed, so they will want you to ACT FAST, this is so you don’t figure it out. Most job studios take their time hiring, in fact they’re ridiculously slow in most cases so that should be a red flag 🚩 4) TRUST YOUR GUT‼️ If it’s too good to be true, it probably is fake. 5) VERIFY THE RECRUITERS NAME AND THAT THEY WORK FOR THE COMPANY. If the person who contacted you can’t be found, that’s a red flag 🚩 If you can find them, then try to reach out to them and verify it. “Dear (name), I received your job offer email, and I’d like to discuss it further..”
372 Comments -
Kenn White
Need a new ringleader for your next big thing? I know the people you need to talk to. You're looking for some super senior, staff level PGMs who absolutely know how to run multi-million dollar initiatives, and I happen to know some of the best in the business are suddenly on the market from my previous team at MGM. They coordinated multiple front and back end teams toward implementation of very different technologies, utilized both strategic waterfall and tactical agile methodologies, implemented and ran communication plans and reporting at C-suite level. Intricately tech savvy and able to navigate complex organizational structures effortlessly. These are not entry or even mid-level candidates. Extremely competent and should be picked up for companies looking to get serious about actually shipping large, complex technology projects. I'm happy to make the introductions. Let me know who needs to meet them. Note: I am not a recruiter, just their former manager who knows that these are exceptional people who should be connected with exceptional companies. #opentowork #programmanagement #tpm #pgm #tech
372 Comments -
George E. Osborn
This week's Video Games Industry Memo took a depressingly timely look at new research exploring the intersection between the far right and video games. In a week where Donald Trump appeared on a Kick stream with an influencer who has previously hosted a leading white supremacist and the UK was rocked by far right rioting, I summarised research which showed: 🚨 Alarmingly lax moderation by Steam, which allows demonstrably far right groups to use its community functions to spread its message and recruit. 📺 Extremist challenges on a range of streaming platforms, with particular concern focusing on Kick's willingness to allow far right activists and consipiracy theorists a platform. 🤝 Constructive research exploring how the industry and the public sector can address challenges via practical partnerships built on trust - rather than reaching for regulation. This week's newsletter also explores the news that Warner Bros is exploring the sale of its game division, highlights some great jobs going (including one at Major League Soccer) and picks out unofficial Love Island simulator The Crush House as the release to watch. Subscribers received Video Games Industry Memo earlier this morning straight to their inbox. Get it sent to yours too by signing up via the link in my bio or by searching on it on Substack or a search engine of your choice.
211 Comment -
Ivo Pejković
🌟 Who is the PS5 Pro really for? 🌟 With the #PS5Pro officially priced at $700 (or €800), as highlighted in this #Eurogamer article, it begs the question - who is it truly aimed at? But let’s be honest, haven’t we always known? 🤷🏻 Historically, the #PS Pro models have been designed for a very specific audience: the hardcore #PlayStation fanbase. These are the players who are already deeply invested in the PlayStation ecosystem and seek the absolute cutting-edge experience - whether that’s for higher frame rates, sharper resolutions, or faster load times. 🎮 While the price may seem steep to the casual gamer, PS Pro consoles have never been about mass appeal. Instead, they cater to those who demand the best and are willing to pay for it. 💰💰 It’s a move that makes sense for the segment of #gamers who want to stay at the forefront of innovation. 🎮 Do you think the PS5 Pro is worth the €800 investment, or is it exclusively for the die-hard PlayStation enthusiasts?
1 -
Sara Machado
Last Friday I found out... 👀 I'm a finalist in the In-House HR and Recruitment Impact category at the MCV/DEVELOP Women In Games Awards! 🎉 It’s such an honor to be recognised alongside some amazing professionals in games. To be completely honest, I feel TINY, compared to my fellow finalists Danielle Davis, Julie Piedrabuena, and Khally Saarman-Jones. It’s really awesome to share this with you 💖 And congratulations to everyone else that got nominated including the wonderful MJ, Imogen, and Ellie. --- While I love, sharing about nominations and events, I KNOW how sometimes only seeing the good stuff creates unrealistic career expectations, so let me tell you a bit about the past years: ➡️ 2017: I left Brazil at 21 for a study abroad at King's College London in War Studies. I only had internship experience in administration & project management, and barely enough money to last me 6 months. ➡️ 2018: King's wouldn’t accept my first year at my home university, so to get a degree, I’d need to pay £12k for another year. With no money, I started working in a pasta bar, doing everything, including recruitment. ➡️ 2019: I landed my first traditional recruitment job at a large agency, where I learned all the hiring practices I still criticize today. Six months later, I got my first recruiter job in the #GamesIndustry. ➡️ 2020: Worked my butt off, burned out, and then repeated the cycle. All while a global pandemic was causing havoc and my country was the top 2 in number of deaths. ➡️ 2021: I joined Into Games, leading their #KickstartScheme Gateway, covering budget, marketing, stakeholder management, and employability skills. By the end, 130 young people on Universal Credit landed their first game job. ➡️ 2022: I worked for Hitmarker and released the largest recruitment report in games, with over 600 respondents and 190 hours of data. I then joined Sumo Digital, sharing my report’s findings at events like the Sumo Developers Conference, Unwrap Festival, IGDA Pathfindings, and Digital Dragons. ➡️ 2023: Worked my butt off, dealt with the previous year's burnout, and started taking better care of myself. I was shortlisted for MCV/Develop IRL's 30 Under 30, became a BAFTA Connect member, and started my own company, Bird's Eye View. ➡️ 2024: Bird's Eye View launched the Entry Level Skills Hub, detailing the knowledge, skills, and behaviours of 12 entry-level gaming roles. Then layoffs happened, and here we are—✨Open to Work✨. I'm telling you this because 2017 Sara imagined a completely different life for herself, but I don't think she would have much to complain about what we’ve accomplished today! So give yourself time; none of us has any idea what we are doing. --- 📣 Follow #RethinkRecruitment and ring the 🔔 to stay updated! ⏩ https://entrylevel.games/ 🌟 Opinions are very much my own™️ #GameDev #CareerAdvice #CareerDevelopment
8919 Comments -
George E. Osborn
Why is it important to understand games? Because they explain how a party turns 35% of the vote in an election into over 400 seats in Parliament. Labour’s win in the UK general election is many things. A sign that voters could not do anything other than boot out a tired and incompetent Conservative Party; a relatively unenthusiastic trade off of steady competence over wider vision; a least worst option that has opened the doors to smaller parties. It’s also a victory for ruthless campaigning. It’s an operational masterclass in which financial and personal resource was directed with strategic precision to get as many Labour MPs over the top as possible. And it is derived from a fundamental truth: elections are games with clear rules. Labour’s strategy - and, to be fair, The Liberal Democrat’s approach - rejected the idealism of “the best vision wins out” to say “how do we win this game within the set rules” to avoid another 2019 style disappointment. It’s an approach that is central to great campaigning. It is also, as Kelly Clancy posits indirectly in her great book Playing With Reality, a perfect example of minmaxing a game: controlling and risking as little as possible from your side while maximising opportunities within the rules (and errors from your opponents). Clancy argues that our failure to understand play and to take it seriously within society means we can’t understand fully the social, cultural and biological drivers that lead us to create the rules based systems that we play within. Elections are therefore one of those rare times where the dynamic of play is surfaced in a way that we can truly see, that we can understand explicitly and that we can talk about easily - demonstrating its immense value in a way little else can. P.S. If you like reading about the surprising ways games reshape society, think about subscribing to my newsletter Video Games Industry Memo. There will be plenty more where this has come from in the year ahead.
725 Comments -
Amir Satvat
Another games jobs cut situation today at CI Games as reported by Game Developer's Christopher Kerr and confirmed by the company, saying "This restructure affects approximately 30 roles across production" https://lnkd.in/eHmMFztw Here's where this puts us. I will start exposing these statistics regularly as a reminder of the human cost of these decisions: 100+ games layoffs in 2024 One games layoff situation on average every 1.3 days in 2024 (apologies for getting this inverted in the picture) Over 10,000 games layoffs in 2024 YTD Within 500 cuts of hitting 2023's games layoff number...in May If you were in fact affected by these cuts, I have no words to express my feelings. However, our community has three resource "homes" built to help you: HOME 1 - 🔗 AMIRSATVAT.COM: Our hub offering 15 resources to help you find work, including a fully updated design. - 🔗 Games Org Support Posts: Find a template at AMIRSATVAT.COM (Category 4, Resource 10). If you can provide information from your team (with their consent), I’ll help edit and disseminate the final product, reaching 100,000+ people. These posts are highly effective in increasing visibility and we have done 96 of them. HOME 2 - 🔗 Please visit discord.gg/amirsatvat to join our Discord, a live extension of our community resources. With over 2,700 members, we are in an open-join phase. HOME 3 - 🔗 LinkedIn: Our community here includes over 86,000 members, with 1-3 daily posts offering support and career assistance in the games industry. To our broader community, your involvement makes a difference. Here’s how you can help: - Spread the word: Reshares and comments on this post amplify the visibility of these resources. - Offer support: Utilize the 13 ways listed on AMIRSATVAT.COM under "How You Can Help" to assist, or simply lend an ear or advice on our Discord server. - Join our movement: Volunteer with us at AMIRSATVAT.COM to support our colleagues in the games industry. Our network has facilitated over 1,800 jobs and 33,000 coaching conversations to date and has been visited by over 3,000,000 gamers lifetime. We're committed to providing daily encouragement and support during these challenging times. We will never stop fighting for you!
15812 Comments -
George E. Osborn
Video Games Industry Memo came out earlier this morning with an important message to readers (and maybe just a couple of glib jokes) to get out there and vote. Don't waste your democratic rights, my friends. But alongside the exhortations to vote, there was plenty of the usual tip top video games industry analysis including: 📊 A deep dive into Newzoo's Global Gamers Report, including a close examination of the 31% of 'trend hunting' players who are spending big on new and engaging game content. 📰 A look at the big headlines of the week including Cloud Imperium Games having a mare in front of an employment tribunal, Keywords being bought and the Esports World Cup kicking off in Saudi Arabia. 💼 The job move news - including the appointment of a new CMO at Roblox, Director of Comms at Square Enix and Product PR Lead at Nintendo - and some great roles including a Public Policy gig at Epic Games and a Senior Game Designer role at Niantic. 🎮 The big game releases of the week, including Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail and Resi 7 making its way over to iPhone and iPad. I'll pop the link to the newsletter in the comments below shortly. But if you can't wait for me to do that, search Video Games Industry Memo and you'll be able to find it on Substack or the widest web the world has ever seen. (P.S. I mean it. Go and vote, ya filthy animals x)
572 Comments
Explore collaborative articles
We’re unlocking community knowledge in a new way. Experts add insights directly into each article, started with the help of AI.
Explore MoreOthers named Alexander Rehm
-
Alexander Rehm
Frankfurt Rhine-Main Metropolitan Area -
Alexander Rehm
Corporate Language Designer, Brand Consultant, Copy Trainer. Founder of Corporate Language Institut
Greater Munich Metropolitan Area -
Alexander Rehm
Professor (FH) for Leadership, Senior Executive Coach
Ticino, Switzerland -
Alexander Rehm
Senior Kundenbetreuer Wealth Management, Mitglied der Direktion
Steinheim an der Murr
25 others named Alexander Rehm are on LinkedIn
See others named Alexander Rehm