Nick Rathbone - Senior Games Designer @ Codemasters

Nick is an ex University of Bolton student who studied Games Design back in 2005-2008, graduating with a first class honours. With a lot of hard work and determination within university, Nick found himself to be employed just a month after graduation at Climax Studios, as a graduate designer.

Throughout the presentation Nick described how his hard work throughout university and personal time, helped him to gain the skills that were needed to be successful within the games industry. Shortly after joining his first job at Climax, 4 months down the line he would be employed at Codemasters as a games designer. Throughout his career nick has worked hard, allowing him to move up in the ranks, where he is currently employed as a Senior Games Designer, still at Codemasters.

The presentation given was headlined ‘Break into the Games Industry’ which lead on to cover multiple factors such as the sales pitch, portfolio and interview. Throughout a number of presentations covered by the guest lectures, they have all implemented their own ideas, opinions and experiences when it comes to your portfolio and the interview process as it is such a massive part of getting your first job in the games industry.

Throughout the stages of receiving a job offer within the games industry, it will almost every time land you to one of the final stages, which is the interview process. This certain process can come in multiple ways, over the phone interview and/or in person. The interview is the ‘last chance that the studio has to cut you loose’ (Morrison, 2013), or hire you so it is definitely one of the main stages that you should prepare when applying for a games industry job.

Morrison’s (2013), Gamasutra article describes 3 main steps that will guide you to nailing a games industry interview. These 3 steps are; making a list of likely questions, preparing answers to questions and also practicing answering the questions aloud. With a lot of practice and hard work these 3 steps will become easier and will benefit when it comes to the interview process. Within these steps there are also little tips that can go a long way when it comes to the real life interview. For example, making sure that the answers to your questions are clear and straight to the point, this allows you to seem as professional as possible and shows you really want this job that you have applied for. Another massive tip when it comes to the interview process is practicing your answers aloud; this allows you to remember your answers by memory, as during the interview you will not be able to take in a ‘cheat sheet’ as this seems unprofessional to the employers. The 3 main steps described in the Gamasutra article ‘How to Ace a Games Industry Job Interview’ (Morrison, 2013), highlight the main factors that should be focused on when practicing for any interview. There are also some other little tips that have been expressed in the article, which can help you go a lot further within the process. For example, Smiling; this time should come across very exciting for you as you are so close to gaining a job, express that excitement in your interview by always having a smile on your face, and good manners cost nothing. The importance of these tips and points are massive when it comes to the interview process within the games industry, it allows you to take on board all the information that you want to display on the day of the interview and make it the best representation that you possibly can. This will allow one to go further within the interview process, and show the hard work and determination that they will display if given the certain job.

References: Brice Morrison, (2013) How to Ace a Games Industry Job Interview. Gamasutra [Online]. Available from:http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/BriceMorrison/20130618/194109/How_to_Ace_a_Games_Industry_Job_Interview.php [Accessed Date: 13 March 15]. LinkedIn, (2014), Nicholas Rathbone [Online]. Available at: https://media.licdn.com/media/p/3/005/0a4/22d/38d26f7.jpg [Accessed 13 March 15].