Howdy Reader,
Most weeks the games news is about who got cut. This week the story I keep coming back to is about a team that won.
THE NUMBER: 16 million
Arc Raiders has sold 16 million copies, per publisher Nexon’s June numbers (reported by GamesBeat). Embark Studios grew from about 60 people to more than 120 to keep up.
It still wasn’t enough. Executive producer Aleksander Grøndal told Game Developer the team was “constantly overshooting our capacity.” Monthly updates turned into burnout, so Embark moved to bigger, less frequent drops. He also shared that he once spent five months on sick leave after a Battlefield launch at EA.
Here’s why that matters to you. A hit studio is hiring. That’s the good news. But a hit studio is also where the hours quietly stack up... and nobody puts that in the job description. What I mean by that is growth and burnout tend to show up together, and you want to know which phase you’re walking into.
Even if you're desperate for your next role, burnout is not sustainable and can lead to poor mental health and an itch to leave which in turn can ruin productivity.
A hit game doesn’t mean a healthy team. Ask.
Also this week: Nerial, the Reigns studio, went into “hibernation” and laid off its staff (Game Developer, Game Informer). And Grasshopper Manufacture split from NetEase to go independent, after NetEase closed or let go of several studios it had backed (Game Developer, VGC).
THE MOVE: ask the capacity question
Next interview, ask about the month after launch. Not the launch. The month after.
- Ask what happened after the last big ship. “What did the team’s workload look like the month after your last launch?” Listen for specifics. A vague answer is an answer.
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- Ask what gives when the roadmap runs long. Scope, dates, or people’s weekends. Something always gives. Find out which.
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- Ask how they staffed up. If the team doubled in a year, ask how new people got onboarded. Fast growth with no plan is literally where burnout lives.
Already employed? Ask yourself the same three questions about your own team. If the answers make you wince, that’s your signal to start a plan now.
THE ROLES: 5 open this week
Pulled from the studios’ own careers pages. Listings close fast, so check before you apply.
- Riot Games. Senior VFX Artist, Unpublished R&D Product. Los Angeles or Mercer Island, WA. Senior. Posted at $150K to $209.6K. 5+ years as a real-time VFX artist in Unreal, Unity, or similar. Back door: VFX artists at Riot Discovery Studio, the team hiring. Ask what “R&D” looks like day to day. Apply​
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- Roblox. Senior Software Engineer (Full Stack), Global Actions. San Mateo, CA. Senior. Posted at $196.75K to $243.29K. 3+ years building full-stack systems at scale, plus React and TypeScript. Back door: engineers on the Global Actions team. Ask what problem the Affinity System is solving. Apply​
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- Electronic Arts. Experience Designer, College Football. Orlando, FL. Mid-level. 3 to 5 years of UX/UI on shipped games, plus Figma and After Effects. Back door: UX designers on EA’s College Football team. Ask what players pushed back on in last year’s menus. Apply​
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- Sony Interactive Entertainment. Lead Franchise Strategist, PlayStation Studios. San Mateo, CA. Lead. Posted at $155.8K to $233.6K. A track record shaping entertainment IP across formats. Back door: people in PlayStation Studios portfolio strategy or PlayStation Productions. Ask which franchises they see stretching beyond games next. Apply​
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- Atari. Publishing Producer. Remote, US. Mid-level. Posted at $100K to $115K. 3 to 4 years in PC and console production and 2+ titles shipped on different platforms in the last three years. Back door: producers on Atari’s publishing team. Open with your first-party submission experience. Apply​
THE WIN
I want to give a HUGE shoutout to my client Charles for securing a 20% pay increase. He and I have been tracking his wins and contributions and he's been making sure that leadership has been tracking along with him.
A reminder to be consistently keeping your receipts, focusing on doing good work and creating positive influence. Just being heads down and grinding is noble--in today's games industry, we have to simultaneously be looking out for our studio, team, and ourselves.
YOUR TURN
Hit reply and tell me what the month after your last launch looked like. I read every one.
If you want help working this for your own search, the first step is a Fit Call. Thirty minutes where we look at where you stand and what you’d do first.
​Book a Fit Call​
Know someone hunting? Forward this. They can reply to me and I’ll add them to the list.
Talk soon,
Adam
​gamingcareers.gg​
Sources: Game Developer and GamesBeat on Embark and Arc Raiders. Game Developer and Game Informer on Nerial. Game Developer and VGC on Grasshopper. Listings from each studio’s careers page, found through Games Jobs Index.
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