Game development credit you don't want

[@M]

If you worked on a video game that is universally hated/mocked, would you still put it on your resume?

I probably wouldn't, unless it was the only game to my credit. I'd list my job duties/accomplishments at the development studio, and maybe mention some other titles that I worked on that were more successful, but, conveniently forget to list any of the bad one(s).

Who wants to be the guy to say, "Hell yeah, I was the lead programmer on Shaq Fu!" in a job interview?

 

[Neo Alec]

Who wants to be the guy to say, "Hell yeah, I was the lead programmer on Shaq Fu!" in a job interview?

I think that would be a good story, and quite easy to spin it to make it a sympathetic one.

 

[@M]

Neo_moe won't hire you if he finds out you worked on a shit game, unless you've got great tits, then you're in.

 

[NeoSneth]

i would not see it as a negative if you have other accomplishments. If it's infamous enough, then it's going to make for great conversation which is a huge part of an interview. It gives you something to talk about. "We really failed to interpret the market in X,Y,Z ways....Project Management suffered for the following reasons....,etc"

It's no different than working for failed tech startups or companies that went bankrupt. I know it sounds like something from a ted talk, but you learn the most from your failures. Companies in 1st place often have the most complacency and least innovation.

 

[city41]

I doubt people in the industry would pan working on Shaq Fu. Technically it's not bad at all. Hell, it's not that bad in general.

 

[@M]

It doesn't have to be Shaq Fu, you can substitute N64 Superman or whatever other infamous "bad" game strikes your fancy. The question is would you want to take credit for a perceived failure when you're trying to get another job and demonstrate why they should choose to hire you.

 

[StevenK]

I've achieved so little in life I'd put my name to the Hindenburg.

 

[Tarma]

I was the lead producer on "Aliens: Colonial Marines".

It should have been the Doom (but with Aliens) we'd all been crying out for since the early 90s... but...

I was wasted on crack most of the time.

 

[@M]

I've achieved so little in life I'd put my name to the Hindenburg.

Wasn't your fault, some stupid fook insisted on using flammable hydrogen instead of inert helium...oh, that was you?

 

[StevenK]

Wasn't your fault, some stupid fook insisted on using flammable hydrogen instead of inert helium...oh, that was you?

I actually read up extremely briefly on it after I posted that. Apparently, at the time only the US had any substantial stores of helium and they refused to supply nazi germany with any (it was1937). So in went the hydrogen.

So no, I can't even take credit for that.

 

[Syn]

Atari ET, Barbie games, game.com titles

 

[wyo]

ET worked out ok for Howard Scott Warshaw. He gave a great presentation at last year's Freeplay Florida.

 

[fake]

Even if a game/movie/whatever sucked, it doesn’t mean you did a bad job in your role. One person can tank a project.

 

[100proof]

People in that business don't care. It's more important that you don't have large gaps in your resume than having something you worked on not working out when you're one of (often) dozens of people working on a game.

Honestly, they'd be more interested in hearing about what happened that caused the game to suck (for gossip reasons but also for sussing out what kind of employee you are).

 

[Johnny16Bit]

Working on a shit game doesn't mean you did a shit job. And even if you did, it doesn't mean someone else isn't to blame for it, and you didn't learn from the experience.
Also as said above, nowadays when teams are generally so huge that you're either nobody or someone damn important, you will not revert to a lesser status no matter what.
So yeah, I'd put anything on my resume!

 

[Burning Fight!!]

You guys are dumb, shit jobs make it so much easier to tell made up exaggerated job tales that HR loves to lap up. They can be grandiose yet specific enough so you don't get blamed for the end product as a whole.

 

[Moob Butter]

I assume bad software engineers follow my career path. Work there for a couple of years, leave just before or immediately after the thing you’ve been half assly working on is released and shit goes everywhere, blame that shit on others in your next interview and talk about what a great learning experience it was working in tough conditions with difficult stakeholders, negotiate a higher salary, work for a couple of years…

 

[Berty]

I once worked with someone responsible for one of the biggest video game memes of all time. They did not appreciate you asking them questions about it...

 

[Moob Butter]

A secretive meme big tymer? What a pha got.

 

[Neodogg]

I once worked with someone responsible for one of the biggest video game memes of all time. They did not appreciate you asking them questions about it...

was it "all your base are belong to us"?

 

[neo_mao]

hello yes I am lead programmer in Dead or Alive series responsible for breast jiggle physics.

 

[SignOfGoob]

You guys are dumb, shit jobs make it so much easier to tell made up exaggerated job tales that HR loves to lap up. They can be grandiose yet specific enough so you don't get blamed for the end product as a whole.

While I work in auto development I can say that this sounds very familiar. If you were the producer-director on a failed project…maybe that would hurt you…but grunts are grunts and management knows they have no responsibility for what project they ended up toiling under. They’ll toil for excellence as much as they toil for mediocrity.

And I agree, stories are good interview fodder. Working for engineering 3rd parties you run across some of the most crackpot startups…trying to pay you to spin straw into gold via methods already disproven by a basic understanding of science…crappy little car companies going out of business writing checks day by day to cover expenses…especially when you’re in an industry where turnover is high. The interviewer may have worked on the same stuff!

If you show up with a credit of assistant craft services boy on Avatar I think you’ll have a harder time in the interview. If you claim any involvement with Ferrari or Apple the base assumption will be you were just pushing a broom and trying to ride the credit by association. A guy who was assistant director on 30 episodes of Small Wonder would be looked at with less suspicion.