Considering that I’m a couple years away from being thrown out into the real world (college is not the real world), any article with the title “HOT JOBS!” or “10 Jobs That Don’t Suck” catches my attention. In this case, the “bright new careers” list on Yahoo! sparked my interest:

3. Video Game Design
Video game development has evolved into a $9.9 billion industry and rivals Hollywood for blockbuster budgets and long production schedules. The video game industry expects to double employment over the next few years. The industry reported 144,000 jobs in 2004; that number should reach 265,000 by 2009.

This is good news for anyone with a vivid imagination, visual art skills, and/or storytelling abilities. With a degree in video game design from a technical institute, you can translate talent into a lucrative career as a video game producer, tester, programmer, or sound engineer. For the more artistically-inclined, there are several opportunities in graphic design, image modeling, and animation.

Ah yes, the hilarity continues. Apparently, my vivid imagination and storytelling abilities can translate into a career as a programmer. Sounds juicy.

Obviously, most people are extremely uninformed about how the whole making video games for a living works, and this article doesn’t help matters. My school actually has a game design major, but at least 70 percent of freshmen drop the major after realizing that actual work takes place (wait, so we don’t just play games for a living?!?!?). My best advice is to pick up Paid to Play and give it a read. It covers pretty much every aspect of the industry, so it’s definitely a great read even if you have no desire to work in games!

Yahoo!