Randmness

In my last post I explained the requirements for game testing and where to look for a job as a game tester. In this post I’ll focus on the Downs to game testing because I think it makes sense to explain the bad stuff before getting into the good parts to the job. Before diving into this post I’ve got another video for you to watch. This is from X-Play and was a feature from a few months ago.

Before you apply for a testing job there are some things to keep in mind. I’m going to start of with the Downs to Game Testing.

A few years ago I left my job as a Recording Engineer and started a new life as a Video Game Tester. Everyone that knew me was jealous because I’d be getting paid to play video games. Sounds like a fun job right? Well over the next few posts I’m going to talk about the basic of game testing. But first watch this informative video!

Wasn’t that hilarious! To start things off that is neither game testing nor is it game programming. There is no place in the world where that situation would actually happen - other than in good ole’ TV land. Now that you’re all loosened up from that laughing spell here are the requirements and tips on where to look for a job.

The Macbook Air is now available through Apple’s website and I have to admit that it does look sleek. The problem I have with the laptop (referred to as the ‘MBA’ by Mac lovers) is that it isn’t meant for everyday laptop users.

The $1800 stock MBA unit comes with a 1.6 GHz processor, 2 GBs of RAM, built in Bluetooth, backlit keyboard, and built in 802.11n wireless connectivity which is just over the minimum for what someone would need in a laptop nowadays. It’s also very small; just over 12 inches wide, 8 inches deep, is less than 1 inch closed, and weighs only 3 pounds. It even has an estimated battery life of 5 hours with the wireless connectivity enabled. All of this sounds great right?

Recently my fiance and I took a trip with her family to Jamaica. We were there for a week and stayed at the Holiday Inn Montego Bay resort and BOY did we have a lot of fun!

The Holiday Inn Montego Bay is an All Inclusive hotel. This means that all of the food, drinks, and liquor are included in the cost of the stay. Basically the hotel is a cruise on land with shows, activities, games, and just about everything else to keep a person occupied during their stay.

Here’s a map of the campus, along with a breakdown of the different things to do:

Portal, a apart of the Orange Box edition of Half Life 2, is a pretty fun game. It’s not a 1st person shooter; it’s a puzzle game. The basic story is that your character is in secret testing facility and is being forced to figure out how to get through a set of rooms using a ‘Portal Gun.’ The gun is able to shoot large holes in walls and floors that are big enough to walk through, making it easy to get from one side of a room to the other by just shooting a hole in a wall next to you and shooting a wall at the other end of the room. Below is a screen shot of what I’m talking about.

The Nintendo Wii is a pretty popular game system right now. It’s in such demand that Nintendo can’t even manufacture units quick enough for consumers. My brother stood in line at the crack of dawn to get one a while back and I have to say that it’s a pretty neat piece of machinery. Heck, even my parents are into playing Wii Sports with us every once in a while.

Cloverfield is out today but more importantly just before the movie starts there is a new trailer for Star Trek XI.

The trailer will be released on Paramount’s Star Trek Site, along with StarTrek.Com on Monday. The casting for Star Trek XI can be found on Wikipedia here.

After I got U-Verse installed the day after Christmas my fiance and I started to notice that shows would freeze for up to 10 minutes, that the picture would become distorted and blocky with pixels, and that the HD stations would have a hard time keeping up with the picture (we’d get colors from past frames in the new frame making things look like an acid trip).When the install tech left he gave me his card and told me to call him if I had any problems so I gave him a ring. After answering the basic questions he asked me to go to the U-Verse router’s information page. After reading out some of the numbers that were on the screen it was decided that the phone line going into my apartment was bad. Here’s a screen shot of that screen.

So here we are at Part 3. This entire post will be dedicated to tips on how to survive as a recording studio intern. It is important to remember that an intern is part janitor and part concierge service. While both jobs may seem mundane or stupid the both can teach you a lot and give you plenty of contacts for the future. The one thing to remember is that being an intern is a stepping stone to the job in audio that you really want. You may not care for the clientele that comes in to do work or the type of recording (live sound, ADR, scoring, ect.) that is done in one particular studio and decide to go to another studio to work. The thing is that regardless of where you end up working the skills that you learn along the way as an intern can do nothing that help you deal with whatever may come up in the future.

There are a lot of rules for what you can not do as an intern. Unfortunately being the ‘low man on the totem pole’ leaves little, if any, actual work that has to do with recording. For the most part an intern is the faceless and nameless person behind the scenes that helps get the session up and running, and is around to help keep the session running smoothly. I’ve come up with a list of rules and explanations below to try and help out anyone wanting to be an intern. If these rules seem stupid or obvious that’s ok - a lot of interns that I had were young kids that didn’t have a chance to work out in the ‘real world’ before going to school or deciding to get into the recording industry. My hope is that this list of rules covers as much as possible but if I’ve left anything out please let me know!