Hello everyone. My name is Dylan and I'm an 18 year old high school student. I'm going to be starting my CS degree in the fall so I won't be applying for any real jobs for ~4.5 years.

From what I've read, small code samples showing off a clean, elegant, efficient solution to a difficult problem are often a good thing to provide on your resume. But I'm curious, is there any benefit in providing the employer with a closed source, completed, polished game? Not just a 2D arcade game but something of higher complexity like an RTS with networking or a single player 3D RPG.

From my perspective, providing the employer with something like this would show them that I'm serious about game development and I have the passion and skill to complete large, high-quality projects.

So, is a completed game something employers would be interested in seeing? Would they want to have access to the source code too?

Thanks.

Yes, it's a great benefit to provide completed games. As you say, it proves you care about what you're doing, and that you can finish a job. In fact, the more games/demos you can provide, the better! Nice large portfolios are always a plus.

Having source available is important, just in case someone wants to review it - but keep in mind that most places won't bother checking into large code bases without seeing some smaller examples of your skills first. So don't neglect those small, quick-to-digest examples either.


Either way, it sounds like you're on the right track; best of luck and we'll see you in the biz in 4 years [wink]