1. How is public transportation? In most cities you can get everywhere without a car?
2. Which part has the most modern standard of living overall? London?
3. How is the post? Is it a major part of life or uses as rarely as possible?
4. How about paying bills? I never paid bills in America but I recall seeing on TV they send checks via mail to pay.
5. How about checks? They don’t exist in Japan due to being inconvenient.
6. How about mail? Can most packages be delivered to your local convenience store like in Japan so that you don’t have to be home nor have to go to the post office?
7. Weather?
8. Wall-socket voltages? Compared to Japan. I don’t want to short out everything I own by plugging them in.
9. Health care?
10. Insurance?
11. Are dental and medical stupidly considered separate like in America, or correctly considered the same like in Japan?
12. What is a typical benefits package at a company?
I live near to Cambridge and commute to London a lot. Have never been to Ireland (yet!)
1. People like to complain about public transport but it is generally good. We have a prolific train service to get all over the country. Bus routes in towns and cities. In London there is also the underground tube train system and Taxicabs (although taxis in general exist all over the place). So yes you can get around without a car, no problem. Trains and buses might be late from time to time though. If you live outside of a city then a car is actually a pretty viable option too, it's not that hard to get a license and cars aren't (or don't have to be) all that expensive really.
2. London has the full spectrum, you'll find some of the lowest standards of living there as well as some of the world's best. For the average citizen I would actually argue they have lower standard of living in London (and most cities in fact) on the basis that most of my city-dwelling friends live in rented flats shared with flatmates, whereas I (living outside of a city) live in a 2-bed house with just my wife and I pay about the same monthly cost.
3. Post is provided by Royal Mail. It's reliable. If a letter goes undelivered it's a talking point! Individuals rarely send letters though. I can't remember the last time I wrote a letter, whereas I receive post almost daily. Most of what you receive are summaries about your banking or bills (which can be handy), the rest is basically spam.
4. Bills are paid with direct-debit or standing-order. So you set them up once and forget about them (just keep an eye on your online banking).
5. Cheques (that's how we spell it) do exist but are rarely used. Your bank will issue you a cheque book when you open an account. Only once in a blue moon you will have to write one, usually if the company you are dealing with is low-tech and even then it'll just be a one-off thing like a deposit.
6. Yes! We have a lot of options in that regard. Obviously there are post-offices, as you mentioned. But we can have online orders be delivered in-store for collection. Some stores even offer "reserve and pay" where they just hold stock for a period of time and you only pay when/if you come to collect. We also have services like Collect+ (and similar) which is a service opted into by private establishments where they act as collection points for your parcels so you can collect them later, they could be petrol stations, corner shops, supermarkets, etc. I've used that many times for Amazon deliveries. Sometimes I also just order stuff to my work offices, especially with Amazon Prime's free next day delivery (I usually know where I'll be tomorrow and just order stuff there).
7. Stereotypical weather is rain, especially in Ireland. In fact it's not raining all the time but it certainly can rain at any time of the year. Brilliant hot weather and clear blue skies are only available for 2-3 months of the year, if that. Get's cold in Winter, some years we have snowfall, some years we don't.
8. 230V 50Hz. Bear in mind that devices which were developed for cross-regional markets will likely work on a variety of rated voltages. You might just want to check laptop power adapters, USB wall chargers, or anything that is potentially intended for a Japanese-only market.
9. Public healthcare is dominant here, called the National Health Service (NHS). We do have private healthcare too, for those who can/want to afford it. You'll pay taxes as you earn to fund the NHS regardless of whether you use it. It's a strained service but still manages to offer high-quality healthcare IMO. It's one of those things you appreciate more if/when you suddenly find you need it.
10. We have all kinds of insurance (health, property, car, pet, etc). I guess you're referring to health insurance? It exists but I would say most people don't bother unless you want private healthcare.
11. More or less considered separate. There *are* NHS dentists, but they are few and far between, if you live near to one then you're lucky. Most dentist practices are private. Same goes for opticians.
12. It varies. The most common one is "competitive salary" ;-) Many companies don't offer one. You might get employee share options as an incentive. Gym membership/discounts. I always think
RedGate offer an unusually good benefits package. Pension schemes are widely offered but then they are in fact (nearly) a legally enforced requirement for companies to provide and over the next few years workplace pensions will be a hard legal obligation for all companies (you have a state pension too).
Finally, it would be great if anyone could throw out any high-end game-developer names from there.
So aside from Rareware, Sony, Rockstar North, Guerrilla Games, Media Molecule, and Jagex, what am I forgetting?
You probably named the ones I was going to say. Perhaps just worth pointing out that companies like EA, Ubisoft, Microsoft Studios, Square Enix, etc have studios here in the UK too, but they're not 'from here' as such. Do you enjoy working for one of these already? If so you could consider asking for a transfer.
