
Ask HN: Thinking about Applying for a Gamedev Job, Any Tips about My Portfolio? - aurelwu
I have a sort of messy CV (multiple studies without degree), been self-employed for the past years working on a super niché project (Energy Market Simulations) and some other small projects, and now consider applying for a junior position at a  german game developer working on an RTS (I&#x27;m german myself). I put together a quick portfolio. I never applied anywhere before so could you please give me some feedback, I&#x27;m a bit at a loss - I obviously could improve the design of it but for now I&#x27;m not even sure if I should include all those small not-very polished side projects or not.<p>Aurelwu.github.io&#x2F;portfolio.html
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blueboo
It's good and you'll be fine if you leave it as is. IF you have extra time to
mess with it, read on.

Be aware that on average the people interviewing you will look at your
portfolio for ~60 seconds. Show off the stuff you're proud of and think is
interesting.

Show your games in action: use gifs. It'll make people more likely to try the
actual games. They still almost certainly won't, but that's not a strike on
you, it's just that there's literally no time.

Tell us why the project is cool. "Random terrain generation in ShaderGraph!..A
unique twist on Sokoban with procedural puzzle generation! An Excel add-on
that visualizes energy market futures using realtime data!"

If this is used instead of a CV, I'd want to know what languages and tech are
involved with each project too.

List the relevant companies for the playtesting experience. Knowing which QA
operation you were in is more important than the specific game.

Finally, I'd encourage you to do a little bit more styling of the webpage.
Let's get some margins to center up the content. Use complete sentences with
correct grammar, but keep things as brief as possible. Let the gifs and
screenshots speak for themselves when they can.

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aurelwu
Lots of good advice, thanks a lot. As they are a rather small company and they
posted the position a few months ago I think they might spend a bit more than
60 seconds but gifs are still more telling than still images.

There will be a CV, list of languages/tech I am experienced with and cover
letter as well, so I omitted that here, might add it to the work projects for
clarity.

Improving the styling - not my strong point but I should definitely do it.

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cbanek
> including 1st Place in Supreme Commander with my brother Dario who now is
> professional Starcraft 2 Player (LiquidTLO)

As someone who has watched TLO play, that's pretty awesome.

I think your portfolio looks pretty good! I think the trick is really a good
cover letter or way to get attention before they look at your portfolio. If
you say why you're a good fit, and how you would like to work for them, and
why, and how you can help them with your skills, then they look at your
portfolio, I think you'll have a better chance. I personally think the hardest
step is the first one, because if a company has a lot of people applying, the
manager might only look over your resume/portfolio for a minute or two, and
might not even be fully paying attention when they do.

Building something and showing it off is still way ahead of most people, even
if you are a bit embarrassed about a lack of polish. That's what the artists
are for! Good luck!

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yellow_lead
Looked briefly and saw a typo. "A word typing game a friend and me created
during LD 42." Should be "a friend and I".

~~~
yesenadam
(At last! the perfect occasion to link to one of my favourite cartoons...
"THRAK AND I")

[http://explosm.net/comics/2830/](http://explosm.net/comics/2830/)

