Here's a quick update about what I've been up to in my games design journey and career since my last posts 3 months ago in October. Following my final submission on October 10th, I spent a bit of time taking a more leisurely pace to my work and studies, taking a break from practical work and just doing casual reading and research.
In late October I attended a testing day in the game design studio at UCLan - several members of the Preston-based game developer Soccer Manager Ltd came in and had students from the game design course testing the Beta version of their game for the day. While there, I was introduced to one of the company's founding members and their lead QA tester. We discussed the game and my previous experience in QA, and they asked me to send in my CV to apply for a Games Tester vacancy at their office in Preston. Long story short, I ended up going for an interview and being offered a job, and I started working at Soccer Manager on 13th November 2017!
I've now been working as a Games Tester at Soccer Manager for nearly 3 months and its proving to be a really stimulating and enjoyable job. I've already learned a lot about testing and development and I count myself very lucky to have landed my 2nd job in the games industry before I'd even officially graduated with my MA. Soccer Manager Ltd develop free-to-play football management games for PC and mobile, that are played by thousands of users all around the world. Their recent releases include Soccer Manager 2018 and Soccer Manager Arena.
My duties at the company include day-to-day testing of new updates and features across all platforms and games, creating and tracking bug reports, and occasional customer support tasks. It's a relatively small company with a small QA team which means that its a more responsible and hands-on job than my QA job at Tt Fusion in Summer 2016 was. The company is close-knit and direct collaboration with the development team is a regular occurrence. I'm learning a lot of new skills, refining my previous testing skills and gaining some really valuable experience in a very enjoyable role and atmosphere.
I've also recently graduated from my MA Games Design course, on December 5th. It was a great day and I'm really proud of what I have achieved and how far I've come in the past year or so. I'm at an exciting time in my career and my journey into the games industry. I now plan to give it my all in my job at Soccer Manager, while also developing and honing my design skills further in my free time!
