Hey, y'all, let's talk for a minute.

[SpaceGhost2K]

I know it's been kinda quiet in here. Been kinda quiet for a while, actually. I sent an email to Kamshaft, but didn't get an answer, nor have I seen him around here. Ghostrider's been busy. Moltenluv kinda disappeared. It's kinda like everybody came together as a group for a while and now everybody is back to doing their own thing. The last three customs I sold on eBay I practically gave away, and the two I didn't give away, didn't sell, either.

I've got a lot of plates to work on. A few of those are for people but most of them are for games that I hope to get signed by devs. A guy who sent me five emails back and forth about a plate finally found out I was asking a whole $45 for his custom, and he said "Oh, never mind then." Someone else is buying some stickers for what they cost me and nothing more.

I've wanted to be in the gaming industry so bad for a long time that I'm doing irrational stuff. I agreed to take on some writing projects for a website called thegamereviews.com. I spent 15 hours playing Dead Space so I could write them a review, and a couple of hours working on the review, and a couple MORE hours editing the review along with the staff there. I did two other articles for them, too. I had to write them back and tell them there just wasn't any way I could keep a schedule like that.

I started back at Game Crazy. I have an interview next week in LA with a Gamestop DM who I THOUGHT had a manager position available, but doesn't. However, he does have an ASM position available but I don't think I can justify moving to LA for that. Still, this guy is the guy to know, so I'm considering it a recon mission.

I also have an offer to submit freelance work to OXM. I sent inquiries out to two places about potential stories. One place never got back to me. The other said they would, and THEN never got back to me. Plus I still haven't been paid by OXM for the article I DID write. I emailed last week, and THEY haven't gotten back to me.

I wrote a concept for a game that we never got a chance to pitch because the company changed gears and went a different direction. And there's so much I want to do in here at XBA to this database to make it more than a really long list, and there's just nobody to do it.

Maybe it's all just mid-life crisis. I want to have some kind of an impact on SOMETHING. All of my swings seem to just be glancing blows.

So, sorry for the emo moment.

I think what I might do is this: I might call 2009 the last hurrah for the game industry. That might change if I do get in somewhere where I can make a positive impact. But I think I'll do something like... I'll work on faceplates until 1/1/10 and then say goodbye to the customizing hobby. I'll still collect them if there's money to be had, but there's other things to be done, too. I'll go to E3 if I can, and PAX if it is at all possible. But once 1/1/10 gets here, I think I will relegate my connection to the gaming industry to "a guy who plays games" and leave it at that. That will give me a long time to work through the requests that I have, and the things that I want to do for my own creative outlet.

To end: This isn't a "me" thread. It's just a thread. If you've got something you want to talk about with the rest of us faceplate guys, throw it out here.

[Floppy Brown]

After reading your post and knowing your skills at faceplate crafting (among other things probably), it'd be a shame that your talent(s) would be wasted or underused.
Times are hard at the moment but there's still room for hope and there's room for you in the videogame industry.

I think you should stick with faceplates customization and offer your skills to game developers / publishers for events like E3, GDC, PAX... where 360 with WIP games would be running. It'd be something perfect for companies to promote their games without the need of a huge scale command to faceplate manufacturers.

I'm a videogame developer myself (in Europe) and having a couple of faceplates for games we're presenting would be a must.

I don't know if you're on it yet but you should register on LinkedIn for example to build a "job network" by getting in touch with people from this business.
Have a look for tester jobs if available in your area, that's most of the time one of the first steps in the videogame industry.

You can pm / mail me if you have anymore questions or just want to chit chat.

Take care and don't lose hope.
Floppy

[Symmetric-XBA]

space after reading this I need to talk to you a.s.a.p. man. trust me, its nothing bad at all, however, I have something under wraps that I've kept quiet on for a long time, however, this is something that I can not do alone. if you get on xbl sometime soon man hit me up w/ a private chat b/c this will take a LONG LONG time to type lol.

[LINKINPARK8591]

Your very talented with the faceplates, i think floppy is right. Linkedin is a great site to make connection with different things. i have a account on there but havent used it in so long, i think i'm might have to start using it again. As for the faceplates i've been wanting to pick up some for the longest time but, for some reason didn't. And now that i've really been wanting too, i can't cuz i'm well unemployed and still looking for a job. Symmetric sounds like he's got something that he needs assistance with. To me it just sounds like your stressed and over stretching yourself.

[KatamariKutie]

I dunno.... you bought a new red car last year, you got a 29 year old girlfriend last year... I think it IS a midlife crisis......

There is nothing wrong with pursuing your dreams. (as long as others aren't hurt in the process)

I don't see a reason to link faceplates with the cessation of your pursuit of a gamer career. The want for them is going to taper off and all that - but I say as long as people are still willing to pay for them that you can use that as a creative outlet (unless you want to take up making origami with $100bills and give all your practice ones to me)

(PS though you ARE in the gaming industrty at GameCrazy -with the most contact with the customers - way more than any game company has with them)

[Symmetric-XBA]

Symmetric sounds like he's got something that he needs assistance with.

yeah definetly lol. this isn't something small but (i'm not going to say "if") but when it pans out it should be something absolutly huge that all xbox gamers will get to see. I'm looking for people w/ drive and determination to see this through. I'm not looking for people to feign interest and then do absolutly nothing to further this goal.

[KatamariKutie]

yeah definetly lol. this isn't something small but (i'm not going to say "if") but when it pans out it should be something absolutly huge that all xbox gamers will get to see. I'm looking for people w/ drive and determination to see this through. I'm not looking for people to feign interest and then do absolutly nothing to further this goal.

Ooh ooh ooh Do you need a cute blonde sissy gamer girl to sit around and provide moral support in exchange for 25% of the profits?

[LINKINPARK8591]

Ooh ooh ooh Do you need a cute blonde sissy gamer girl to sit around and provide moral support in exchange for 25% of the profits?

i'm sure moral support is always welcomed, when can you start providing that support?

[cin84_12]

I think that you've tried so hard to get into the gaming industry that you've forgotten about the actual games and how fun they can be. Maybe you do need a break from it to just sit back and enjoy playing again.

[SpaceGhost2K]

I think that you've tried so hard to get into the gaming industry that you've forgotten about the actual games and how fun they can be. Maybe you do need a break from it to just sit back and enjoy playing again.

Part of that is true, but I've always been more interested in the workings of the industry than the actual playing of games.

I'm going to be critical of Game Crazy for a second, even though I currently work there. We are out of COD4. We're out of Madden 09. We're out of Dead Space. We have one copy of Fable 2 after being out. We get a lot of pressure to sell MVP cards, console warranties, disc game guards (disc warranties) and take preorders. All of those are ways to bring in money without actually giving out a tangible product. Now I'm not saying those things aren't of value. Certainly, if your console dies, or your disc dies, or you buy used games at all, it's a deal. But WTF happened to being in the game business to sell GAMES?

They track all that stuff plus number of transactions, dollars per ticket, items per ticket, new and used percents, etc. And you're held accountable for those numbers. But what everybody seems to be missing is that these things ARE NOT THE GOAL. These things are indicative of the health of your store. If you are talking to customers and not just ringing things up, those numbers will be there, but sometimes they won't be. You can't beat peopel up because their numbers aren't there.

In the end, there's only ONE number that matters, and that's how much profit your store has made.

See, here's how it works. Organizations don't think very highly of their employees. Upper management doesn't think that lower management can be given a directive like, "You need to make $XXXXX in profit this quarter" and then let the management do it. What they do is, they lay down these metrics, or ways to measure the store, and they hold you accountable for those, figuring that if you hit those, you'll hit the profit number. Well people get praised for hitting them and beat up for not hitting them, and they actually have no idea whether their store was profitable or not. They don't even have a target number for profit, just for sales. And again, upper management figures that if they set a sales target, set a used game percentage target, set a dollar per ticket target, set an items per ticket target, set a warranty target, set an MVP card target and so on, that it will all magically come together to hit that profit number.

The problem is... you can't hit ANY number if you don't have Dead Space and Fable II and Spiderman and Madden 09 and Call of Duty 4 - the most played online game of the whole freakin' year. You can't get used games traded in if you don't have new games to sell to the people in the first place. Used games drive profit. Used games drive MVP sales. Used games drive disc warranties. All of that dies if you don't start off with new games. With Christmas coming, people want new games to give as gifts. If you don't have them, they don't get something else. They GO somewhere else.

[KatamariKutie]

i'm sure moral support is always welcomed, when can you start providing that support?

You can do it! Go team go! Um.... its not the dog in the fight its the fight in the dog.... um..... you shut your mo- no wait thats not a very nice one um....... Okay so I gotta practice some more....

[JakofallAces]

I know it's been kinda quiet in here. Been kinda quiet for a while, actually. I sent an email to Kamshaft, but didn't get an answer, nor have I seen him around here. Ghostrider's been busy. Moltenluv kinda disappeared. It's kinda like everybody came together as a group for a while and now everybody is back to doing their own thing. The last three customs I sold on eBay I practically gave away, and the two I didn't give away, didn't sell, either.

I've got a lot of plates to work on. A few of those are for people but most of them are for games that I hope to get signed by devs. A guy who sent me five emails back and forth about a plate finally found out I was asking a whole $45 for his custom, and he said "Oh, never mind then." Someone else is buying some stickers for what they cost me and nothing more.

I've wanted to be in the gaming industry so bad for a long time that I'm doing irrational stuff. I agreed to take on some writing projects for a website called thegamereviews.com. I spent 15 hours playing Dead Space so I could write them a review, and a couple of hours working on the review, and a couple MORE hours editing the review along with the staff there. I did two other articles for them, too. I had to write them back and tell them there just wasn't any way I could keep a schedule like that.

I started back at Game Crazy. I have an interview next week in LA with a Gamestop DM who I THOUGHT had a manager position available, but doesn't. However, he does have an ASM position available but I don't think I can justify moving to LA for that. Still, this guy is the guy to know, so I'm considering it a recon mission.

I also have an offer to submit freelance work to OXM. I sent inquiries out to two places about potential stories. One place never got back to me. The other said they would, and THEN never got back to me. Plus I still haven't been paid by OXM for the article I DID write. I emailed last week, and THEY haven't gotten back to me.

I wrote a concept for a game that we never got a chance to pitch because the company changed gears and went a different direction. And there's so much I want to do in here at XBA to this database to make it more than a really long list, and there's just nobody to do it.

Maybe it's all just mid-life crisis. I want to have some kind of an impact on SOMETHING. All of my swings seem to just be glancing blows.

So, sorry for the emo moment.

I think what I might do is this: I might call 2009 the last hurrah for the game industry. That might change if I do get in somewhere where I can make a positive impact. But I think I'll do something like... I'll work on faceplates until 1/1/10 and then say goodbye to the customizing hobby. I'll still collect them if there's money to be had, but there's other things to be done, too. I'll go to E3 if I can, and PAX if it is at all possible. But once 1/1/10 gets here, I think I will relegate my connection to the gaming industry to "a guy who plays games" and leave it at that. That will give me a long time to work through the requests that I have, and the things that I want to do for my own creative outlet.

To end: This isn't a "me" thread. It's just a thread. If you've got something you want to talk about with the rest of us faceplate guys, throw it out here.

Part of that is true, but I've always been more interested in the workings of the industry than the actual playing of games.

I'm going to be critical of Game Crazy for a second, even though I currently work there. We are out of COD4. We're out of Madden 09. We're out of Dead Space. We have one copy of Fable 2 after being out. We get a lot of pressure to sell MVP cards, console warranties, disc game guards (disc warranties) and take preorders. All of those are ways to bring in money without actually giving out a tangible product. Now I'm not saying those things aren't of value. Certainly, if your console dies, or your disc dies, or you buy used games at all, it's a deal. But WTF happened to being in the game business to sell GAMES?

They track all that stuff plus number of transactions, dollars per ticket, items per ticket, new and used percents, etc. And you're held accountable for those numbers. But what everybody seems to be missing is that these things ARE NOT THE GOAL. These things are indicative of the health of your store. If you are talking to customers and not just ringing things up, those numbers will be there, but sometimes they won't be. You can't beat peopel up because their numbers aren't there.

In the end, there's only ONE number that matters, and that's how much profit your store has made.

See, here's how it works. Organizations don't think very highly of their employees. Upper management doesn't think that lower management can be given a directive like, "You need to make $XXXXX in profit this quarter" and then let the management do it. What they do is, they lay down these metrics, or ways to measure the store, and they hold you accountable for those, figuring that if you hit those, you'll hit the profit number. Well people get praised for hitting them and beat up for not hitting them, and they actually have no idea whether their store was profitable or not. They don't even have a target number for profit, just for sales. And again, upper management figures that if they set a sales target, set a used game percentage target, set a dollar per ticket target, set an items per ticket target, set a warranty target, set an MVP card target and so on, that it will all magically come together to hit that profit number.

The problem is... you can't hit ANY number if you don't have Dead Space and Fable II and Spiderman and Madden 09 and Call of Duty 4 - the most played online game of the whole freakin' year. You can't get used games traded in if you don't have new games to sell to the people in the first place. Used games drive profit. Used games drive MVP sales. Used games drive disc warranties. All of that dies if you don't start off with new games. With Christmas coming, people want new games to give as gifts. If you don't have them, they don't get something else. They GO somewhere else.

HOLY **** WALL OF TEXT MUCH? and anyone who can read either of those posts by u in a minute isnt human, also.....damn man sorry to here that customizing and games really isnt working out for ya, sucks to have such a large part of your life wasted on something that just might not work, sorry mate, but look on the bright side.......its somewhere......oh here it is.....you may find something much more worth while and satisfactory if you persue another career, all the best, your best friend Jak

btw have fun reading the next wall of text below...vvvv

[Symmetric-XBA]

Space I know exactly what you are saying. Being an audio engineer I've gone through the trials and tribulations to earn where I am knowledge wise as well as career wise. Right out of school I wanted to get a job in the audio field, which is very very lucrative to begin with. Nothing seemed to pan out and I ended up getting a job w/ the audio company Bose. I went into the store (there's only one in the whole city where I live) and applied for a position there. I was greeted w/ an old friend of mine and she was all warm about bringing me on b/c she knew that I was a hard worker, so I guess to start things off it was good. She informed me on how Bose will set "sales goals" as well as "instal goals" and "extended warranties" and so on and so forth.
Well in the store we carried almost everything except the Bose Personal Amplification System (if you're a muscian and haven't heard one of these wow, you're denying yourself something special). The item is a cylinder about 6' tall and projects such a wonderfull tone from it. Well needless to say being the only Bose store in my city I would constantly be getting questions from clients not interested in any home theater products, but studio work as well. Now granted we sell individual speaker pairs, however, nothing I would ever even remotely consider for a studio. After listening to the speakers that Bose provides for the studio I would never reccommend them and instead talk to them about how this other brand offers better frequency response, a lower latency, and we would talk "shop" about audio. This was hated by my manager (who was a college drop out btw. and only a GED) b/c I never sold the product. I would sell the home theater and headphones and computer speakers and wave products, but when it came down to speakers for studio work I simply would not do it.
I retorted to her that the reason behind that is because would you rather have me "push" a sale which I know will be returned and thus damage the Bose image? Or would you rather have me give them the knowledge they want so they think that people that work here know what they're talking about and are being honest?" This didn't set well w/ her and she started saying that Bose taught me different, and I cut her off mid sentence and said bluntly "listen, I know more about audio than you, I have a degree and was trained by some of the top people in the industry, I've paid my dues, and for you who have never even at least set foot inside a real audio studio and know what the "ins and outs" to audio are, is wrong. Bottom line is that I left Bose after that due to the simple fact that if I can help I will, but don't tell me that you're better than me in the field of audio when I've got 6 years of education directly related to the audio field and I have a total of 15 years of audio education starting back from when I was in the 5th grade. lol
Needless to say that I was fighting an uphill battle so I had 1 of 2 choices to make, either further my own life and pursue what I love to do, or shut up and bend over. I took the 1st option and have never looked back. Upper management can't see logic past the end of their nose and rely on strict indimidation tactics (loss of bonuses, firing employees, etc..) who do not do their job, when if they looked at the situation logically they would realize that YOU are not the problem, and that a REAL solution to the issues that trouble them are sought in a different area. The fact that once upper management becomes so narrow minded it becomes almost impossible to make any headway b/c you will constantly be like a salmon swimming up stream and the upper management is just waiting for you to do something so they can snatch you up from the river.
I have had a real problem w/ management and their ethics and I feel that its wrong for employers to unload a bunch of fear into their employees if their employees are following a good code of ethics. One last example then I'll stop typing lol. In college I got a job working as a teller at a bank (National City which got bought recently by PNC). Well in this job I would meet people who are overdrawn on their account almost 25 days out of a month, every month. Well upper management wanted us as tellers to push the applications and sales of credit cards and lines of credit with the bank. I refused to do this b/c logic told me "If they can't even keep money in their account, what makes me think that they will pay the bank for this line of credit?" Well I was informed by my manager that I needed to make some sales, or that I would in essence be "let go".
I told her my ethics for not selling them, but b/c she couldn't see logic and all she saw was numbers, she couldn't understand or agree w/ me. Needless to say I got out of there b/c I refuse to be a part of a company that is taking advantage of people. I told her if you wanted to gain revenue for the bank, there are other ways to go about it, it all depends on how badly you want to make money FOR the bank. She didn't see it that way and we parted ways.

Ok now my fingers are breaking and sorry for the long post ppl, just had to vent a little and let space know that I know exactly where he's coming from, and its not fun at all. lol now for some advil for my fingers lol.

[OBL infad3ll]

spacy, you seem to be very well spoken and have great writing skills, maybe you should apply for a marketing or promotion spot at a real game developer.

[LINKINPARK8591]

You can do it! Go team go! Um.... its not the dog in the fight its the fight in the dog.... um..... you shut your mo- no wait thats not a very nice one um....... Okay so I gotta practice some more....

eh our moral booter, has Tourettes nice. Welcome aboard.

[SpaceGhost2K]

spacy, you seem to be very well spoken and have great writing skills, maybe you should apply for a marketing or promotion spot at a real game developer.

I've tried that a number of times. Most of them don't want someone with no experience. They want someone who wants to leave the same job with a different company. I don't know how to break into an industry where they just rotate people. What I need is someone with an entry level position in marketing, and not something where they're going to require you to handle all of the North American marketing for a game like Saints Row 2. I wouldn't hand a job like that over to some guy like me, but where does some guy like me learn to do that except by being in the department with his hands on?

In fact, I used to work for a record label based in Nashville. I sold music to Christian bookstores in nine western states, including two enormous chains of stores. I also worked as a buyer for a company who bought music and videos for 120 KMart stores and over a thousand Thrifty/Payless/Rite-Aid stores. A THOUSAND. So I've been a buyer, AND a seller.

So THQ has (or had, I dunno) a position open for a sales guy who's sole job would be to sell THQ product to Target. That's it. One seller. One buyer. Two guys across a desk, me and Mr. Target Video Game Buyer. I would make presentations. I would have their stores broken down by size of store (# of "A" stores, # of "B" stores, etc.). I would make quantity recommendations, and have the power to affect discount percentages and dating (30 days, 30/60 days, 60/90 days, 30/60/90 days, etc.) I would track co-op dollars and choose how to spend them on flyer, tv or in-store marketing. I could help conceive promotions for getting pre-orders or bonuses with purchases. I would work to guarantee shelf space for THQ games.

I am uniquely suited for that job, and still, I never even got a call back.

[wicked_d365]

I know what you mean about the Game Crazy stuff, that's why I hate dealing with any game store. Their all like that, all about the dollar bill. Forget the actual customer.
We need more people like Space in the gaming industry, looking out for the real, true gamers, like us.
Keep your head up and don't give up, it will all work out for you, I know it.

[KatamariKutie]

eh our moral booter, has Tourettes nice. Welcome aboard.

I do not have COOKIE tourettes. I just have random outbursts at SUPERNOVA sometimes awkward times. No big ALGEBRA deal.

[LINKINPARK8591]

I do not have COOKIE tourettes. I just have random outbursts at SUPERNOVA sometimes awkward times. No big ALGEBRA deal.

LOL ok i take that back it's just randomness.

[gh0st_r1der]

About breaking into the game industry. It might be hard to do it as programmer or artist if you've never did similar work before that.
I think you shouldn't try to go into the sales. One problem is that they want at least MBA even for junior positions and even if you don't have any experience.
Tester, designer or producer is more easy.
Especially in assistant or junior positions. We have alot of testers turned to designers or producers.
From assistant producer you can easy get to a designer job.
Now I'm not sure how assistant producers get picked but I bet 70% is passion for games, 10% experience and the rest who do you know.
Now passion and experience definitely can blend especially for producers position.
The higher rank you go less passion and more experience and connections are required.
The other unique way to get into the industry is actually to be the industry, i.e. open a studio and start doing it ... it is enourmous amount or work ... but is worth it