A career in the video game industry may bring programming, animation, or game design to mind first, but major gaming companies employ people across a much wider range of fields.
Veterans can find opportunities in project management, cybersecurity, quality assurance, finance, customer support, human resources, marketing, and other areas. Companies such as Electronic Arts, Activision, and Microsoft recruit for positions well beyond game development.
Military experience in planning, logistics, leadership, communications, information technology, maintenance, security, or administration may already overlap with work being done inside gaming companies.
Production and Project Management
Large game projects bring together many teams working toward the same production schedule. Producers and project managers coordinate that work, track deadlines, resolve problems, and keep teams informed as development moves forward.
Veterans who have managed personnel, equipment, maintenance schedules, training plans, or complex operations may recognize many of those responsibilities. EA Careers, for example, includes production among the career fields supporting its studios and games.
Cybersecurity and Online Game Security
Online games depend on large networks and services that must be protected from fraud, cheating, security threats, and other disruptions. Gaming companies employ specialists in cybersecurity, infrastructure, privacy, threat analysis, and data protection.
Publishers such as Activision recruit technical professionals across security, infrastructure, data, and online services. Veterans coming from cyber, intelligence, communications, or information systems may find a direct connection between their military experience and these positions.
Business Operations, Finance, and Human Resources
Gaming companies need many of the same professionals found throughout other large businesses, including accountants, analysts, recruiters, human resources specialists, legal staff, facilities personnel, and managers.
Electronic Arts recruits across corporate and business functions in addition to game development. Veterans with experience in budgeting, supply, contracting, administration, personnel management, or organizational leadership may be able to pursue similar work without changing career fields entirely.
Customer and Community Support
Games that remain online for years require teams that communicate with the people playing them. Customer support specialists handle account and technical problems, while community, marketing, and publishing teams work with players, share updates, collect feedback, and support events.
Military experience in public affairs, recruiting, instruction, customer service, or communications can be relevant in these roles. Knowledge of games can help, but companies also need employees who can communicate clearly, solve problems, and work with different groups of people.
Quality Assurance and Game Testing
Quality assurance involves much more than playing games. Teams test software for problems, document errors, reproduce issues, and work with developers as those problems are corrected.
Veterans with experience following technical procedures, inspecting equipment, troubleshooting systems, documenting discrepancies, or working in quality control may already have skills that apply to this type of work. Some positions require additional technical knowledge, but game testing can provide another path into the industry without a background in programming or design.
A Different Way Into the Industry
Breaking into gaming can be competitive, and some positions require additional education, certifications, software experience, or a portfolio. Veterans do, however, have several resources available to help with the transition.
Activision’s military and Veterans careers page provides information for former Service Members interested in the company, while Hiring Our Heroes connects Service Members, Veterans, and military spouses with employers through fellowships, networking, and career programs.
Veterans in Gaming from Hire Heroes USA focuses specifically on entering the video game industry, and Microsoft maintains military and Veteran career resources for those interested in opportunities across the company.
Veterans interested in gaming may want to begin by comparing open positions with the work they already know how to do rather than searching only for jobs with “game” in the title. Production managers, financial analysts, cybersecurity specialists, recruiters, quality professionals, and project managers can all work in gaming without designing a character or writing code.
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