Game Testing as a Career

For some people, video game testing is just a side job or a hobby that lets them make a little extra cash now and then. For others, though, they want to make game testing into a full career. Is this actually possible? Can you pay all of your bills every month by doing game testing, or is it just a good way to make some extra money?

Well, that depends on how much time you are willing to put into testing and on how lucky you are in securing testing jobs. For those who see game testing as a side job, they're often only willing to work on testing a few hours a day. They usually have a full time or part time job in addition to doing game testing, and they only do it because they enjoy working in the video game industry and testing games.

It doesn't take up a lot of their focus. However, if you're going to treat game testing as your career, you have to be willing to set aside a good six to eight hours a day to focus on it. This may mean turning off your home phone, sequestering yourself in a room that doesn't have anything distracting in it, and even telling your friends and family not to visit you during certain times. You've got to treat game testing as a real job; otherwise, you won't be able to test enough games a month to pay your bills. Remember, companies generally pay per game tested instead of paying an hourly fee.

Game Testing as a Career Tips

You also have to be certain to make all of your deadlines and keep to the schedule the game company gives you. If you fall behind, you may not be able to make up the lost time, or you may have to put in some ten or twelve hour testing days and no one enjoys working that many hours.

Another important thing to know if you're thinking of doing game testing as a career is that it's OK to work for more than one game company if you're not under an exclusive contract. In fact, to really make a living as a game tester, this is almost a necessity. One game company may only have a game for you to test every two or three months, for example, and you obviously can't make a living off of that. Just be careful that you don't overextend yourself—you could find yourself with four or five games to test at once, and that will once again lead to working ten or more hours a day. If you enjoy that and can make all of the deadlines, it's certainly an option, but you don't want to overwhelm yourself.

Remember that if you're working as a freelance game tester, you may be hired as contract labor by the game company. Often, this means that a lot of taxes are not withheld from your pay. Be sure to put some money aside to pay this when you file so you don't panic when you see that you owe tax money.

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