MOVERS AND SHAKERS This month: Valve, Turbulenz, Mind Candy and Reloaded Productions
VALVE CLINT HOCKING has taken a job at Valve, according to a Twitter update. He recently announced his departure from
LucasArts, and said he had found work elsewhere, but did not say where. Hocking broke his silence last month
and teased his new job at the studio behind Half-Life and Portal in a Twitter post showing his son playing on the company namesake in the lobby of its Washington office. The former Ubisoft employee
worked on the original Splinter Cell, and served as creative director for the sequel Chaos Theory. He is also known for game design on Far Cry 2. Hocking joined LucasArts in 2010.
Langridge will be senior engineer.
His career in the games industry began at Bullfrog, where he was an artist. Later, he joined Lionhead where he worked on Fable and Black & White, as well as experiments, like Milo and Kate. Wyle is senior designer. Before joining Lionhead, he poured his passion for game design into various titles at Big Park Studios, Ubisoft Vancouver and EA Black Box, where he began his career working on Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2. At Turbulenz, they will be working on the studio’s first internal game and progressing its work on HTML5 research and development. “We are super excited to welcome
two world-class game developers to the Turbulenz team,” said Turbulenz COO Gavin Shields. “Adam and Rob have incredible
pedigree and to have them heading up our first internal game team is a huge boost for us. “Of course, we had to first convince them that HTML5, and Turbulenz in particular, represents a huge opportunity for developers. But once they saw what we have coming, they were quick to jump onboard.”
TURBULENZ Internet technology company Turbulenz has hired two former Lionhead staff, ADAM LANGRIDGE (left) and ROB WYLE. Langridge and Wyle were previously lead gameplay programmer and lead designer respectively, working on Fable: The Journey for Xbox Kinect.
MIND CANDY Moshi Monsters developer Mind Candy has hired ex- Playfish exec KEN WARD as its new director of talent.
Ward, who has assumed the newly
formed role, is now responsible for directing the outfit’s internal recruitment team, and will further focus on building the studio’s employment brand and talent acquisition strategy. “Mind Candy is an incredible
company,” said Ward. “The chance to help build such an exciting vision was too compelling to pass up. We have a talented, passionate and committed team and I’m thrilled to help build upon such strong foundations.” Mind Candy COO and CFO, Divinia
Knowles, added: “We’re delighted to have Ken on board, he brings a wealth of experience to the role following his years at Playfish and has made a great impact on the business since joining.” Prior to joining Mind Candy, Ward
served as people operations director at Playfish. He has also held roles at Skype and a number of financial bodies.
RELOADED PRODUCTIONS MMO publisher Reloaded Productions has appointed former Realtime Worlds director of IT,
MICHAEL BONIFACE, as its new European managing director. Boniface, who has been promoted
from his role as general manager, will be responsible for the company’s business operations across Europe and
increasing the publisher’s presence in Asia and Latin America. In his previous role at the company,
Boniface led the management of the redesigned free-to-play title All-Points Bulletin: Reloaded. Boniface will be based in
GamersFirst’s European headquarters in Edinburgh, Scotland. “I am delighted to be working at a
new level with Reloaded Productions during a very exciting time for the company and the wider games industry,” he said. “Reloaded’s European operation has expanded rapidly over the last year to accommodate the huge growth in online gaming, increasing numbers of players and new opportunities worldwide to bring our games to entirely new markets. “We have ambitious plans for the
future, which include helping other companies to use our technology, experience and expertise to bring their games to a huge global audience.” Boniface joined Reloaded in March
2011, after leaving Realtime Worlds, the original creators of APB. His background is in technology and
IT, which has enabled Reloaded to make strong strides in the free-to-play market as it grows and evolves. Reloaded Productions will continue
to adopt new business models, explore new areas of gaming and find new distribution channels in order to attract increasing numbers of players from new markets worldwide.
Service & technology recruitment hot seat We speak to Epic Games’ recruitment manager Tim Johnson about what it takes to join the engine maker’s ranks
What makes Epic different from other game engine companies? At Epic we make amazing engine technology as well as amazing games. Because our games drive our engine tech, whatever it is we’re working on has an impact on the engine. There aren’t many, if any, development studios where you can see pieces of systems you helped create used by thousands of other developers in hundreds of games.
What benefits do you offer your employees at Epic? We cover 100 per cent of all benefits for employees and their families. This extends to things including medical and dental insurance, life insurance, a $401k retirement plan with a generous match and profit sharing component, holiday or sick leave,
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flexible hours, a one-month sabbatical after seven years of employment and a very generous bonus plan.
With Unreal Engine 4 on the horizon, are you looking to expand? We’re always hiring at Epic, and that certainly pertains to phenomenal artists and programmers of all disciplines. We’re currently looking to expand our production and marketing teams at our headquarters in Cary, North Carolina. And we’re also recruiting programmers and artists for our other studios, such as Chair, Epic Games Japan, Epic Games Korea and People Can Fly.
Why go for a career in game engines rather than development? Our games drive our engine and tools development. Working at a company
that makes both awesome games and engine tech is an opportunity for everyone – artists, designers and programmers alike – to be on the ground in helping to shape the next generation of games, and have a huge influence on where the industry goes.
What advice can you give for a successful interview? First, be yourself. Employers want to get a good idea of who you are and what it will be like to work with you. Be ready to meet with lots of different people and talk about what you can bring to the table. We want to hire people who really want to work for Epic, so tell us why you want to. Be ready to talk about why you
want to make games. Don’t be afraid to display your passion, and again, be honest about what makes you excited
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as a developer. Don’t tell us what you think we want to hear, tell us what you think. A big part of the reason we’re going to hire you is because we think you’re going to make us better. Make sure you can talk about why having you on the team will benefit us. Also, be ready to ask questions.
While it’s important that we like you, it is equally important that you’ll be happy here.
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