Specialist or Generalist

Once, games were produced with one or two people doing every job. In the very beginning games were purely code produced by a single programmer. As it’s grown and matured alongside the technology that supports it, the game industry has diversified in roles and as game sizes grow so too do the size of the studios and teams that produce them. Recently companies outsource their work as well as using their own employees. The industry is now a fast-moving multi-billion dollar industry that has risen from a niche industry in focused markets to a mainstream industry that took 25.1 billion in 2010, in the United states alone.

After several guest lectures from the industry over the course of the last two years we’ve contemplated our future roles and jobs in the future and one of the most prevalent questions we’ve been asking is it better to be a generalist or a specialist? Better to excel at one chosen field or be capable at many or all? After the uncertainties of the industry it would certainly seem better to be a jack of all trades; able to turn your hand to anything a company may ask of you and if you intend to become a freelancer in the field then that adaptability will serve you very well.

Now I personally have always preferred to have a healthy mix of the two, sometimes called a T shaped person with a core skill and experience in others. I’m confident enough in my skills to count certain things amongst my specialities whilst having the confidence in my ability to attempt things I would not consider to be my strong points. I am not afraid to go where my skills are lacking to improve them. A prime example of this being my choice for the final major project; Of all of last year’s projects the foliage and tree projects were my least favourite, and possibly my least successful. This year however I’ve chosen to take this and turn it around and my final major project is hopefully to be a garden.

This game art course has given us the opportunity to try a wide range of skills and build our talents in each. But rather than the skills themselves the greatest thing I have learnt in this course in my opinion is the ability to react quickly, learning as I go to build skills. At the start of this course I could not have imagined the things I’ve produced but the steep learning curve has served me well.

In order to work in the industry successfully now, I’m of the belief that unless someone is of incredible talent, the talent of being able to turn your hand to whatever is handed to you is a far more valuable skill than the ability to create one set of objects spectacularly. In terms of employability the diverse nature of skills will allow you to apply and take on many different jobs and fill many positions within those jobs.