Going Abroad

I too am interested in this (sweden and canada mostly )

i heard icelandic chicks are the hottest on the planet !

Sweden also has Avalanche, the guys that made the Just Causes

I think moving to sweden from europe is easy-peasy, I moved here from Norway 4 years back and I didn't have to do anything special (although that was within Schengen)

I see you're in Germany, ask steppenwolf how it was for him to make the move from there to sweden

Moving to Sweden is no big hurdle for EU citizens bureaucracy wise. Biggest problem there is to find a place to live because most houses and appartements are not for rent. And the ones who are are mostly in the rather shabby areas on the outskirts. It can also take years to get something for rent.

You can buy something which is a certain risk because you don't know for how long you are in the country. If the house prices fall this could bite you in the ass when you have to leave.

What i did was to rent an appartement second hand from someone who studied somewhere else. Catch is: it was more expensive, but good thing was that all furniture, TV, Internet etc. was already there. The company helped me to find this place.

Culturally living in Sweden is not a big shock. Most things are similar to Germany. Some things work a bit better (taxes and banking for example), some work a bit worse (health system).

Getting into Germany from Portugal was no biggie at all either. In fact, I didn't even had to do jack shit, Crytek's HR dept took care of everything for me.

And afaik, it's very very easy to move around inside EU if you want to, especially for us devs, the company your joining will help you with everything.

My girlfriend just joined me here in Germany, and since she doesn't have a job yet it makes things a little bit complicated, but it's still fairly easy because again, she's a EU citizen, no visa needed.

Since she's living with me, and I'm the only one who works for now, I need to sign a document saying that I'm responsible for her, and show proof of my last paychecks and she also needs to get a German insurance by herself, but again if you already have a job you don't need to go through this hassle.

But what the OP meant was how hard is it, and what are the circumstances involved into moving abroad while working in the games industry.

Well, if you're a EU citizen wanting to get into the US? It's really really difficulty and for many impossible. There's a lot of things you need, and you need to have a degree inside the same area of the job your going to work on in the US, or 12 years of professional experience in that field, even if you have a company sponsoring you.

Companies like Blizzard have emigration lawyers that know how and where to pull a few strings to make it easier for you, but all in all, for a EU citizen getting into the US is not sweet peas.

Getting into Canada, whereas is not as easy to move inside EU it's much easier to get than US!

PS.

Make sure you read this: http://www.polycount.com/forum/showpost ... ostcount=1

I live in Sweden, and it should be no biggie for anyone to move here! If you stay here illegal we have the worst police officers that won´t care to find you, almost no military force and worst of all, alchohol and beer is expensive as fuck. Most Swedes rent a big truck, go to Germany, load it with beer, then go home. (Atleast i do sometimes, saves me shitload of money).

On the serious side, it shouldn´t be a problem as long as you got something to do, altho you can come here and not do anyhthing for 10 years and still stay like many other people in my town have done. A part of me hates my country so much after how i got treated by the authorities, but most of the time it works. If you go to Sweden, be sure to stay close to the coast cities, they are the only good ones, the deeper you go into this country the more it sucks.

Come move to Toronto Mino, and join our team!

It's piss easy to get a visa to come to canada, ubi sorts out and these canadian type folk are really friendly to work with.

Quote from Zombie

Come move to Toronto Mino, and join our team!It's piss easy to get a visa to come to canada, ubi sorts out and these canadian type folk are really friendly to work with.

I did apply to Toronto but they are only hiring senior people now. Our studio's HR manager did his best to relocate everyone but out of all people who applied, only one got a job so far (a senior programmer, he's starting in Toronto in December or January).

What really spoiled my chances was that I had to rush to get my portfolio sent on time. I'll contact the recruiter soon when I have my portfolio updated.

HP: I just got a little worried now for having dropped out of college when I came to Sao Paulo. I should have started another diploma but it's so damn expensive here that I'd rather go back to my hometown and finish the one I started. But then that would take another 2.5 years of my life

It would also be nice if Dorothy shared her immigration experiences in this thread

Quote from Tisky

I live in Sweden, [... ]and worst of all, alchohol and beer is expensive as fuck.

Wait, what?

Most norwegians load up a big truck and travel to sweden to load up on beer and vodka

I heard that in Finland beer is very very very expensive too!

There is more or less no games industry in Ireland. Not the top place to live in the world I can say from experience too.

Yeah I wouldn't go for Ireland, not heard of many good companies there.

Also, Sarge Mat, are you a student in Stafford? I swear we've spoke about this before!

Quote from Skjalg

Wait, what?

Most norwegians load up a big truck and travel to sweden to load up on beer and vodka

Yeah, Norway have some crazy prizes, not really tourist friendly

You should travel to Burg, in germany and visit Calle.dk . Make sure you got a big trailer.

Quote from PogoP

Yeah I wouldn't go for Ireland, not heard of many good companies there.Also, Sarge Mat, are you a student in Stafford? I swear we've spoke about this before!

Yea I am, think we did talk about it before back in the summer. Not a bad uni sounds like this year is a lot better than past ones from what people tell me.

Europe:

Sweden is the closest thing you'll get in Europe to a "stable" industry next to England, which is not saying much. Sweden I think is the second biggest video games country in Europe in terms of numbers of studios or even their importance.

The UK (read England) has by far the largest established base, but they're all pretty gloomy right now aside from the infallible Rockstar and a few other successful places like Rocksteady, Media Molecule or Ninja Theory (from the looks of it). At least they keep saying they can't get talent, are pissed at Canada for being so cheap and are disappointed they didn't get their own tax breaks.

Germany has Crytek, possibly Yager depending on what they come up with with their recent project.

France has Ubisoft that never hires anyone permanently before giving them contracts for as long as they possibly can, so if you're looking for stable you can go somewhere else. Not to mention piss poor salaries and the absolute need to speak French to everyone around you. Bethesda bought Arkane so it will be interesting to see if they can get their heads out of the water a bit higher.

Spain has basically very little of any significance, so does Portugal, Switzerland or Italy.

The Netherlands has Guerilla, and Denmark has IO Interactive. We'll see what Hourences gets with The Ball, maybe that's a new powerhouse in the making

Finland has Rovio that is doing great for itself in a genre that's really not your current one. Remedy too but they're still very small and Finnish only so going there might be some sort of lonewolf adventure.

Iceland has CCP (Eve Online)

And that about sums it up.

Canada:

Huge development community in Montreal, followed somewhat by Vancouver and Toronto. Montreal itself has Ubisoft, Visceral, Square Enix, THQ, Warner Bros, A2M, Bioware and an army of small start ups looking to make it big. Quebec has Beenox and Ubisoft. Toronto has only recently started to grow its industry with Ubisoft, but you can also find Digital Illusions and Silicon Knights nearby. Vancouver I hear has hit a bit of a snag lately, with seemingly only Blue Castle Games really hitting it off alright after having recently been purchased by Capcom. Ubi also has a studio there, and there is always Propaganda (Disney) although they just canceled one of their two projects.

US:

Florida has a few low key studios, while North Carolina still has Epic and Tripwire Interactive. NYC has Kaos still there and no one else (publishers only). Boston is seeing some good stuff with Irrational and Harmonix. 38 Studios just recently left for Rhode Island. The PAX East conference is likely to drive more business around Boston too.

Down south, Texas (Dallas, Austin) are doing ok, with the likes of Bioware, Id, Vigil Games (Darksiders) and others.

West coast still is where it's at the most, with dozens of studios in California and Seattle, the two hot beds for video games in the world.

Asia:

Singapore is interesting to follow with the recent arrival of big studios (Ubi comes to mind again) and the film industry (LucasFilms) China and Shanghai have always been a weird situation, where the companies likely to hire an experienced western developer are making games for the western markets too and not for the local one where tastes are drastically different.

Japan: Most likely have to be fluent in Japanese to even stand a chance.

Then it's time to find a new job

Quote from insta

Then it's time to find a new job

Sometimes the obvious answer is the best

Save some money for a rainy day every month and you will be less afraid of worst case scenarios.

For job safety the games industry unfortunately is a bad place.

Also try to not take too much stuff with you when you go abroad. Companies will pay relocation for you when they hire you but when you're out of job you pay for all the bills of moving back. With furniture and stuff this can get very expensive.