Types Of Jobs In The Game Audio Industry
Overview
The goal of this section is to offer insight into the many jobs and career paths available to you within the game audio industry. Additionally, it will show you the different skills required for each job and what their responsibilities and tasks are. You’ll also learn some more about the differences between freelance, outsourcer and in-house jobs, and the pros and cons of being a generalist versus a specialist.
Lastly, we’ll look at some general stats about the job market in the game audio industry.
Do bear in mind that a lot of job titles are interchangeable, and may vary from one studio to the next even though the work is fundamentally the same.
For example, Audio Designer and Sound Designer, or terms like Associate and Junior.
These job titles mean the same thing and are merely worded differently.
Freelance, In-House & Outsourcing
There are three main employment options for people working in game audio:
The Freelancer/Contractor
Freelancers are workers-for-hire without a permanent employer; they work on projects for set periods of time until the job has been done or the money runs out.Freelancers tend to build up a client base over time, which can be a network of individuals or studios, providing them with a steady flow of income.
They have a lot of freedom to pick and choose what they work, on which allows them to work on a wider variety of projects - but they have to find and secure them first.
There are no paid holidays or sick days, and generally far less job security. Freelancers also have to manage more of their own finances, as their income tax isn’t pre-paid by an employer so it’s important to take that into account when negotiating a price for your work. On the upside freelancers usually tend to get paid higher daily rates because of these factors.
The In-House Studio Employee
In-house positions are ‘traditional’ employment roles within studios, usually full-time with paid holidays, sick days and other perks or bonuses.These positions are incredibly hotly contested, especially at an entry level, hence why it’s important to stand above the competition.
One of the most valuable yet underrated benefits of an in-house position is being a part of an audio team with different backgrounds and levels of experience. This can be a fantastic opportunity to learn, expand your skillset and grow in a nurturing and supportive environment.
Another big perk of working in-house is job security, and not having to constantly look for work.
One of the drawbacks of in-house work, however, is that you may find yourself working on the same franchise for years in a very similar role, especially if you’re working for a very big company.
For some people that might not a negative, but others like myself enjoy more diversity in the kinds of projects they do.
The Outsourcer
Outsourcing studios are collectives of professionals from similar disciplines within an industry (e.g. sound designers, composers, foley artists, dialogue editors) who have banded together.They usually consist of a small full-time-employed ‘core team’ with a group of supporting freelancers who work for the outsourcing studio on a regular basis.
The outsourcing studio is then hired by game studios to lend some extra hands, or sometimes to act as the entire audio department for a project.
The team can easily be scaled up or down on demand, which is an incredibly valuable feature as projects evolve or plans change.
A big benefit of outsourcers is that they work in tight-knit teams similar to bigger studios, but have the more varied work that you’d expect from freelancing. Outsourcing studios also offer more job security than freelancing, as a larger multi-person operation can find and secure projects more easily.
Illustration of the relationships between developers and the main employment types available to audio designers.
Specialist vs Generalist
One of the big questions that I had when starting out was:
“Should I specialise in one area or try to branch out as much as I can?”
There is, unfortunately, no clear answer to this and it really depends on your circumstances, as well as your personal interests and ambitions.
There are advantages and disadvantages to both routes, but it’s not an irreversible decision, and you can always widen or narrow your area of expertise further down the line, so don’t stress about choosing one over the other.
It is interesting to compare the two, however, you may find your career path and the jobs you take influencing your decision as you progress in the industry.
The Generalist
A generalist is someone who is adept in a wide range of skills in the game audio field, from sound design to technical sound design and music composition.
Freelancing tends to lend itself to a more generalist approach, as you are more likely to work on varied projects in different genres, using different game engines and middleware, and a broader range of knowledge will make it easier to adapt and learn in new situations.
A generalist skillset can also be useful when working in smaller teams that don’t have dedicated roles for every job within a project, and everyone has to pitch in and help where they’re needed.
The drawback of this approach is that if you apply to a position that only requires a narrow, specialised skillset - like a dialogue editor - then your additional broader knowledge is less immediately useful, and someone who has a lot of experience in that particular specialised area will have the upper hand.
The Specialist
A specialist is highly proficient in a single or few areas, and less so in others, often finding their homes in bigger companies, as AAA projects require huge amounts of high-quality assets and benefit from employing folks who can give a single task their undivided attention.
Where working in a smaller team means you’re likely to be required to pitch in and work within multiple disciplines, bigger companies will more often have a much larger audio department, with everyone taking on a specific role - you might be working exclusively on weapons, foley, implementation etc. for the duration of a project, and slowly becoming an expert in that field.
As a general rule of thumb: the bigger the company, the more specialised the job role.
That said, specialist freelancers are still very much in demand, brought in to fulfil a specific role on a temporary basis.
Examples include George Vlad, who specialises in nature recordings, or freelance composers like Mick Gordon, whose hybrid of metal and electronic music has created a sound unique to him and his specialised writing/production process.
How Do I Choose?
In short, if you’re certain that you want to work in a specialised field like technical sound design, it’s wise to focus on building knowledge and experience in that specific area.
However, if you’re not so sure, enjoy working across many different fields, or are required to because you work freelance/in a small team, then it’s smart to keep your skillset as broad as possible and avoid prioritising one discipline at the cost of others.
While it’s an extremely common bit of advice, it’s still worth mentioning again: follow your interests, and what you’re passionate about, whether that means specialising in one area or generalising and doing a bit of everything - you’ll be more motivated and have more fun by doing what you actually want to do.
Experience Levels
When applying for a job, roles are usually split into 3 general experience levels:
Entry Level (0-3 Years Experience)
Mid Level (3-5 Years Experience)
Senior Level (5+ Years Experience)
Most career paths have entry-level jobs, but some roles like audio director or principal sound designer, will only be open to more experienced applicants.
Another way jobs like to measure experience is “Shipped titles” which refers to a credit on a game that has made it into the world and been published.
This type of measurement is often inaccurate, however, as you may have received a credit on a game that was very close to shipping when you joined the team, or not received one if you left before a game was shipped.
This is why you will often see job listings ask for “Full development cycle on at least 1 shipped (AAA) title”, meaning that you are expected to have been part of a project from start to finish (or at least for the majority of the dev cycle).
Career Paths
There are a bunch of different career paths within the game audio industry. The most popular and well-known ones are the sound designer and composer roles.
I’ve put together a very rough chart illustrating the different in-house job openings at studios and their commonly required experience levels. Of course, each studio has different hiring practices and demands for how many years of industry experience and shipped titles you have to have in order to qualify for certain positions. So take this chart with a grain of salt as it’s only a loose interpretation of the current job landscape.
Illustration of the current job landscape for in-house studio jobs.
It is reasonably easy to transition from one field to another within the game audio industry with the exception of the audio programmer role. This is because audio programmers are generally required to have a background in computer science which makes it harder but not impossible to learn and get into. Next, we’ll get into the individual career paths.
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Composer
Responsibilities
Composers are responsible for creating the score of the game and all of the various other musical elements like stingers. Composers often work together with music editors and technical sound designers to implement the music stems into the game.
Skillset
Composers need to be experts at using their DAW of choice, know music theory and general compositional techniques used in games (vertical layering & horizontal resequencing) as well as the basics of synthesis and recording. If they are working together with an orchestra they are responsible for transcribing the score (or hiring someone to do it) and directing the sessions. As with all the other disciplines communication is one of the most important skills as composers are a key part of the audio team and have to work closely with the audio director and other members to make sure the score fits cohesively into the rest of the soundscape.
Tasks
On a daily basis, a composer spends most of their time inside their DAW, playing instruments as well as writing and recording music. As I’ve already mentioned above they communicate with the rest of the audio team on a regular basis and even work with other disciplines such as design especially if music is a game mechanic or plays a big role in a specific level or the entire game. They might also implement the music cues into the game or work together with a technical audio designer or music editor to ensure it’s implemented as intended. Music composers also have to spend time in spreadsheets tracking their work and the bugs that it creates.
Progression
There are barely any entry-level in-house music composer positions so a lot of people start out as freelancers. At a mid, to senior level, the available positions are more numerous. Composers most often transition into sound design roles but are also able to go down more technical routes and become audio directors. Some composer-related entry opportunities that aren’t necessarily in game audio but still relevant are: copyist, orchestrator, conductor, mixing engineer, and music editor.
Further Information
https://www.berklee.edu/careers/roles/composer-video-games
Sound Designer
Responsibilities
Sound designers create the sounds for the game which includes recording the source material and (sometimes) implementing it. Sound designers also test the sounds in game and get feedback from their peers, leads and audio director and iterate on it accordingly.
Skillset
The key skills of a sound designer are the ability to use a DAW, editing, processing and synthesis. Basic knowledge of middleware and how sounds get into games as well as microphone theory for recording sounds. On the soft skills side attention to detail, communication and organisation are very important to work in a team and collaborate effectively as well as keeping an overview of the tasks to successfully meet deadlines.
Tasks
Sound designers spend their days recording source material, editing and processing it in their DAWs as well as taking sounds from libraries to layer, process and combine them in order to create new audio assets for the game that match the vision of the game and audio direction. Lots of time is also spent in spreadsheets tracking various things like assets, bugs, progress and deadlines. The bugs are found through playtesting which is also an important aspect of the job as it allows sound designers to hear their work in the context of the game and collect feedback from their colleagues, leads and the audio director and make changes to get the best end result.
Sound designers also collaborate a lot with the rest of the audio team, especially the technical sound designers with whom they work closely to get the sounds into the game and tweak parameters that change the sounds during runtime.
Progression
This job starts at a junior level and goes all the way up to lead level and eventually audio director. Sound designers also often transition to technical sound designer or dialogue designer roles.
Further Information
https://www.berklee.edu/careers/roles/sound-designer-games
Technical Sound Designer
Responsibilities
Technical sound designers work with the sound designers, the audio leads, and the audio director to create the in-game audio systems which determine how the sounds will be played back and controlled at runtime. They implement the audio assets into the game and make sure they work as intended.
Skillset
The skillset required for this job is as the name suggests heavily technical, this includes knowledge of game engines, audio middleware, basic audio scripting (in code languages like C# or visual scripting tools like Unreal Blueprints) as well as the ability to design sounds. Knowledge of source control, spreadsheets, bug tracking and project management software (like Hansoft and Jira) are also highly sought after.
Tasks
On a daily basis, technical sound designers work a lot with the rest of the audio team to create the systems that will play back the sounds and then implement the audio assets that the sound designers made into the game and test them. They maintain the projects in the middleware and help with the optimisation to ensure the game runs as smoothly as possible. Additionally, testing, debugging and bug fixing are also part of the daily routine.
Progression
This role starts at a junior level and goes all the way up to lead with the opportunity to go into audio director roles. Technical sound designers can also easily branch out into sound design, audio programming, dialogue design and other audio disciplines as the job requires a lot of knowledge that is also needed for those other roles.
Further Information
https://boards.greenhouse.io/sonyinteractiveentertainmentglobal/jobs/4441222004
Audio Programmer
Responsibilities
Audio programmers work with the audio team to create audio systems, tools, and pipelines, and extend the capabilities of the middleware and game engine. They ensure that the audio for the game is optimised and within the allocated memory budget with the help of debugging tools that the audio programmer writes.
Skillset
As the name suggests, programming and audio scripting are mandatory core skills for the job. The programming languages they use vary from studio to studio but generally, C# or C++ are the most popular and desired ones. A deep knowledge of game engines and middleware is also necessary as well as the ability to debug meaning. Debugging is essentially looking at the data that the console spits out and interpreting it to find issues. On the interpersonal side communication, creativity and problem solving are incredibly important as audio programmers have to speak with a lot of different people and find creative solutions to tricky problems.
Tasks
The tasks of audio programmers are quite varied, they communicate regularly with the audio team to identify and help solve their technical problems, write and maintain code for the audio tools and systems, playtest to identify and fix bugs, debug the game to find performance bottlenecks, and optimise them. They also have to talk a lot with the other disciplines as the tools built for audio often need to reach into other parts of the game like animation systems or shaders.
Progression
This job can be started at a junior level and the progression goes all the way to senior level. There are few junior positions and a lot of people find their way into this career from programming or technical sound design jobs at a mid-level but it’s also possible to do the opposite and branch out into those roles after a career in audio programming.
Further Information
https://www.berklee.edu/careers/roles/audio-programmer
Dialogue Editor
Responsibilities
Dialogue editors are responsible for getting the best possible sound and performance out of the recorded dialogue files by cleaning them up through the removal of unwanted sounds, levelling (making the volume consistent) and adjusting the timings.
Skillset
The tools for this job are DAWs and other audio editing & processing software like iZotope RX additionally dialogue editors need to have a keen ear for small details. Since there are a lot of lines to keep track of spreadsheets are used on a daily basis, it can save a lot of time to learn some key commands and know how to use Google Sheets or Excel.
Tasks
Most of the work takes place in the DAW editing and processing the audio. This means finding, cutting out and removing pops, clicks and birds as well as getting rid of traffic noise and other unwanted sounds with eq and other tools. Levelling the audio is also an important step to make it more consistent and after all of this is done it’s time to name the files and export them in the correct formats as well as track them on the spreadsheets.
Progression
The dialogue editor position starts at entry-level but goes all the way up to mid-and senior-level positions. Dialogue editors also often branch out into sound designer, tech sound designer and dialogue designer roles.
Further Information
https://www.berklee.edu/careers/roles/dialogue-editor
Dialogue Designer
Responsibilities
Dialogue designers are responsible for the entire dialogue pipeline from start to finish. This means working closely together with the narrative, design and production teams to create the dialogue systems for the game then organise the scripts, plan the recording sessions as well as cast and record the voice actors. After that, they edit the dialogue and lastly implement it into the game and test for bugs. Dialogue designers also engage in creative sound design tasks like creating the dialogue processing chains for things like helmets or setting up reverb buses and even creating entire languages from scratch.
Skillset
As with many of the other roles in the audio discipline, communication is a key skill as it requires a lot of talking with voice actors and people from the rest of the audio team as well as other disciplines. Additionally, organisation is incredibly important because there are often thousands of lines that need to be tracked, recorded, edited and implemented which leads us to the other skills. A good background in recording and audio engineering, the ability to edit dialogue, use middleware as well as some knowledge about game engines to set up and debug the dialogue systems.
Tasks
The things dialogue designers do change a lot throughout development, in pre-production and production they help design the dialogue systems and need to make sure the script translates well into this system and works as part of the gameplay. They then need to assist with the casting of voice actors which is a process of detailed listening, notetaking and most importantly making sure that they have provided the voice actors with the cue sheets and other material (discussed in more detail in the Dialogue topic in the Game Audio basics section). After the casting comes the recording where it’s necessary to work together closely with the voice talent, engineer the sessions and get the best performances out of the people and ensure the quality of the recordings as well as confirm that no lines were left out. The dialogue then needs to be edited and cleaned up and lastly implemented into the game and tested thoroughly. Dialogue designers also get to process the VO in cool in creative ways to create processing chains for voices coming through helmets, from monsters or other weird and wonderful creatures.
Progression
Although there are some entry-level dialogue designer roles, most people get into this area through sound designer and dialogue editor positions. With more experience, this job can lead into senior and lead roles as well as eventually an audio director opportunity.
Further Information
https://gamejobs.co/Dialogue-Designer-Audio-at-Electronic-Arts
Audio QA Tester
Responsibilities
Audio QA testers ensure that the audio is working as intended in the game as well as find and report bugs. Additionally, they help out with testing audio systems and new content and work closely with the audio team to give them feedback.
Skillset
This job requires a huge amount of patience and resilience as you have to play the games that are very much unfinished and in development over and over and go through them with a fine comb. QA testers have to have to be reasonably skilled at playing the game and have an incredible eye for details to notice smaller issues that can have big ramifications. They also need to be creative in their own right, finding new ways that players can potentially break the game and testing them. Knowledge of Jira, Hansoft & other bug tracking software is a must.
Tasks
Life as a QA tester is fully immersed in the game, they repetitively test new features and try to actively break the game to find potential bugs and report those with detailed reproduction methods in bug tracking software. Then they communicate these issues to the audio team and production. In-house QA teams are often also heavily relied upon for feedback as they are the ones that play the game the most.
Progression
The QA tester role starts out at a very junior level with very little other experience required and then goes all the way up to lead level with the ability to specialise in audio QA testing at a mid-level. A lot of people find their footing in the industry in QA and switch to other roles like sound design or production along the way.
Further Information
https://www.screenskills.com/job-profiles/browse/games/quality-assurance/games-tester/
Audio Producer
Responsibilities
The audio producer works closely with the production, leadership and audio team to create a roadmap with milestones and deliverables for the audio team and enable them to meet these by eliminating bottlenecks and hurdles for them. Producers are the mediums between teams and help them communicate effectively. They are also responsible for getting people the information, resources and tools they need to do their best work.
Skillset
Communication and organisation are two of the most important skills as an audio producer because of the team-centric role. Additionally, the ability to use spreadsheets effectively and knowing their way around project management and bug tracking software are essential.
Tasks
People in this role spend a lot of time creating spreadsheets as well as tracking tasks and bugs, managing the project and of course attending lots of meetings. They often have to communicate between the audio team and other disciplines and connect people who can help each other like a designer, animator and a sound designer to work on a specific feature.
Progression
Audio producer is a mid to senior-level job with people often finding their way into the role from either an associate production job or other audio lead roles. They can move up in their role as well as become audio directors.
Further Information
https://jobs.smartrecruiters.com/GameOnStudio/743999678832069-audio-producer
Audio Director
Responsibilities
The audio director is responsible for creating and upholding the audio vision of the game, overseeing and leading the team and coordinating and collaborating with the directors from the other disciplines as well as the production to make the development as seamless as possible. Audio directors represent their teams, they have a high-level overview and make sure the right tasks are prioritised.
Skillset
This job requires a deep understanding of the various audio processes and pipelines from music and sound to dialogue and implementation. Communication and leadership are very important as audio directors make a lot of decisions and represent the audio team's needs in cross-discipline meetings. Organisation is also a key skill because they need to keep an overview and be able to prioritise the things that are essential for the game over the trivial.
Tasks
Audio directors have their fingers in all pies meaning they do a lot of different things and can be involved at the highest and lowest levels (from planning to actual sound design and implementation). This largely depends on how big the company is. They often have meetings with other team members to communicate opportunities as well as issues and give feedback. Additionally, they track the team's progress and prioritise tasks, and make sure the game is headed in the right direction, the vision is upheld and the soundscape is consistent. They are also responsible for the final mix of the game and make all of the final decisions.
Progression
Audio director is a very senior role, a lot of people transition from other leadership positions within the audio discipline such as lead sound designers.
Further Information
https://www.berklee.edu/careers/roles/audio-director
Learn More & See The Statistics
Interested in the statistics and potential salaries? Then check out the Game Audio Industry Survey: https://www.gamesoundcon.com/post/game-audio-industry-survey-2021
If you want more information about specific jobs then I recommend looking through different audio roles on DevBrada and cross-comparing: https://devbrada.com/jobs/
Want to learn more about game audio?
Check out our Learning Roadmap!
