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Michael's Meeting Notes
Michael Lubker
00:00Also how are you doing Maryland
Aaron Bothne
00:03when I'm doing all right I had a lot of sleep last night a lot which is where so it's nice
Michael Lubker
00:10oh that's good all it's good to get sleep um Well Oh can play off but have been kind of showed me a bit
Aaron Bothne
00:29OH MAN Yeah 1000 People not even in game like in video games.
Michael Lubker
00:35Yeah still really really did to like what we like white. It's crazy anyways I am just dropping the lights out to people but Togo's if you want to either show screen or drop your resume in in the chat icon through the stream either way it works. Okay are you having audio visual problems? Or not at all at the moment
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
01:35right yes
Michael Lubker
01:45yes a little bit my
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
01:46mannerism Yes.
Michael Lubker
01:48Okay. I will pull this up. We can go to and then I will go drop some for see if anyone else wants to join in but we can go through this now
Aaron Bothne
02:17ordered my new computer speak it here after Christmas but it looks like I'm gonna have to get a nice webcam to go along with it's not potato quality here.
Michael Lubker
03:03Also, co.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
03:04if you have a portfolio to anything else they want us to look at this link that is
Michael Lubker
03:35Okay, so from Columbia,
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
03:37I know a few folks. I know a few folks, either in Columbia or from Columbia. Nice people. I'm pretty sure
Michael Lubker
03:50yes. Oh so both experience in video games and take a call
Michael Lubker
04:24Okay, and let me know when school students
Aaron Bothne
04:33Yeah, 
I'm looking to go ahead and scroll down the software you're going to get two pages this is good. That's actually your resume looks pretty good. It's set up for ATS here. Skills, a lot of relevant experience. I mean, yeah, wow. There's not much I can say here. Sometimes you know, not sometimes, you might want to try to manipulate it to where it's on one page as much as possible. All the information you have is great. You can try to maybe reduce text size a little bit and find some extra space but some of the information that we like to give to job seekers is that you know, recruiter or hiring manager usually can only spend about 30 seconds looking at your resume. So you want to have all the information possible at the very all the most relevant information possible at the very top of your resume. So you have a kind of you have a summary there and then your job experience and then your skills. What was really saying last time pretty much it's like if you're coming out of school, you want to education first. If you're looking for like I guess, 
mid level, you want to have your work experience first. And if you're looking for senior level, you want to have like your skills and contributions first. So looking at your resume here, and I mean, you're probably mid to senior level here. So I think you're set up nicely. You know, having your work experience or the industry visuals. You might want to take out that summary. That'll get you some more room first and then second, then information could be put in cover letters. When whenever you're applying. So it'll give you more space on your resume and then the cover letter serves as a purpose of kind of overview of what you've done. Okay, and relating it to the job that you're looking for. Yeah, the only really the only thing main thing I'd say is like make those bullet points, maybe smaller, maybe cut out two or leave it to like three or four to try to fill up space. But you know, for the most part I think what you what you could benefit from is just messing with font sizes and spacing to to reduce the amount of space you're using.
+2
I'm looking to go ahead and scroll down the software you're going to get two pages this is good. That's actually your resume looks pretty good. It's set up for ATS here. Skills, a lot of relevant experience. I mean, yeah, wow. There's not much I can say here. Sometimes you know, not sometimes, you might want to try to manipulate it to where it's on one page as much as possible. All the information you have is great. You can try to maybe reduce text size a little bit and find some extra space but some of the information that we like to give to job seekers is that you know, recruiter or hiring manager usually can only spend about 30 seconds looking at your resume. So you want to have all the information possible at the very all the most relevant information possible at the very top of your resume. So you have a kind of you have a summary there and then your job experience and then your skills. What was really saying last time pretty much it's like if you're coming out of school, you want to education first. If you're looking for like I guess, +2
mid level, you want to have your work experience first. And if you're looking for senior level, you want to have like your skills and contributions first. So looking at your resume here, and I mean, you're probably mid to senior level here. So I think you're set up nicely. You know, having your work experience or the industry visuals. You might want to take out that summary. That'll get you some more room first and then second, then information could be put in cover letters. When whenever you're applying. So it'll give you more space on your resume and then the cover letter serves as a purpose of kind of overview of what you've done. Okay, and relating it to the job that you're looking for. Yeah, the only really the only thing main thing I'd say is like make those bullet points, maybe smaller, maybe cut out two or leave it to like three or four to try to fill up space. But you know, for the most part I think what you what you could benefit from is just messing with font sizes and spacing to to reduce the amount of space you're using. Michael Lubker
07:18One One thing that I have also heard that's a suggestion is like having five bullet points on your most recent and then other meeting are two jobs two or three bullet points. So that way, you're taking up space.
Aaron Bothne
07:36Yeah, that sounds good. And then your skills there you have a lot of skills. You want to try to like this is good and I've seen a lot of people do it where they make a robust resume, and then they cut that resume down when they're applying for specific jobs. So for example, you know, you could you have all these skills here that are really good. Whenever you're applying for a specific job. Try to find those bits which which ones were most common or most relevant in the job experience and then just test the skill section down to just those 10 or 15 skills
Aaron Bothne
08:18all right, and looking at your portfolio This is fantastic. Done a lot of good concept work here. And the fact that you're focusing on concept work is very good. You know you have one and you're not kind of all over the place your portfolio really sells that your your focus is concept art, so that's good. Yep,
Michael Lubker
08:45I agree. Do you have any questions for us?
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
08:52And not for a moment. So the points do tell me for the resume is a really, really interesting I'm thinking not. So thank you. Thank you very much for for the advices
Aaron Bothne
09:07You're welcome. Wow, that looks really cool. It's one that looks like an orc with the second row second from the left. I like that. Do you have any examples of the concepts that you made? That are in do get like have been modeled and rendered
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
09:34for 
for for video games, I have some the last ones the two last one for was for for video games. I mean, the the most recent ones. Oh, sorry. That was for a video game. But we're saying mostly he yard or diesel development. And the rest of my work is from the NBA so I can show anything. Hadley
+2
for for video games, I have some the last ones the two last one for was for for video games. I mean, the the most recent ones. Oh, sorry. That was for a video game. But we're saying mostly he yard or diesel development. And the rest of my work is from the NBA so I can show anything. Hadley Aaron Bothne
10:08I was just reading an article on this unfortunately how tough it's for artists because a lot of your stuff is under NDA. So yeah, they were literally the articles suggesting that unfortunately as an artist you have to spend a lot of time on your on your downtime working on portfolio work because you're not going to be able to show all the portfolio work that you've done. But so you said these first two here were from a video game. So these are the concept sketches. Is there any in game footage of this sort of thing?
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
10:44Let me find the patient the game
Aaron Bothne
10:48so that's what I would recommend is like you show your concept art and if you have something that's actually been built in game, put that next to it so people can see you know, where your concept art goes from, from concept initial concept to actual physically being put out there. Yeah,
Michael Lubker
11:07let's just say something like this. This is the concept Otis Meyer, the this just like give credit to whoever did that. That's also something that I usually send people through. Yeah,
Aaron Bothne
11:30I see you name the game champions ascension game in in here. I mean, make it easy. If you could throw a link in there. I haven't used Artstation myself, but if you can, I mean, make it easy. So people can link right to the campaign. I can Google it too. Okay, okay
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
12:01the game is still in I think in is not full full. Initial. Sorry, understand. This. pre alpha
Aaron Bothne
12:17looks pretty cool. Well, that's good, good game to have worked on. Did you volunteer for this or was this a commission?
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
12:25That was our commission or for all the the visual development of the environment? Better what was really interesting, really fun to them.
Aaron Bothne
12:42So it was as you said, you did the environment for this, all of them.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
12:46Yes. The concept or not, not the 3d modeling. Yeah. Engineer stuff, just the concept work.
Aaron Bothne
13:02That's pretty cool. Things things. Yeah. Again, you look like you're in a good position based on your portfolio and your resume. So just keep doing what you're doing. Make few little tweaks but make sure to when you're sending out resumes. Yeah, just make sure to tweak your resume to, to the to the position you're applying for. I like to use chat GPT to generate the initial cover letter. Well go here. Here's the cover letter, or here's the job description. Here's my resume, generate a cover letter based on that. And then, you know, I don't just send that to them. I'll just, I'll make sure and tailor a little bit more tweak it up and go from there. But that's a real good way to get quick letters that contain the things you need and are really specified for the job you're applying for. Have you been applying for a lot of jobs recently? Yeah, yeah, it's just want to make sure and stress again, a lot of people get get a little disconcerted when they are applying for a lot of jobs and just not hearing anything back but unfortunately, that is most people's experience these days. So just make sure not take it personally and keep keep working for it because a lot of people are really applying a lot of people are laid off what it wasn't 6000 and in the jobs industry, or 9000 and yet what it wasn't Michael, do you remember what was what was the number total now
Michael Lubker
14:39with the latest? I think it's closer to 11,000 Nuts
Aaron Bothne
14:44including the parents, both Hasbro ones. Yeah. So 11,000 people out there in the games industry or gaming related industry looking for jobs right now. I keep saying it's a great time to if you're looking for work and everybody's looking for work, it's gonna be real tough. It's always a great time to do your own thing. Start your own studio, work on your own projects,
Michael Lubker
15:06and love to have a publisher and your convention while you're doing too rough too rough too to where we were kind of out taking games that are out a prototype stage or or prior um, and Aaron is working on kind of an incubator and accelerator fooding if you want to go into that a little bit. Yeah,
Aaron Bothne
15:36so I'm helping developers get to the point where they need publishers, you know, so rafter is helping now to after that point, I'm helping helping developers get to that point. So any developers that are interested I got a form online. I am link it in the chat coming up here. But yeah. We're definitely kind of working together on both ends of that thing to try to help out developers that are maybe newer to the industry get their thing seen get their things played get their games dreams created.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
16:20That sounds really really interesting. I even in Colombia, so is the industry here is because Mall. There's a few studios doing doing things doing really interesting things, but that still are really small and they are not hiring anyone. So it's difficult now but yeah,
Aaron Bothne
16:42well, that's why I continue to stress and now it's the time to put in, you know, putting in that sweat equity you know, put in your time onto a project to hopefully bear some fruit later. So if you're not getting paid anyway, you might as well put yourself in a position to get paid later. And so sometimes that it takes doing the job for free in order to get the job. So if you can find something to work on in the meantime, that's really important that you AC your skills, stay sharp and be so you can keep putting stuff on your resume. Keep that in mind too, that you don't have to just put AAA stuff on your resume if you're working on indie stuff you put your tabletop stuff, which is fantastic. That's that's very important, too. But yes, put everything on. You're working on their resume. Yes.
Michael Lubker
17:30Oh, I also put another link in chat. We had a interview yesterday. With another group that was actually key in helping rafter to get started. But game moves home is if you're looking for freelance work, you can create a profile there as well.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
17:55Okay, interesting. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much for all your words and your your tips. I am thinking notes and I for sure will apply Oh
Michael Lubker
18:14yeah, I'm I'm popping believe in to a few groups to see if anybody else wants to join. There were a few people that had asked to join on the LinkedIn page but I'm just one problem also blocked on people. But yeah, we may be a little short but it's almost holiday time so I get no not everybody may be on the line of smokes right now.
Aaron Bothne
19:07Realize that that other person was your auto pilot, auto pilot
Michael Lubker
19:11ah yes
Michael Lubker
19:26okay
Michael Lubker
19:31gonna stop screen two for one moment
Michael Lubker
19:47so you've been in the industry for six years turbos I guess how how. How do you like the game industry? comes in I mean, it's like is there a specific type of game that you're like working on and things like that?
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
20:16Well, my my actually gain game experience and almost the last two years what I was working on almost lien, marketing image plus all the stuff and I was doing some concept art as well, but the projects were. I was working in outsourcing studio, so we we have the task. Almost never know. What are the game where where we are working at. We don't know a lot of things about the game actually. So was really difficult to to get familiar for for specific type of games. But I really liked to work on big games. They were building on all the stuff is really interesting for me, all the level design works. So I would like to work on that projects.
Aaron Bothne
21:24Okay. So you certainly a lot of times you don't even like get the rest of the project. To see how what you're working on bits in.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
21:38Yes. The sourcing world is like that you will get the task and you don't you. You get the tasks done. And that's how you, you pass to other tasks for totally different game. A totally different style. So it is it is weird, but you get used to that
Aaron Bothne
22:07that's an interesting, interesting challenge to have to work with. I can't imagine it Yes.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
22:14Yeah, because I like to dive into the, the lore of the game or how the game works. How is the concept of the game when when you you receive a task, just do this scenario. Tomorrow work on this total different thing is almost impossible. So you have to to build that skill to change really quick have a style means mindset.
Aaron Bothne
22:50Well, yes. Especially with concept art, because I can't it's like having to make up a concept for a game when you don't really fully know the premise. I mean, that's that's got to take some serious skill.
Carlos Andrés Osorio Cardona
23:06Yes, yes. Oh, sorry. Let's, let's say continue with the with my Mitchell. Guys. Thanks. Yeah.
Michael Lubker
23:17So you go go ahead and finish what you were saying. But I just wanted to say welcome him. Or Hello mispronouncing
Strahinja Dragojevic
23:26not all good. Oh, good. Hello. Yes. Did
Michael Lubker
23:31you have anything else to say close? And no, thanks. Thanks. Hello. You're okay. Yes, sorry. Can you say your name? I just want to point out, right.
Strahinja Dragojevic
23:46Oh, me. Yes. Striking. Yeah, you can try but you can call me study if it's easier for you. Okay. Yeah.
Michael Lubker
23:54Well, could you please elsewhere? Yeah. I put these up on the screen share it
Aaron Bothne
24:19right sorry I didn't catch her. How do you say your first name striking? Yeah. Yeah,
Strahinja Dragojevic
24:28yeah, that's that's important. Yeah.
Aaron Bothne
24:32I'm getting better. It start working with a lot more people all around the world and it gets easier to pronounce some names. Alright, so take take a look at your resume here. The first thing you know that I have is yeah, you want to take it out of this format. And put it in the hole. Is this is just a standard like Word format or office or Word document format. Because what you have here is going to have ATS the applicant tracking system that most many hiring people use these days will have trouble going through and pulling out the keywords out of the out resumes that are laid out like this. And then a lot of times what that means is you are not even gonna get past the first step of resume reviews. Because when it's pulled through that AI system, it's not going to pick anything up. So one thing that we always want to tell everyone and as we just told Carlos is that, you know, when you have a recruiting manager or hiring manager looking at your resume, you got about 30 seconds to capture their attention. So even if you did get through that first step of ATS, you got a lot going on and on this on this resume here. You got your eyes are kind of going all over the place and I kind of feel like when I first look at this I'm a little bit overwhelmed.
Strahinja Dragojevic
26:11Understood Understood. Thank you.
Aaron Bothne
26:12You're welcome. So I in the basic thing must most simple suggestion I'd have is to start off with like a basic word document. You got about seven says yep, seven plus years. experience working as a game designer. That's fantastic. So you're looking for a mid to senior level role. So start off with your work experience and skills your education may already on here. It doesn't take up a huge section. So that's good because you know, you're not just at a school you're not trying to get a job right now. I like all the information you have you have the awards that you've won. That's fantastic. That's something if I'm looking to hire people I'd love I'd love to see you take up a lot of space here with the platforms and the genres and stuff like that. So I mean that's good information to include it shows people that you are a gamer that you live in this world but but this does take up a lot of space right here scroll down Michael affliction. You see what I'm saying? But yeah, what you have platforms PC mobile console, like that takes up a lot of space. And that could literally just be one small line on your resume. So Wow.
Michael Lubker
27:24Or even, or even first icons. Yeah,
Aaron Bothne
27:28even though Well, we want to stay away from icons and pictures because again, ATS can't pick those up. But that is true. I want I want to stress that this resume looks fantastic. You built a very good looking resume, but unfortunately in the job world. Now it's not people that are can be looking at it right away.
Strahinja Dragojevic
27:50Understood understood because
Michael Lubker
27:51because most like most gaming jobs that I've seen, and this is actually something that led directly to me studying rafter like before studying rafter I have been working for work for about a year and I got one interim shot. You know, even with multiple optimizations of my resume, it was still very challenging. I was seeing like, and this is before the really mass layoffs stood indicating. Even before that, like six months ago, I was seeing like 800 people applying to one job within 24 hours and some like big companies were getting like 2400 applicants within like two or three days.
Aaron Bothne
28:53And some kind of troubling news. We had a recruiter or HR person on here at some point I forgot who it was exactly, but they they mentioned that for the most part these companies they take taken and look at resumes as they come in. So first come first serve. So, you know if you got 2300 people applying for a job and you're 2301 it's gonna you're gonna be hard pressed for heads even get your resume looked at so you gotta be quick, unfortunately and see those jobs come up. There's a lot of things that don't even necessarily have to do with your resume, per se. That factor in to you even you're getting the job getting looked at such so yeah, just one thing.
Michael Lubker
29:38I'm dropping a few things I'm grabbing a link to I will be dropped doubling in but I shared
Michael Lubker
29:54but these are a few resources that we can offer in this whole mess also. Close connect us. But basically, Rafter games is my company. We're focusing on helping you publish games that are out a prototype or both is working on the accelerator which will protect study not quite to that state yet. And then gamers home if you're interested in posting up freelance profile they they are accepting profiles. It's also a good community.
Strahinja Dragojevic
30:39Thank you for the links means a lot. Thank you and thank you both for your insights into my resume. Yeah, I have nothing else to say except that I'm grateful. Yeah,
Michael Lubker
30:49so 
I do have a few questions. I mean, I see you have quite the design background. Is there a specific type of game that you're interested to work on?
+1
I do have a few questions. I mean, I see you have quite the design background. Is there a specific type of game that you're interested to work on? Strahinja Dragojevic
31:10While I'm trying to transition more into hopefully AAA at some point because I've always wanted to work on those but as far as like, I just like working in video games so I don't have a specific like type as long as I can contribute to making video games. That's all that's all I want to do.
Michael Lubker
31:30I can't say what title yet. But rafter is in the middle of signing a few protects with with mostly trails. strategy on sim games on our docket, but we're also looking at a few others. So keep an eye out on the left two kids and the LinkedIn. We may be posting opportunities hopefully in the near future.
Strahinja Dragojevic
32:07Great to know no thank you. Thank you
Aaron Bothne
32:13Oh, is there aside from bunch of layoffs. Did you see any other exciting industry news I've all I've seen lately is a lot of people dumping on Starfield. It's like still seven years $300 million something like that. I mean,
Michael Lubker
32:33some people seem to like it, um some people I haven't seen some of that as well
Michael Lubker
32:48sorry, one second.
Aaron Bothne
32:54tell you this. I talk way too much about season discovery. Way too much as in I'm actually considering starting to play World of Warcraft again. Oh my god. Just just the very idea. Makes me feel like I'm going crazy.
Strahinja Dragojevic
33:14I agree with you that no, I don't want to start I was thinking of starting it again. But I honestly cannot. I shouldn't fighting valiantly against myself starting it again. But yeah, yeah.
Aaron Bothne
33:31It's it's yeah, it's that internal struggle that I have as well but I got a little devil on my shoulder. Also another buddy of mine has been playing lately and he's been whispering in my ear. Well, Max when I was 30 characters, same
Strahinja Dragojevic
33:46Sam, my one of my best friends started playing again and he said like, why don't you join us? I was like, no, no, no.
Michael Lubker
33:54I have been playing WarCraft one ball though. The new mobile game which is actually pretty good. They did a pretty good job actually making it feel like OTS on mobile like it is kind of clash royale style. But you have like all the classic Warcraft characters and unit types and it is actually pretty fun. I probably have over 20 hours in it so far and like a lot more
Aaron Bothne
34:32leeway I think. So what kind of game is it? I'm looking at it in an RTS
Michael Lubker
34:39II. Yeah, it's kind of like they took Clash Royale and expanded.
Aaron Bothne
34:47What is the Clash Royale?
Michael Lubker
34:49Ah, it's a popular mobile game but is I would say some people call it like a tower. Multiplayer tower defense game but Warcraft one ball has bigger than wraps like because they are always just like one screen where ours you do actually have like a big map like to the floor at us that you can like move to move them out. So it's it's pretty cool. I'll probably open at this point.
Aaron Bothne
35:33Looking at the screenshots Yeah, I kind of liked the sound of multiplayer tower defense. That's a cool sounding gun. Yeah.
Michael Lubker
35:46Yeah, though, the one criticism I have so far is that there was no like, you can't play against friends. You can only Matt's mate sofa. But yeah, has like a full single player campaign and maps, make maps made PvP and you can add things in a guild so that you are able to kind of collect because it's a collecting game as well. Like you collect different units over time.
Michael Lubker
36:39it's actually probably the game that I've been playing most like
Aaron Bothne
36:55winning one mentioned that if you weren't already planning yeah
Aaron Bothne
37:05well, so hopefully I will be going. I'm actually considering Tatyana just mentioned in that as thinking about going to GDC this year, which is in March.
Michael Lubker
37:20I'm definitely looking out for our conference. Ended up like furball costs were too high. Because a plane or a bus or a train is actually expensive done at every point. Now what
Aaron Bothne
37:36is crazy because we don't have crap for trains in this country and it's too bad. When I read that Europe that was so awesome. Being able to go all over with trains so easy.
Michael Lubker
37:45Yeah, I mean, I was able to go to Dallas dream hack in 2019 before the pandemic. I like Cobos. Definitely keep in touch. I will I will make sure that I'm connected with you on like Yeah,
Aaron Bothne
38:03yeah, guys. Yeah, me too. I'm gonna strap my LinkedIn definitely connect with me on LinkedIn. Yes
Aaron Bothne
38:16that's right, man. I'm not getting any links. You're doing right apparently I'm gonna Yeah,
Michael Lubker
38:21have to put the HTTP on Zoom
Aaron Bothne
38:37Yeah, definitely connect with us, or let us run in this industry quite often. I know. I'm personally as as an accelerator. I'm quite often looking to work with freelancers and help hook up developers with artists and things like that. So artists game designers, all sorts of things. So hook us up with us on LinkedIn and yeah, definitely something. I'm always going to be shouting out and posting on LinkedIn to see
Michael Lubker
39:131122 other fake resources since you guys both have quite a bit of experience. Um, another resource that you can look at is those indie game Academy and there's Amelie Shopbop Celeste. Let's I'm sure a lot of us are familiar with but just in case but beyond like just walking into the job last. I also recommend like, if, since you have industry experience like sign up as a mentor in either of those programs just to be able to network with other people because like with indie game Academy, they're doing kind of a game jam type of format, where they help people actually build a game and then pits them to topple Sue's. So it's, it's another networking opportunity.
Aaron Bothne
40:21Right. Well, as far as industry news, I don't really think there's too much else going on that I've seen. No,
Michael Lubker
40:29not not at the moment. I mean, we've had a bunch of Team announcements. Oh,
Aaron Bothne
40:37that one game that grant
Michael Lubker
40:39that one. I'm wondering if we're thinking of the same thing that that game the bike, gathered, steam paid for the arms, but failed.
Aaron Bothne
40:54Oh, no. I mean, I'm not sure if it's the same thing. But he's, yeah, I said that game that MMO or something that launched and then like three days later, they're like, Oh, we're done. We don't we can't we can't do this anymore. I forgot the name. of it all of a sudden, but yeah, it was it was crazy news. And it sucks because it's what I see when I see that as it feels like it's like, oh, we're just gonna ruin it for everybody else who wants to crowdfunding crowdfunding again? Yeah.
Michael Lubker
41:20Yeah, um, I mean from my understanding Yeah. First off also be that they got hit by extinctions cuz I believe the developer jus in Russia.
Aaron Bothne
41:32Oh, wow. Really? Yeah. That's that would say, Well, they didn't seem to say anything about it.
Michael Lubker
41:41Yeah. I mean, they might not have been able to.
Aaron Bothne
41:46I'm curious if we are talking about the same one the day before is the Yeah, okay. Yeah, yeah,
Michael Lubker
41:52I know a stream. Ooh, that was gonna be putting out a bunch of content about so it's like like just the ripple effect on things like that. It's pretty
Aaron Bothne
42:05crazy It's just frustrating because you know, to see something that made a big splash crowdfunding it was a good and for Indians like this was their first game to you know, it's like, Oh, hey, gives us all hope. And then they just shit the bed and it's like, oh, well, I guess that's why people don't want to fund in these are first timers, which makes sense. But, you know, if they had gone and made a super huge hit, it would have been, I think a huge shot in the arm for the indie scene but you know, this is actually I think the opposite.
Michael Lubker
42:39Mike Yes. Yeah. It's pretty, pretty tough.
Michael Lubker
42:56Well, where are you based?
Aaron Bothne
42:58I said in the top left corner.
Strahinja Dragojevic
43:04I'm based in Serbia at the moment. Okay.
Michael Lubker
43:06So yeah, that makes awesome. I saw it says education. You know, you never know if you're in the same place as far as you went to school.
Aaron Bothne
43:19So what is what is your rates for freelance game design? When you do that? Um,
Strahinja Dragojevic
43:25honestly, I does the hardest question anybody can ask me. I don't know at the moment. I mean, I've only been out of work for a couple of weeks. So I haven't actually like done rates when I worked freelance for the, for the four apps factory, which worked on my little world, the mobile game, I think it was my payment was around 3000 euros per month. That's, I worked there for a while. As a freelancer. I did work a month there, um, just to look and help them set up everything and then all of the others was around at that rate as well. So that's kind of I think, what I'm okay with what I can live comfortably with. So, so yeah,
Aaron Bothne
44:24that's good. So euros are we exchanging about the same right now? I think the last time I looked we were
Michael Lubker
44:36that's pretty close. Point.
Aaron Bothne
44:38Nine one. So yeah, so about, I guess, maybe about $3,500 a month that's that's pretty good. Shoot, I can live off that. So yeah. We live in Texas in Austin, Texas has been like the one of the fastest growing cities for the past, like 12 years. Did you see that? We're like the 12th year in a row. We're the fastest growing city for this year. So it's been getting pretty expensive. But, you know, it's good to see that day. You guys and in places like Serbia and Eastern Europe can demand and actually get comparable rates what we're getting that's that's good to hear. Because, yeah, not even five years ago, you're seeing like maybe even half is what is what people were able to charge. It's
Strahinja Dragojevic
45:32still the same. I might have been lucky but some of my peers don't have those rates as well. So they have they had a full time job where they are and like maybe 1000 per month, which is I think extortion at its finest. Due to the amount of work that they do, but yeah, it is what it is. It's it's a bit of a wonder that economically strong as a country, so it is what it is. But yeah, I must have been lucky.
Aaron Bothne
46:02Yeah, well, I mean, that's the thing you can well, maybe not, you know it since you unfortunately don't have a job now, I can see it happen a lot. It's like Oh, well. You might have to take some hopefully you got a good savings. But even if even even if you do have good savings, I might I would still recommend taking some smaller things that maybe don't pay as well. Just just to keep that income flowing and stop hindered or not hemorrhage as much family. You know, that's not a resume thing. That's me from my my experience comes from production business side of things, so I can't help offering those kinds of suggestions. Yeah,
Strahinja Dragojevic
46:43I'm open to anything to be honest, as long as I can contribute with as I said to video games. I basically one time I wrote to Ron Gilbert, when they announced the Monkey Island return to manga I wrote them Can I work for free? Because my favorite game of all time if every series so yeah, I don't have a like as I said, as long as I can contribute to video games. I need to live off or something but I will gladly do it for for like much less no issues.
Aaron Bothne
47:15Well, if you if you like Monkey Island, I'd actually be interested in your opinion on one of the games that I produced was point and click Story game. Let me get you a key for that if you're interested in playing through some.
Strahinja Dragojevic
47:31Of course, of course I reached out I sent you a connection on LinkedIn. So I'll play it and then I'll switch you up. I'll ping you when I'm done if that's okay. Yeah.
Aaron Bothne
47:50Yeah, I'll send it to you on here that probably easier. Well, I mean, I guess we're kind of coming to a close here, Mike. Yeah, you have anything else?
Michael Lubker
47:59I'm not at the moment. I will drop the recording in the event. We've been doing this that way. If people come across the event, they can see what happened. And you guys can download it.
Aaron Bothne
48:19All right, cool. I'll be messaging you here shortly. But let's talk to you hopefully, guys, and come hang out and chat and we'll see what comes of it. Of course. All right. Have a good one to talk to you guys.
Strahinja Dragojevic
48:39Have a great day. Thank you. Thank you both.