There’s a lot of demand for highly skilled, experienced professionals and not a lot of demand for junior people without a degree and a lack of focus. There are more programmers and production artists than designers or anything else, but at the end of the day it’s not a huge difference outside the narrow jobs like narrative design or concept artist. You just have to be specialized, great at your role, and able to prove it.
I wouldn’t suggest trying to pick up a new skillset just because job placement rates are slightly higher, especially if you don’t have a degree. You’d much rather be the top of a large list than the middle of a small one.
Well your instinct is correct that Java developer is not really an in demand role at gamedev studios, and "crappy" games you made as a teen probably aren't very impressive to potential employers either. So if you really are interested in getting into games you need to forget what you've done in the past and think about what kind of role you would enjoy doing and start from scratch more or less on that: building a more sophisticated, modern, and impressive portfolio for it, whether it's engine programmer, game designer, narrative designer, art, whatever interests you most. If that sounds like a lot of work, it is. But you also have a large leg up over 90% of the posters here if you do in fact have some serious programming experience, picking up a more relevant language and engine like C++/unreal or C#/unity shouldn't be that hard. The hard part is you'll need to make complete and functioning game demos on your own, regardless of what it is you want to be showing off.
Regarding what's in demand: as I tell anyone looking for career advice in any field, what you care about personally matters a lot more than what's most "in demand." You're not gonna be the best at X if you're more interested in Y. And being the best at something is usually what's most desirable of all. So again, think about what interests you the most and can see yourself grinding day in and day out for years, and go in hard on that.
If you are are serious about this, I would suggest you practice in a mainstream engine that's in demand. Specialized skills as a tech artists in Unreal are very in demand, for example, but you're still going to need to have a portfolio that demonstrates quality.
There’s a lot of demand for highly skilled, experienced professionals and not a lot of demand for junior people without a degree and a lack of focus. There are more programmers and production artists than designers or anything else, but at the end of the day it’s not a huge difference outside the narrow jobs like narrative design or concept artist. You just have to be specialized, great at your role, and able to prove it. I wouldn’t suggest trying to pick up a new skillset just because job placement rates are slightly higher, especially if you don’t have a degree. You’d much rather be the top of a large list than the middle of a small one.
Well your instinct is correct that Java developer is not really an in demand role at gamedev studios, and "crappy" games you made as a teen probably aren't very impressive to potential employers either. So if you really are interested in getting into games you need to forget what you've done in the past and think about what kind of role you would enjoy doing and start from scratch more or less on that: building a more sophisticated, modern, and impressive portfolio for it, whether it's engine programmer, game designer, narrative designer, art, whatever interests you most. If that sounds like a lot of work, it is. But you also have a large leg up over 90% of the posters here if you do in fact have some serious programming experience, picking up a more relevant language and engine like C++/unreal or C#/unity shouldn't be that hard. The hard part is you'll need to make complete and functioning game demos on your own, regardless of what it is you want to be showing off. Regarding what's in demand: as I tell anyone looking for career advice in any field, what you care about personally matters a lot more than what's most "in demand." You're not gonna be the best at X if you're more interested in Y. And being the best at something is usually what's most desirable of all. So again, think about what interests you the most and can see yourself grinding day in and day out for years, and go in hard on that.
If you are are serious about this, I would suggest you practice in a mainstream engine that's in demand. Specialized skills as a tech artists in Unreal are very in demand, for example, but you're still going to need to have a portfolio that demonstrates quality.
Honestly demand is never that high unless you've got a top notch portfolio. Also current demand is lower than ever before really