Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • We are at Gamescom in Germany.

  • This is one of the biggest

  • video game fairs in the world.

  • The video game industry is huge.

  • 65% of households in the United States

  • have one or more people

  • who play three hours, at least,

  • of video games per week.

  • And there are an estimated

  • 34 million active gamers

  • just here in Germany.

  • That's about half the population

  • above the age of 14.

  • German Chancellor Angela Merkel

  • is getting into it herself.

  • But for a lot of people here

  • it's not just fun and games.

  • It's actually a full-time job.

  • We are on a quest to find people

  • who are playing video games for a living.

  • This honestly feels like an amusement park,

  • not a trade fair.

  • Okay, so,

  • we've made our way to Xbox.

  • This is a business

  • that's been around the industry

  • for quite a while now.

  • I actually started at Microsoft in 1998.

  • The first game that I worked on

  • was Age of Empires.

  • And when we started the Xbox program

  • at Microsoft I kind of leapt toward that.

  • I've been working on Xbox now

  • since the Xbox 360 days.

  • I'm really designing something

  • that I would love to use every day.

  • The average job in the U.S. gaming industry

  • paid a salary of $97,000 per year in 2016.

  • You don't even have to be an engineer

  • to make good money in gaming.

  • Programmers, artists, musicians,

  • it takes all kinds to do games.

  • We found Carlos Paton

  • who is the product manager

  • for Thunderobot in Europe,

  • which makes gaming products

  • like laptops and virtual reality sets.

  • This is a prototype now.

  • Carlos has been gaming since he was little

  • and now gets to play and test games

  • as part of his job.

  • When I have a little bit of free time,

  • what I really love to do is play games.

  • A lot of the gaming industry

  • is built around major franchises

  • like Star Wars or Super Mario.

  • How's it going Mario?

  • Gaming jobs have come a long way

  • from the days of arcades and consoles.

  • We found a lot of businesses

  • focused on casual gaming

  • So I want to get the gold?

  • Which are games less experienced players

  • can download on their phones

  • or web browsers.

  • The popularity of casual gaming

  • has opened up new jobs in the industry

  • Lose!

  • But it's still not for everyone.

  • Clearly I'm not quitting my job

  • to do this anytime soon.

We are at Gamescom in Germany.

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it