video game designer

monteur vidéo

tester

game tester

quality assurance tester

Keywords Studios

While we were working this job was pretty good. Now, it really depends on the client you are working for but the work is reasonable and if this is the career you really want than you know what you are getting into, it's repetitive and boring but it's in a fun industry and you typically get to work with good people who are like-minded. 
There is a benefits package (it's actually an employee paid group insurance program) which covers most of the things you need.
If things hadn't gone south I honestly could have seen myself doing this job for the next 20 years. I would describe myself as an exceptionally loyal employee and natural leader who was very dedicated to performing my roles and responsibilities to the best of my abilities and looking past minor issues within the company.

That's where the good stuff ends. 

This is supposed to be a full time job but when the current contract we were working on ended my entire team was suddenly let go with the claim there was no more work despite hiring agents posting that they were looking to fill hundreds of remote work roles. The truth is they didn't want to treat us fairly.
When our client tried to force us back to work in the office (not their regular employees, just us contractors) we unionized in order to fight for the right to maintain our existing work conditions and safety (as this was still during the height of covid). While we were allowed to remaining WFH all other good faith treatment stopped. Many people on my team were trying to get raises, but despite being highly qualified, experienced and hard working, we were paid up to three times less than people doing the exact same jobs hired directly by the client. We wanted to be treated fairly. Over the next few months more and more things came to light where over the past three years we were denied opportunities or had been treated with disrespect or dealt with in unfair and predatory ways, these are industry wide issues which the clients Keywords works for help to propagate as well. 
This in addition to being yelled at by managers with less leadership experience or training than I have. My manager yelled at me in front of the HR manager trying to get me to whistle blow on people who had shared information with me in confidence, but whom I know if she had just asked them they would have told her the same things about believing they had a lack of training and opportunities. I was mocked by management when during an interview I was asked what I thought made a good leader and I said "many things can make up a good leader but I think one of the most important ones is that a good leader must first know how to be a good follower-" I was going to continue to describe how the things that make a good follower, such as understanding the chain of command, listening skills, comprehension, empathy for your team, etc. Are all skills that carry over to being a good leader but instead I was cut off and mocked, literally scoffed and laughed at by a person who obviously lacks any of those skills. It was then I began to feel the leadership at Keywords had no integrity and no sense of morality. I stopped trying to get any advancement within the company and focused my efforts on aiding my team and avoiding any further interaction with that manager. Once that manager was replaced I began to have hope again, the new leadership seemed to take more interest in our team and our new manager was more interested in learning about the team and our work. Right up until we were all unceremoniously let go.
As I mentioned above, I could have happily carried on with my work for another couple of decades, sure everyone wants more money and it's nice to see some advancement but in the end what I really wanted was just job security in a job that I did well and was recognized by my peers and supervisors as one of the best. And that's the thing they took away, both Keywords and the client, simply washing their hands of the situation, they made their profits off my work and loyalty now they don't care what happens to me. And you can say sure, that's what happens at any corporation and my story isn't unique. But that doesn't make it right. And it doesn't mean we should let them get to keep doing it to other people. 
Game workers are still workers. Highly trained, highly educated, and doing a service that brings value in the terms of billions of dollars to shareholders and enjoyment and enrichment to gamers. They deserves fair compensation, fair treatment, fair opportunities. Those were all things Keywords claims to give but denied to everyone on my team.

I worked at Keywords for a few years as a certification and QA tester.

When you start you make bare minimum wage and are forced to pray for hours. I recall having a week where in total i was scheduled 6 hours, 3 hours each on 2 stress tests. The most frustrating thing was seeing people absent or not available and yet not getting scheduled for a shift. The worst thing is you never feel valuable because they are constantly hiring more people and if you have worked for a longer period of time you are expected to coach and mentor other testers because leadership cannot be bothered to do so.

This company confirms your attendance DAILY. as in you get an email every day for what time you are working. There is no consistency with the schedule you are given and you are forced to constantly adjust your sleeping patterns to whatever time they give you. The planning department is completely useless and will constantly schedule you for 

1) weekend shifts (that you did not sign up for) 
2) shifts at a time you TOLD THEM you could not work 
3) shifts on a day that you organized to have off

You are then penalized for not showing up or you need to go talk to HR for a mistake that was not your fault but you are punished for regardless.

There is an extremely large amount of NEPOTISM here and very little opportunity for growth as a consequence. The only pro of this job is that the people you work with are usually very nice and easy to get along with being that most people have the same interests and hobbies. 

You are not a person here but rather a number, your sole purpose is to fill a seat and that is all you are viewed as. Miss 2 days in a month because you were ill or an emergency occurred and you will likely get a written warning. This company weighs late's the same as a full on absence. HR is utterly incompetent and only has the views of the company in mind with whatever interaction you have with them. They do not care if you have valid proof as they will just dismiss it as many of the reviews have already pointed out.

Do not make the same mistake that I did for 3 years. Testing video games is enjoyable for a bit but you have NO guarantee of getting work at all. They over hire and do not care about their employees, they do not care about the loyalty you show to them, the work you put out or your job security.

There's a lot I could say about this job but let's keep it brief. Its a contract job which they try to sell you as a positive. "You get to be flexible with your hours and choose when you work!" Except that this isn't true at all. It's just an attempt to sell precarity as some sort of positive, and you don't really get any rights as a worker. Here's what you should know:

-you have no permanent hours. I went several weeks at a time without shifts and worked other jobs to make up for it.
-you're on call every day that you've put as available and they only let you know at 6pm the night before if you're working or not. 
-they pay minimum wage so if you lose a few shifts and have no backup income source you're pretty stuck, 
-there's basically zero room to move up and even the highest paid position you can reach after several years doesn't pay a living wage. They gave a bunch of people a 25 cent raise the week before the minimum wage was increased so even if you work hard its not like it makes a difference. 

I will say that they at least pay for the training which I appreciated. I've been told by other employees that HR essentially sides with corporate at all times and will drop you at the sign of any contention. This is probably why they have a strict "no politics" rule during work and break time. Again they try to sell all of this as fun and competitive (look we have a video game area where you can wait for 3 hours and see if you have a shift or not today!)

Avoid this job if you can and don't get caught sitting 2 weeks behind on your bills wondering if you're going to get a shift or not!

Keywords Studios' goal is to acquire multiple service lines around the world, strip them from all benefits and essentially turn themselves into THE premiere Sweatshop of the video games industry.

I have worked in multiple departments within the company (FQA, Console Certification and Virtual Reality).I was mainly a Certification Tester throughout my employment, and I cannot stress how anti-worker the company is.

If you're familiar with Rockstar/Riot/Activision/etc in the news, expect the same expendable/harassing treatment from management throughout your employment.

Certification Testers are paid the ABSOLUTE minimum and not compensated extra for their extensive commitment to their department. As individuals who are verifying titles for end-user release for Microsoft/Nintendo/Sony/VR, we were constantly spoken down to and threatened for talking about workplace conditions.

Speaking of conditions, the Virtual Reality department is the biggest offender in my opinion. I am not sure if they have improved the lab, but when I was working there, we were squeezed closely together using VR headsets and constantly hitting each other with no solution in sight. Furthermore, the lab is literally unfurnished with concrete flooring, just desks and PCs with carpet only situated for management. I am pretty sure the CNESST would have a field day with the room.

Do what I did, get your experience and find a company that would actually appreciate you.

Working as a foreing language agent at Keywords is not so bad - the salary is not terrible for some languages and you can be more or less sure you won't get randomly fired (which happens all the time with English speaking agents) and the schedules seem to be a little more flexible, since there is generally no need for 24/7 foreign language coverage. 

You will still be disgusted by the fact that the manager basically makes all of the employees feel like they're 100% replacable, the labour law is often broken, your supervisors don't trust you a bit and many more.

Please also note that as a foreign language agent you pretty much don't have options of promotion because you're generally more valuable to the company as an agent (even if you are one of the best ones, that could easily coach or perform leader tasks).

I only recommend working at Keywords temporarily, to get some experience, and then move on to a more serious company that offers much more stable employment conditions and actually hires people to have them stay. Keywords hires young people, often being their first job, and this is perfect for the company, because these young people, students, don't know their rights that well yet or are simply too excited to be working in the gaming industry to care about their rights. 

Otherwise, I'd rather recommend staying away.

This company has potential to be decent, but toxic management and corporate brainwashing has actively kept wages and employee morale low.

As a "freelance" worker, you're subjected to strict attendance and workplace policies that are made to keep your mouth shut about the company.

Management scans your public Facebook/Twitter/Instagram accounts and reprimands you for any negative comments about the company. More so, they have implemented a "whistle-blowing" policy to actively sweep responsibility under the table and to keep their public image clean.

HR will always side with management, no matter what kind abuse of power or conduct. HR actively discourages testers to pursue claims, and in some cases, punish you for being "unprofessional" if you show emotion. As far as I know, its another "leak" for them to plug.

As of now, the company is very well aware of its issues (due to a mass survey sent out) but are still hesitant to provide any noticeable action or changes to fix them due to the manpower and money needed to do so.

It's an absolute shame, this company has the potential to provide a proper career path, but constant jealously and greed from management and corporate are making sure that employees are rotated often, keeping responsibility at a bare minimum, and just plain incompetence are holding it back.

Fantastic people. Great from an investor perspective. Above-market client pricing combined with below-market pay rates in a recession-resistant market means excellent EPS quarter over quarter. Ever since I bought a crapload of shares in the company and left, I've been making BANK. And it's virtually impossible to get fired.

Fumbling, hand-wringing approach to business. At least ten to fifteen years behind in business operations and corporate culture compared to businesses out west or in the US. A top-down approach to the market makes the company inflexible to sudden--or even slow--changes in the market. As a result, they lost out on tens of millions during the pandemic all because they couldn't adapt to a shift in video game consumption habits. Additionally, be warned that if you work here and mention it in other video game professional circles, you WILL be derided and mocked. Oh, and it's virtually impossible to get fired.

I have no advice for management. They're hamstrung by Keywords' particular corporate structure. As a result, their issues are institutional and aren't solved with anything less than a complete restructuring.

Even though it says on the contract that they will let you know 1 week in advance if they're terminating you, they won't. No warnings no nothing. Was absent for a couple days because I was sick and just got fired from HR with no warning. Reached out to provide doctor's notes as well as even told them to call the doctor to prove I was going in and out of his clinic hence could not come to work. HR said decision was final and irrevocable. Will not even try to listen to you. I can handle the undetermined hours of work, having to wait until dinnertime to know I'll be working the next day as well as the minimum salary but seriously? No respect for the employees. Probably has no regard for their employees because they have so many of them to the point people who worked there longer has problem securing hours. They're still hiring though which fascinates me. The "benefits" are not that great too, offering bixi and stm discounts when you can get them from their respective websites, Telus employee discount which only works on certain plans, no healthcare insurance unless you want to talk to a social worker about how hard your life is then you'll have that benefit.

A typical day at work for a project manager included management meetings, one-on-ones with your staff, general admin work (hours reporting, invoicing, etc.), weekly syncs with the clients, town hall meetings, performance reviews, and more. 
I learned a lot of organization skills and perhaps a more Canadian way of dealing with staff, very politically correct. I learned to use JaaS and Coreform. 
As part of the management team, we were very concerned with the happiness of both our clients and our staff. Keeping that balance was quite a challenge. But KW leaves you in charge of how you do that to some extent. 
The culture was quite diverse and dealt with it in a very Canadian way... overly cautiously most of the time. But as long as you have good rapport with your staff, you don't have to be overly stiff. Which translated really well with my staff. 
The hardest part of the job was probably the mundane excel stuff. But only because it is tedious, nothing was particularly hard. 
The most enjoyable part of the job was definitely taking ownership of how you manage your own staff. I love working with people and care for my staff. 

I only had bad experiences with Keywords. I was an LQA and FQA tester for a couple of months there but I didn't get to work a lot. You are on call, meaning you have no guaranteed work and often you won't get any work in weeks. Then they have a project for you and you have to work multiple shifts at once because the organization is absolutely terrible. The management is the worst I've ever had to deal with. There's a 50% chance that when you come to work they will tell you that your shift or the project has been canceled so you will wait for 3 hours in the cafeteria (you get paid the laughable $13 an hour) and then you are told to go home. I did not do this for the money. I wanted to have fun with games because I really love gaming and video games but I have to say that because this company has no structure whatsoever and because everything is super chaotic I mostly just sat in front of my PC doing nothing because something got canceled or a build was overwritten or some other bs.
You will not enjoy working for them. I had more fun working as a construction worker and waiter than here.

Most of the testers and the people working on the projects are awesome people tho and if you go up the ladder it might be better.

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