Playing video games for a living.
It’s the dream, isn’t it?
Well, what was once a distant unattainable dream is now very much within your reach,
if you’re committed and dedicated, that is.
So today we’re taking a look at the top 10 ways to make money playing video games.
Let’s jump in.
10 Quality Assurance Tester While this one would be THE IDEAL job, it’s
still likely the hardest one on this list to obtain aside from our number one spot.
But not totally unheard of.
Many people end up achieving this by going alternate routes - having a youtube gaming
channel for example, and having products sent to you to review and exhibit.
That being said, the traditional jobs at developers are also possibilities, and sometimes pop
up in job postings, but it’’s highly competitive to even get into the interview stage, and
you REALLY need to be well versed in gaming.
And if you get it, remember, you’ll likely be playing levels over and over again to spot
any bugs.
9 Become A Developer Easier said that done, but the best way to
play games is to make them.
Whether it’s something you do in your spare time for fun or something you’re working
on making a career towards (which, hey, let’s be honest, that’s where you’ll make the
money compared to it being a hobby) learning how to dev has become a sustainable skill.
There’s even university programs on it.
For starters, take a look at programs and engines like Unity, Twine, Stencyl, or GameMaker.
Check out Game Jams and make connections with others crafting their own games.
And do your research - the GDC Vault is a good place to start.
8 Gaming Blog Before you write this one off, let’s take
a look at how blogs are useful.
They can get you traffic.
You can use it as a home base website to direct people to.
You can get ad sponsorship on it and increase your revenues.
And it’s a cleaner way to keep up communication with your audience base outside of social
media DMs.
Yes they can be tedious to maintain, but the benefits may be worth it if your content is
interesting and your committed to consistently posting.
7 Podcast Want to start a podcast about your favourite
game?
Or a specific gaming niche you enjoy?
Well there’s a few ways that podcasts in general can be beneficial.
After promoting the crap out of it via social media, if you manage to get enough of a following,
sponsorships can get you around $25 per 1000 downloads for a mid roll second second slot
mention.
It can also get your foot in the door to other career avenues, giving you a reason to network
and interview others in the gaming industry.
6 Ghost Gaming Similar to the concept of ghost writing, this
one is where you play games for someone else in order to advance their progress.
Essentially, it’s doing the dirty work for someone else so they can bask in the glory.
There was a huge surge of this back when Pokemon Go first came out, and people were paying
other players to catch pokemon for them and advance their level so they could confidently
compete at gyms.
High level players were also selling their accounts on Craigslist and eBay for up to
a grand a piece.
5 In-Game Merchant Another way to make a pretty penny is to sell
products in-game.
Farming materials and selling them to other players is one way to make some cash on the
side.
There was actually a player who became a real life millionaire from selling digital goods
on SecondLife.
Anshe Chung aka Ai-lin Gr-aef built her own corporation in the game, starting with small
scale purchases of virtual real estate, eventually expanding to larger properties, and even moving
her business into the real world.
But be careful with this one - some games prohibit this, like World of Warcraft, and
you can get into some trouble for doing so.
So do your research!
https://web.archive.org/web/20160312141326/http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2006/11/second_lifes_fi.html
4 Major League Gaming - Game Battles So there’s a lot to talk about for Major
League Gaming, but let’s focus on Game Battles for this number.
An offshoot of MLG, Game Battles lets users sign up for free and play competitively in
over 100 games.
There’s over 9 million members with over 4 million dollars won at the time of this
recording.
GameBattles is a way for gamers who want to get into competitive gaming to get better
at it.
3 YouTube Let’s Play Videos If you’ve seen our richest video game you
tubers list, you’ll know that there’s a whole lot of money to be made from the online
video distributor.
Users upload their gameplay footage, along with an O.S commentary (sometimes they appear
in the videos too, which is definitely recommended if you’re not camera shy), and just enjoy
the game.
This one is likely the most cost effective way aside from the blog to get yourself out
there and start raking in the dollars.
And it’s even better if you pick a niche, or specific kinds of genres to discuss.
2 Twitch Streaming games is definitely one way to go.
And one of the more substantial ways to make money.
Twitch is a live streaming video platform, which focuses on playthroughs, creative content,
broadcasts of eSports and even music broadcasts.
As of 2015, Twitch had more than 1.5 million broadcasters and 100 million visitors per
month.
If you’re able to entertain and sustain a fan base, Twitch is an incredibly accessible
way to rake in those dollars, with the company paying streamers an average of about $2.50
per Twitch subscriber you get per month.
And once you’ve proven you can pull in a big enough audience, you have the opportunity
of becoming a Twitch partner.
Between donations (via PayPal), amazon reference links and sponsorship, there’s lots of opportunity
to get that cash.
1 Competitive Gaming So yes, this is a little similar to our number
4 spot, but there is a difference between game battles and professional competitive
gaming.
There are professional players who have made over $2million.
But those are the best of the best, and generally, like most other athletes, start their careers
when they’re real young, starting around 14 or 15 years of age.
It takes tons of practice, commitment to a certain game, trying out for teams, and dedicating
yourself to it - it’s more work than a 9-5 job.
There we have it friends!
Have you personally given any of these a try?
Are there other ways you make cold hard cash from playing games?
Give us a shout in the comments below and share your stories.
We’d love to hear em.
But for now I’m Kelly Paoli for top 10 gaming, and I’ll catch you all in the next one.