The results of Gamasutra's annual salary survey, this year with 4,000 respondents, are in (full results can be found here. While the study is based on self-reporting, so the numbers may be skewed higher, some of the conclusions show where the game industry is heading and where it still needs improvement.
On average, salaried game developers made $83,060 in the United States. Note that this is "salaried" positions and doesn't include the wealth of designers and artists who freelancer their work. This figure has remained pretty much the same since last year, though 14% of respondents said they were laid off over the course of 2013. 59% of those laid off found new employment at another game studio, 22% went into consulting, and 16% went into indie development. While 13% were "unsatisfied" and 29% were only "somewhat satisfied" with their current career path, 40% said they were satisfied and 18% said they were "extremely satisfied".
For the respondents, they recognize that several pressing issues in the industry like long work hours, job instability, shifting business models, and "cultural issues such as sexism." Here is a quick breakdown of the average salary of a game developer based on their discipline:
Programmers and Engineers – $93,251
Artists and Animators – $74,349
Game Designers – $73,864
Producers – $82,286
Audio Professionals – $95,682
QA Testers – $54,833
Business and Management – $101,572
Taking the stats one step further, the western region of the continental U.S. earn the highest average salary at $89,559, with California, Washington, North Carolina, New York, Nevada, Texas, and Maryland leading as the top seven states for average salary. Surprisingly, the U.S. and Canada trump Europe by around $20,000-$30,000 in average salary across all levels of experience and discipline.
As for indies, there was a key drop in salaries for solo developers, going down 49% since last year, where as members of an indie team earned a whopping 161% more on average. Despite the wave of Kickstarter and Indigogo campaigns in the gaming industry, only 5% of indies went the crowdfunding route.
According to the report, the gender gap is a pressing issue in video game development, with women making "on average that men made in the U.S. game industry." That may sound troubling, but it's higher than the U.S. overall where "women make 77 cents on every dollar that men make, according figures from a 2012 Census Bureau survey." Female game designers make almost as much as men (94%) whereas female audio engineers only made about two-thirds (68%).
