The scene is all too familiar: A whiteboard (real or virtual), a distracted interviewer with little time or patience, and a contrived problem to solve in thirty minutes. The job candidate’s heart races, fingers poised over the keyboard, while the pressure mounts—the syntax, the algorithm, the fear of forgetting a semicolon—until it’s all anxiety and adrenaline, a far cry from the collaborative, iterative process that defines real-world game development.
It’s so… suboptimal. And for senior game developers—battle-hardened by years of thoughtful problem-solving, who have built formidable programming war chests—it’s downright silly. Yet these interviews are all too often an integral part of the hiring process, even at small studios.
The Three Virtues, or Lack Thereof
Larry Wall, the sage behind Perl, bestowed upon us the three virtues of a programmer: Laziness, Impatience, and Hubris. But in the pseudo-crucible of live coding interviews, the virtues morph into darker counterparts:
Artificial Pressure. Laziness in its virtuous form drives programmers to automate, optimize, and streamline, and that takes time. When an interviewer lords over an artificially short deadline that stifles creativity and encourages careless thinking, they are simulating a type of high-pressure scenario that mirrors the worst kind of real-world game development.
Narrow Focus. Impatience, when wielded by interviewers, becomes a blunt instrument. Swift solutions ignore the intricacies of real problem-solving, while senior developers long for deeper discussions about topics that transcend mere code snippets.
Cryptic Trivia. Hubristic interviewers can’t see past their canned code problems, problems they themselves would likely not be able to quickly solve. They scoff at candidates who question the relevance of the exercise or can’t solve it exactly the way they want. Meanwhile, senior developers are thinking: “I’ve shipped games, optimized renderers, battled nasty memory leaks, rewritten entire subsystems from scratch. Why not discuss that?”
False Positives
Imagine a job description that optimizes for the three [non]virtuous qualities:
Of course no one would advertise for such an absurd developer—a false positive if there ever was one—since these qualities would result in highly undesirable outcomes:
- Stagnation in problem-solving and inability to adapt to novel challenges
- Poorly designed systems, technical debt, and frustrated teammates
- Lack of groundbreaking features, outdated practices, and missed opportunities
- Broken features, uninspired implementations, and missed UX opportunities
- Clunky interfaces, inconsistent gameplay, and spaghetti code
- Misaligned goals, communication breakdowns, and missed optimizations
- Wasted time on trivial details, missed deadlines, and strained relationships
All kidding aside, it’s not difficult to see how, at best, a live coding interview optimizes for a more realistic false positive: a much more junior developer:
- Junior candidates may excel in live coding because they are more accustomed to rapid coding challenges from their academic or early career experiences
- Juniors may have more recent practice with coding challenges due to recent coursework or coding bootcamps
- Live coding tests sometimes favor memorization of common algorithms or patterns, which junior candidates may have studied more recently
- Live coding interviews assess specific coding skills, but senior roles require broader expertise like architecture, system design, and project management
False Negatives
Live coding interviews also have a knack for producing false negatives. This results in:
Missed Opportunities. Rejecting a senior candidate due to to a poor live coding interview means missing out on their potential contributions—you know, the things real senior developers do. They could have optimized code, improved performance, enhanced gameplay mechanics, and mentored others.
Costly Delays. Game development timelines are always tight. A false negative prolongs the hiring process. You’ll need to restart the search, interview new candidates, and onboard someone else. Meanwhile, the game faces delays, impacting release dates and revenue.
Team Morale. Imagine the impact on team morale when a promising senior developer is turned away. Existing team members may question your judgment or feel demotivated. It’s essential to maintain a positive atmosphere.
A Better Approach
Studios deserve a interview process that discourages false positives and false negatives, and senior game developers deserve an interview that celebrates their craft, not one that reduces them to code-spewing automatons. Here are some ideas:
Higher-Level Discussions. Replace live coding with an in-depth conversation. Imagine discussing game architecture, engine choices, plugins and frameworks, optimization strategies, workflow, and pipelines. Senior developers shine when they can articulate their vision, share war stories, and debate trade-offs.
Take-Home Projects. Instead of a whiteboard, assign a small take-home project, for instance building a game mechanic, optimizing existing code, or implementing a non-trivial state machine. This mirrors real-world tasks and allows creativity to flourish.
Collaborative Problem-Solving. Conduct a short problem-solving session. Sit down with the candidate, present a real issue from a real game, and discuss different approaches. Collaboration reveals teamwork, adaptability, and communication skills—essential for any senior role.