On 18-19 May, Virtuos Chengdu studio hosted the third edition of Open Day, offering college students and teachers a glimpse of the magic behind the making of AAA games.
Open Day is a program series organized in collaboration with local partner colleges – created with the aim of introducing local talent to the possibilities of working at Virtuos and the games industry at large. Through closer partnerships with educational institutions, we hope to make the games industry more accessible and help foster new generations of young, diverse talent.
With the third iteration of Open Day, we welcomed over 91 attendees from the Sichuan Conservatory of Music (SCCM) Chengdu Academy of Fine Arts and Sichuan University Jinjiang College: School of Media Arts over the course of two days.
This year’s program included interactive presentations that showcased projects in which our Chengdu teams created various game environments. For instance: the team who worked on the Call of Duty franchise shared practical knowledge on aspects of the production lifecycle, including Virtuos’ approach to pipelines, day-to-day workflow, as well as how all members collaborate and support each other across their respective scopes of work.
Open Day also aims to provide all attendees a truly immersive and interactive experience. A highlight of Open Day for many attendees was the arcade corner specially set up for the occasion. Attendees were treated to a sumptuous canapé spread and encouraged to try their hands at several demo stations, each of them displaying a title that Virtuos had contributed to previously – such as Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War, Demon’s Souls and Forza Horizon 4.
Vox pox of attendees’ feedback: “The environment feels really nice. There seems to be a culture of teamwork where everyone speaks their mind freely and gets to work together.”
“Everyone jokes around! It seems like a fun and harmonious workplace.”
“It’s a pity I can’t take photos and show off my experience to my friends!”
“I learnt that Virtuos is a company that helped make games I love playing. I’m inclined to the prospect of joining the industry and working here.”
“Open Day has been fulfilling. My teams and I really bonded with the students and teachers, and we hope this initiative helped to bring the games industry and our educational institutions closer together as a result. Seeing the students’ eye glimmer with fascination and enthusiasm, I can tell by the positive response that there is more to be discovered and done to support young talent with aspirations to join the games industry. At Virtuos, we are looking forward to evolving and running more of such programs to engage local talent in the near future,” said Tian Li, General Manager, Virtuos Chengdu.
We thank all attendees for participating in Open Day and hope they learnt more about life in the games industry, as well as the inner workings of Virtuos – our history, culture, and purpose of making games better, together.
