Chapter 52
Chapter 52
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 52
Chapter Title: Interview (3)
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"Ah, yes. Thank you."
*So, he called just to talk about this after all.*
<<But, you see, the PR team is saying you've been avoiding media interviews. No matter how busy you are, this is for the good of the company. How can you do that? You're practically the face of our company, aren't you?>>
*Seriously? The face?*
*Just a few months ago, I was just some manager, and now they're treating me like this.*
*Rather than feeling good, I just found it absurd how a company could operate like this.*
*Even now, I felt the urge to talk back to President Oh Geoshin, but...*
"Haha, yes, of course. I'll do the interviews."
*It's not a big deal. No need to pick a fight over it right now.*
*It's not like he has a knife to my throat, and it's just a few interviews.*
*Or so I thought...*
"Hello, PD Jo Hyunsoo of Christian. This is Game Critic! You've become quite the topic of conversation for the 'moving rejection notice' posted on Blind. Could you give us a comment on that?"
"Ah, yes. I felt that since the applicants invested their precious time to apply, I should repay them for their effort."
*The interviews, which I initially thought would only be a few...*
"PD Jo Hyunsoo, could you share a word of advice for the young people dreaming of getting a job?"
"I hope you never forget your passion—the work you wanted to do, the game you wanted to create."
*...continued one after another.*
"I heard the game you're making is also about dreams. Is there a connection between that and the recent rejection notices?"
"Most people who make games do it because it's what they want to do; many entered this profession because it was their dream. I wanted the interviews to be a way to respond to that as much as possible..."
*It got to the point where I had to do interviews almost every other day.*
*I wanted to quit right then and there, but since I'd already given my word to President Oh Geoshin, I couldn't back out.*
*What's more, the thing that was driving me even crazier was...*
[The Genius Developer Other Interviewers Should Learn From! - Onsite]
[An Interviewer Who Made an Applicant Cry? - Sabasa News]
[Christian's Genius Developer, a Hot Topic for His Unconventional Interviewing Style. - On-Hit Game]
*On YouLube, Basebook, and Bluebird, these embellished, heartwarming stories about me started circulating as card news and videos.*
*And when I looked at them...*
*'Who the hell is this?'*
*They weren't depicting the real me, but the image of the 'angelic interviewer' and 'genius Jo Hyunsoo' that people wanted to see.*
*My and the company's images were improving, but honestly, it was a huge burden.*
*It was obvious that when people met the real me, they would be disappointed to find someone so different from the inflated version on the internet.*
*And.*
"Hyunsoo, I saw your interview. It was so cool! An interview that helps people find their dreams, one by one!"
*From Rokhui.*
"Whoa~ our Hyunsoo has become a total superstar, huh? A mentor to the youth, a true teacher of our time!"
*Every time Yoon Byeongjong threw comments like that at me, I felt like I was going to die from the cringe.*
*If it weren't for Oh Geoshin, I would have screamed, 'Stop it, you crazy bastards!' at the reporters churning out these articles.*
*Besides, this wasn't the only problem it was causing.*
"PD-nim, if we keep going like this, I think we'll fall behind the milestone schedule. Will that be okay?"
"PD-nim, should we just do R&D again today? I think we need to start development soon to avoid any delays..."
*As I juggled interviews for both the media and for hiring, problems with the schedule began to emerge.*
*Our team needed to hire seven people, but so far, only the UI designer, Mr. Kim Ho, had been confirmed.*
*Which meant I had to keep interviewing until we hired six more people.*
*'Hiring people is no ordinary task.'*
*On top of that, several other problems arose.*
*First, being dragged around for media interviews meant I could conduct fewer hiring interviews.*
*Consequently, the hiring process slowed down, and writing the 1000-character comments for each interview became an incredible burden.*
*'If I stop now, I'll get cursed out, and the reputation I've built up will go down the drain in an instant.'*
*Even if I wanted to stop, it was difficult to do so now that I'd been praised on Blind and an image of me as some kind of saint had been created on the internet.*
*In the end, I had to keep repeating the interviews and writing comments just to maintain that good image.*
*'On top of that, the average quality of the applicants has dropped.'*
*And the second problem was that the average skill level of the applicants was gradually declining.*
*Unlike the initial applicants who were full of passion and showed interest in the project, most of the later candidates were people who were just applying for a 'job'.*
*Even if they only saw it as a job, it wouldn't matter if they were skilled, but that wasn't the case either.*
"Applicant XXX, could you tell me why you applied to this team?"
"Um, I applied because I want to make a lot of money."
"Mr. XXX, could you tell us your motivation for applying?"
"I want to build my career by working on a famous title."
*Perhaps because I'd been around the industry for a bit.*
*I could easily spot the job seekers who were just going through the motions, without any soul.*
*It's not that they were wrong, but they weren't the right fit for our team.*
*The higher the proportion of such applicants, the more exhausted I became.*
"PD Hyunsoo, are the documents not ready yet?"
"Ah, I'm sorry. For today, please just continue with R&D and prepare for the interviews."
*The worst part was that I was too busy to write the documents.*
*No matter how talented the artists and programmers were, without a design plan, their work was likely to become useless.*
*In the end, because I couldn't get my work done, the other departments couldn't even start theirs, creating a vicious cycle.*
*As things started heading in an unexpected direction, I began to have other thoughts.*
*'Haa, I guess this is why companies use headhunters.'*
*Headhunters, an outsourced agency that handles recruitment.*
*I never used to understand why other PDs would entrust finding their team members to headhunters, but now that I was in this situation, I felt like I could understand them a little.*
*On top of that.*
[Division Head Shin Chihwan: PD Hyunsoo, if you're too busy, just try using a headhunter. Once you try it, it's actually not bad.]
[Me: No, sir. I'll try a little longer.]
*Even Division Head Shin Chihwan started to continuously recommend I use a headhunter.*
*However, I didn't take his suggestion.*
*'I'm trying to hire employees who can each do the work of a hundred people. There's no way I can entrust that to someone else and expect it to work out.'*
*Because we were a small team, I had to carefully select each and every member, which was why I didn't want to leave such an important decision to someone else.*
*But the reality was this ridiculous situation where I was hiring people to get work done, but the hiring process itself was preventing me from working.*
*If I didn't find a way out of this, it was clear that the game's development would be postponed day after day.*
*'Whatever happens, I need to find an answer as quickly as possible.'*
*A dilemma where I couldn't move forward or backward.*
*Even in this situation, the interviews had to go on.*
"Next applicant, please come in."
"Good morning! My name is Choi Kanghyun!"
*The applicant entered, and despite my fatigue, I conducted the interview with all my heart and sincerity.*
"Mr. Choi Kanghyun, what are your favorite games? And if you have a personal philosophy about games, please share it with us."
"When I was young, I was deeply moved by a game called The Legend of Heroes. The emotions I felt back then..."
"Ah, I enjoyed that game too. The ending sequence was really good."
*The other person's tastes, their thoughts on games, and their usual hobbies and preferences.*
*I continued the conversation in-depth, trying to grasp every little detail.*
*The reality was that conducting such a thorough interview with each person, one by one, was bound to take time.*
*And so, I put my all into it for a full hour.*
"I really enjoyed the interview today. I might not get hired, but I truly hope the project is successful."
"Thank you, Mr. Choi Kanghyun. Regardless of the outcome today, I hope you'll be able to create the games you dream of in this industry."
*And when the interview was over, the applicant left the conference room with a bright expression, as if they had just received counseling.*
*This was why, no matter how tiring it was, I found it hard to simply stop interviewing this way.*
"Hoo, let's get some lunch before we continue."
"Yes!"
*After interviewing three people all morning, it was already 12:30 PM, lunchtime.*
*If I could just get through two more interviews in the afternoon, my schedule for the day would be finished.*
*Just as I was about to leave the conference room.*
<<Congratulations! You have completed the achievement 'Master of Interviews'!>>
- Clear Condition: Conduct 50+ interviews / Achieve an average applicant satisfaction of A+ or higher
- Reward: Acquire the skill 'King of Interviews'.
*After a long time, God Game Maker sent me a message.*
*'What's this, all of a sudden?'*
*It seemed I had completed an interview-related achievement.*
*Fifty interviews and an average satisfaction rating of A+ or higher.*
*I'd been worrying that I was putting too much effort into the interviews, so receiving this reward from God Game Maker felt strange.*
*It felt as if it were praising me for all the sincere effort I'd put into the interviews until now.*
*'Let's check it out first.'*
*I immediately opened my status window to check 'King of Interviews'.*
[Skill]
King of Interviews
- Allows you to view the status window of an interviewee.
- The higher the interviewee's satisfaction, the more information you can see.
*'What, I can see their status window based on their satisfaction level?'*
*I immediately tried activating the skill.*
*'King of Interviews, activate.'*
<<Activating King of Interviews. Displaying list of interview subjects.>>
1. Choi Kanghyun
2. _____
3. _____
4. _____
…….
(※ The list will be updated as you conduct more interviews.)
*Only the name of Mr. Choi Kanghyun, who I had just interviewed, was displayed under number 1.*
*I immediately selected number 1...*
[Client Programmer / Choi Kanghyun]
- 3rd-year programmer currently employed at N-Bit
- The project at his current company is in danger of being dropped.
- Interview Satisfaction: A+
[Stats]
▶ Programming: B+
- Client: 35
- Server Programming: 30
- Core Programming: 10
- Web Programming: 15
…….
▶ Communication: A-
[Overall Assessment]
- Decent performance for his years of experience. With his excellent communication skills, he has the potential to improve rapidly with a good mentor.
- Genuinely wants to participate in the Pass On Dream project. Considers Forgotten Andersen's Story one of his all-time favorite games.
- Recommended to proceed with the 1st test.
*'Holy crap, I can see all this?'*
*Just like looking at my own status window, I could see every detail of the person I had interviewed.*
*With this, I would be able to gauge an applicant's abilities much more objectively.*
*'With this, I can make the hiring process much faster and more accurate.'*
*It was the perfect ability for me, especially now that hiring was dragging on and on.*
*If God Game Maker were a person, I would have felt like planting a kiss on its cheek.*
*As the corners of my mouth twitched upward in delight.*
"Um, Daeri Jeong. Don't you think the PD is acting a little strange? He's staring blankly into space again and grinning... Do you think he's really possessed?"
"Nah, he said it was just a habit last time."
"But he never used to be like this. I wonder if he's getting a bit weird because he has too much work lately."
*Jeong Yosep and Heo Yuri were whispering to each other, looking at me with worried eyes.*
*'Oops.'*
*I'd stopped on my way to lunch and was just waving my hands in the air. I must have looked like I'd lost my mind.*
"Ah, haha, sorry about that. I was just thinking about the person we just interviewed and zoned out for a moment. What did you think, Daeri Jeong?"
"Hmm, he seemed like he'd be good. His ability to articulate programming structures seemed solid when we talked."
"Haha, right? His communication skills seemed fundamentally sound, too."
"Yes, yes, I got that impression as well."
*I headed to the cafeteria with Daeri Jeong, making conversation based on the information I'd gained from the skill.*
*'Let's get these people hired as fast as possible.'*
*Thanks to God Game Maker, it felt like a nagging tooth had just been pulled out.*