Video Game Designers

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Occupation snapshot

What does this snowflake show?
The Snowflake is a visual summary of the five badges: Automation Risk (calculated), Risk (polled), Growth, Wages and Volume. It gives you an instant snapshot of an occupations profile. The colour of the Snowflake relates to its size. The better the occupation scores in relation to others, the larger and greener the Snowflake becomes.
JOB SCORE
6.9/10
What's this?
Job Score (higher is better):

We rate jobs using four factors. These are:

- Chance of being automated
- Job growth
- Wages
- Volume of available positions

These are some key things to think about when job hunting.

Risk & user votes

Calculated automation risk

22% (Low Risk)

Low Risk (21-40%): This occupation has a lower risk of full replacement by AI, software, or robotic systems. Some tasks may be automated or assisted, but the role usually still relies on human judgement, communication, responsibility, physical adaptability, or practical decision-making.

More information on what this score is, and how it is calculated is available here.

Human strengths important in this job

These are human abilities and work contexts that are important in this occupation. They may help explain why parts of the role are harder to replace end-to-end, but they are not the only inputs into the automation score.

Thinking creatively

Very important
Why this matters
Coming up with original ideas and designs—creating new concepts, products, systems, or artistic work. This kind of open-ended invention and taste-based judgment is harder to automate end-to-end than routine, rule-based tasks.
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Decision-making and problem solving

Very important
Why this matters
Analyze information, weigh tradeoffs, and choose the best solution—especially when situations are ambiguous, high-stakes, or have real-world consequences.
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Persuasion

Quite important
Why this matters
Influencing people to change their minds or behavior through conversation, trust, and negotiation.
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Developing objectives and strategies

Quite important
Why this matters
Sets long-term goals and chooses strategies and actions to reach them, weighing tradeoffs and adapting plans as conditions change.
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Psychology knowledge

Quite important
Why this matters
Understanding human behavior, motivation, and individual differences to assess needs, respond appropriately, and support behavior change or mental health.
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Show 2 more strengths

Active learning

Quite important
Why this matters
Keeps learning from new information and applying it to make better decisions now and in the future, especially when situations change.
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Operations analysis

Quite important
Why this matters
Figure out what people need and what a product must do, then translate those requirements into a workable design.
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What users think

Based on 858 votes

41% chance of full automation within the next two decades

Our visitors have voted they are unsure if this occupation will be automated. However, employees may be able to find reassurance in the automated risk level we have generated, which shows 22% chance of automation.

What do you think the risk of automation is?

What is the likelihood that Video Game Designers will be replaced by robots or artificial intelligence within the next 20 years?

Sentiment

Based on user votes over time

View sentiment trend

How opinions have changed over time

Pay & outlook

Wages

Very high paid relative to other professions

In 2024, the median annual wage for Web and Digital Interface Designers was $98,090 ($47 per hour).

The median annual wage for Web and Digital Interface Designers was 98.2% higher than the national median annual wage, which stood at $49,500.

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Growth

Very fast growth relative to other professions

The number of 'Web and Digital Interface Designers' job openings is expected to rise 7.0% by 2034

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the period between 2023 and 2033
Updated projections are due 09-2025.

Volume

Greater range of job opportunities compared to other professions

As of 2024 there were 111,400 people employed as 'Web and Digital Interface Designers' within the United States.

This represents around 0.07% of the employed workforce across the country

Put another way, around 1 in 1 thousand people are employed as 'Web and Digital Interface Designers'.

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What people are saying (40)

Leave a comment
Ellie (Low)
14 May 2026 21:10
Video Games are an artform that need humans to make it accesible to humans.
I forgot (Low)
29 Apr 2026 16:54
video game design requires a lot of creative potential that something like artificial intelligence cannot replicate.
N/A (Moderate)
10 Mar 2026 02:53
Moderate but not that much at risk, theres alot of aspects in gamedesign that are hard to generate. Because it involved creativity and concept with playtesting and bug testing these things cannot be generated.
ChristianCoder (Uncertain)
12 Aug 2025 21:34
It depends on how one views the situation. If you are trying to build something original, it is natural to do some hand-sketched storyboards before the actual development starts. However, if you are just having an AI model iterating through designs, that could be a possibility too
Unknown
29 Mar 2025 02:19
In my opinion if they managed to a lot of people might not be to happy or video play games much anymore if I was gonna put robots on a job it would be law enforcement due to the fact they can be repaired where us humans can not however I believe water or electricity would be a big problem and maybe reorganizing faces
sheep (Low)
08 Mar 2025 08:15
it requires heart, talent and love. ai cannot reproduce this.
derrick (No chance)
25 Feb 2025 16:02
creativity is just 1 reason why this can and shouldn't happen
abcd (Moderate)
02 Feb 2025 01:39
Game design is a job that require innovation and creativeness which cannot be taken by ai which relies on the data which is already used by people and the designershould also understand the perspective of the audience.it atill can do the things associated with it like 3d models,animations,coding etc.
zander (Low)
13 Jan 2025 19:48
it combines so many jobs artist programmer music and more all of these ai can technically do but when they reference there own creations slowly decrease in quality. combining those is a completely different thing that i don't think ai can do
Noof (Moderate)
09 Jan 2025 20:41
As a professional game designer at a AAA company, there are many pieces of design that can and will be automated. The overall career will not be eliminated because there will always be a desire for human-led art experiences, however the job openings in the field will drop drastically, companies that churn slop mobile games can easily churn those designs using AI almost from top to bottom.

What will have taken a team of designers even now appears to soon be able to take one or two designers at most.

Expect a new indie revolution in gaming when it hits this point.
Awang (No chance)
10 Dec 2024 14:45
No chance they can be video game designers but not a good game they can make like nothing beats minecraft, roblox, call of duty, csgo, tf2 or whatever the best video games you name it ai will never beat these video games we love
Nadhira (Moderate)
29 Nov 2024 10:35
Cuz AI can make ideas, scripts, design but it won't compare to hard work
Nadhira
03 Dec 2024 23:00
Also sometimes the codes can be really faulty
Arjun
22 Feb 2026 07:57
welcome to 2025, we have Claude code.
B) (No chance)
05 Sep 2024 00:23
It needs multiple things on game. Background music, concepts, story of game, programming, design of game character etc. I don't think that bot thing can replace it. Please don't.
Artrat
19 Aug 2024 22:10
Honestly, next year i might start a bachelors degree in game design, and im terrified of everything getting taken over by ai. I already have an associates degree in graphic design and seeing how people rather use AI than paying an actual designer frightens me so bad
herd
23 Jul 2024 13:14
in the next 5 years, i don't think its gonna happen.
Currently AI sometimes messes up simple programs,
and also the AI making 3D models, making levels, animating, coding matchmaking, adding an anti cheat, and adding system protection against ddos attacks of a server seems impossible looking at the stuff Ai can do today
Anonymous (Moderate)
09 Jul 2024 15:06
it could be likely that ai gets some sort of artifical sentience if you know what i mean, in the future originality might be able to be recreated by ai and from that 3d modeling, coding, UI, etc. is already able to be made by ai (some not so well but ai is getting smarter by the day so its no suprise that it would be done)
Haze (Low)
08 Jul 2024 20:08
Usually, when AI writes code and/or makes models, most of the time, they don't feel "real."

They feel lifeless and inert.
Oliver H. (Low)
05 Jul 2024 17:36
As of right now the methods on which AI is trained to write code have some underlying issues that I can't see programmers getting around for another 5 years or so.
Ahmed (Low)
04 Jul 2024 17:08
We all love good games. Yet, I'm EXTREMELY skeptical of AI's abilities to create fulfilling and interesting, in-depth games.
Pinkaholic (Low)
04 Jul 2024 16:01
While I do think that any digital profession has some risk involving AI, as an aspiring indie game dev I know the creativity and originality required to succeed in the market are both in high amounts, something a Robot will likely never be able to automate

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Job description

Design core features of video games. Specify innovative game and role-play mechanics, story lines, and character biographies. Create and maintain design documentation. Guide and collaborate with production staff to produce games as designed.

O*NET-SOC code: 15-1255.01