Quote: "In fact, I think it's pretty safe to say MISoft is one of the more successful teams in the TGC community, in terms of how many games have been released and how many people are on the team anyway."
Define successful. I consider "number of games released" about as good a measure as "number of lines typed" for a programmer--- that is, not at all.
Quote: "Why not a small one? You're a lot more likely to get experience in all areas if the company is small."
For one thing it's a lot harder to get a job in a small company. If there are 10 people working there, you'd imagine it's a big deal to hire somebody. For a company like EA, they hire tons of people every week so your chances are greater. And let's face it, having a large, well-known company on your resume is a big advantage for your career, as opposed to an indie company that makes niche games that nobody has heard of (sorry Matt, but I am quite capable of taking a shot right back at you
).
Quote: "Not all indie teams talk about games they're going to make and never release them (don't say it Jeku, lol)"
Well, if you work at EA, Nintendo, Microsoft, 2K Games, etc. you can work on franchises that you know for sure will be around for a long time (i.e. Madden, Mario, Halo, GTA, etc.) I'm just saying that having those games under your belt is a big deal for your career.
Not to say working at an indie company is bad, but take it from me, it's not as great as it sounds. It's not stable, there's a high chance of not getting paid until the game is out, and there's an even better chance of
nobody playing the game due to lack of marketing money. I worked at a
real indie company (not a fake company--- we were making a 360 racer) for 7 months and ended up with nothing more than a gameplay video and $10k in credit card debt. Not fun.