The video game industry (sometimes referred to as the interactive entertainment industry) is the economic sector involved in the development, marketing and monetizing of video games. It encompasses dozens of job disciplines and employs thousands of people worldwide. The game industry employs those experienced in other traditional businesses, but some have an experience tailored to the game industry. Some of the disciplines specific to the game industry include game programmer, game designer, level designer, game producer, game artist and game tester. Most of these professionals are employed by video game developers or video game publishers. However, many hobbyists also produce computer games and sell them commercially. Early on, development costs were minimal, and video games could be quite profitable. Games developed by a single programmer, or by a small team of programmers and artists, could sell hundreds of thousands of copies each. Many of these games only took a few ...