I applied through the King website. I was contacted by a very friendly HR representative who spoke English with a strong accent. She explained that the process would be long and would involve a remote interview, followed by developing an application, and finally, an in-person interview at their headquarters.

The remote interview went well. A very friendly, but again, English-accented individual asked me general programming questions.

A few days later, the HR representative contacted me, stating that the interview had gone well. She assigned me a task with a one-week deadline.

The task involved implementing the King Midas Miner game using some provided graphics elements. This was not a trivial task, especially for someone unfamiliar with SDL, as I was. I felt they should have disclosed beforehand that the interview would require such a significant development effort. I actually considered not doing it, but since I was already invested, I decided to proceed.

Along with the task, no specific guidelines were provided (e.g., "use design patterns" or "adhere to certain programming paradigms"). They simply wrote they would evaluate my code structure first, and then transitions, etc.

I worked on the task diligently, and the game worked perfectly. Certainly, not being familiar with SDL, my design might not have been as refined as it could have been had I known the library. However, it was a learning experience for me. Given King's note that the program should be a fun way to provide interviewers with a basis for questions, I believed my program was adequate.

Well, one week after submitting my work, King sent me a two-line email stating they would not move forward with my application. While their decision must be respected, I feel they did not respect me. They failed to clearly state that even a perfectly working program with a decent design (given my over ten years of software development experience) might be rejected without explanation. Had I known they had a preconceived, almost prejudicial, idea of how software should be designed, I would not have developed the game, as I had many other opportunities, which I eventually pursued.

It is my impression that at King, there is a very rigid idea of how software should be designed and developed (for example, with heavy reliance on design patterns or adherence to specific programming practices whose usefulness is debatable). This should be stated clearly in advance. Asking someone to submit a program without providing any guidelines and then rejecting their work because those unknown guidelines were not met is simply ridiculous.

I am quite happy with my current situation and the opportunities I subsequently pursued. However, I chose to write these few lines to inform other software developers and prospective King employees about the realities of interviewing with them. This way, others can avoid wasting their time and potentially accepting a job at a company where people hold a dogmatic, preconceived, and ultimately narrow-minded concept of software development.