Level-5 Will Pay Its Employees More If They Pass Trivia Quizzes About Its Games

Level-5 will award direct pay raises to employees who can successfully pass quiz questions about the company's own games, the studio's CEO announced. It is a corporate incentive program that finally weaponizes the kind of deep lore knowledge usually reserved for arguing on internet forums.

The developer behind franchises like Professor Layton and Inazuma Eleven is treating this trivia not as a fun team-building exercise, but as a "genuine skill" worthy of financial compensation, according to the CEO's announcement. It turns out that knowing the ins and outs of the studio's catalog is now a valid line item on a salary negotiation spreadsheet.

The details

• Reward: Direct salary increases
• Requirement: Correctly answering quiz questions about Level-5 games
• Studio philosophy: Deep product knowledge is considered a compensable, genuine skill

Why it matters

While most corporate training programs focus on software certificates or compliance courses, Level-5 is shifting the focus back to the games themselves. Ensuring that staff across all departments have a granular understanding of the company's catalog bridges the gap between development and business. It also means that for the studio's employees, playing through the backlog is no longer just homework—it is a financial strategy.