Team Sandbox

Director of Ops. John Mak – Meet The Sandboxer

August 6, 2024

In this month’s Meet The Sandboxer, our post comes from John Mak, Director of Operations at Sandbox.

What do you do/when did you join Sandbox?

I joined Sandbox way back in August 2010 at that time I wasn’t a Director but an office manager. Back then, I managed the interns, worked on press tracking and packaged the physical copies of games to send out to reviewers. Review codes weren’t a thing back then.

Favorite experience at Sandbox?

It was a long time ago but this has to be the time we staged a giant trailer in Herald Square next to Macy’s for Cabela’s Survival. It was a lot of work for everyone and it had me running around the city to gather permits but it was amazing to see it all come together.

First video game console/memory?

One of my earliest game memories was going to my best friend’s house every weekend to work our way through Little Ninja Brothers on the NES. I don’t think we ever beat it. That game was freaking hard.

What are you playing now?

I’m slowly making my way through Cyberpunk 2077 and the Phantom Liberty DLC right now. Held off on playing it for a long time because of the issues during release. Finally decided to sit down and give it a whirl and I have to say it’s an amazing game.

What are some of your hobbies outside of games?

Trying to keep my toddler alive and happy is basically my only hobby these days. That and mediating arguments between the toddler and the dog.

Bonus Round – You are well-known for having a fabulous puppers (please include pictures). What are some of your top pups in video games, anime, movies etc?

The two most memorable pups for me were Dogmeat from Fallout and Angelo from Final Fantasy VIII. You can’t ask for a better companion across the Wasteland than Dogmeat and Angelo is definitely the goodest furry rocket.

And here’s some photos of my furry potato