Any Software Engineers around here?

[WrikaWrek]

Took a decision. Fuck Journalism, i don't wanna do any of that shit. I'm getting myself into Software Engineering.

I'm in making moves mode, and this was one of them. I'm feeling very motivated, after so much time feeling like shit, i just got a second wind.

Now i know the difficulties, i know that. But i got me an objective, i want out of this country and computers it is. Now, say i wanna get in the gaming industry? Taking into account i'm in one of Europe's shithole, what tips do you got?

I've been seeing jobs, and honestly...

Graphics programmer
Gameplay programmer
Level Designer

These are probably the areas i'm interested in, putting pipe dreams aside. Now i know i gotta be really good, and to be really good i got put my mind and life to it.

Anybody here can give me some pointers to start my path? I know i must sound crazy, and many will probably be saying "You get paid like shit in that industry, you can work less and get paid more doing X and Y", and i'm sure i'll remember that in time, but i really wanna get in that teamwork spirit, and leave my country, and work in games.

Callin on EB

[Cerveza mas fina]

1. Move to the UK
2. Finish course in the field you want to work in
3. Get internship experience in the UK while doing course
4. Join a company in the UK at shitty entry level position like Junior Engineer of Sound Menu and work your way up, but make sure its a start up or a growing company otherwise you won't move up
(i.e join Gameloft, not Sony)

[WrikaWrek]

If you want to get into the games side spend your time creating a full front to back project in something like Unity or Unreal Engine, show that you can build and develop levels, implement ideas, etc

I have UDK and the Buzz tutorials to get me started.

[tiesto]

I'm a software engineer (bachelor's in Computer Science, master's in Systems Engineering), who originally wanted to be a game programmer, but got scared away when hearing about the working conditions (granted it was supposedly worse when I was in college). Now I work in the defense industry, helping out with wargaming/simulations.

Here's a few general tips for budding software engineers:

-Go for a bachelor's degree in Computer Science (not IT or any vocational school programming courses), those algorithm and computational theory courses are ROUGH and about as much fun as watching paint dry, but will really help you in both grasping theoretical concepts of programming (instead of just being a "code monkey") and will look much better on your resume.

-Do some small programming projects on your own, over the summers and such. If you want to get into game development, and want a pretty low-cost/low-barrier-of-entry way to get in, I highly recommend XNA. You'll learn a lot about C# and object oriented programming, while being able to create fairly cool shit reasonably easily. Plus there's lots of sample source code and documentation online. Visual Studio 2010 and the XNA libraries are a free download, though it costs $99 a year if you want access to the XNA Game Creators Club, which enables you to debug and test on the 360 and such, and upload your games to Xbox Live Indie Games.

-Definitely research SQL, and perhaps a server-side scripting language. There's a good chance you may be called upon doing some type of SQL in your future, since it's just so ubiquitous.

-Make sure you get an internship when in college (even if it's unpaid)! Not getting one was my biggest regret. The difference between the kids who interned over the summer and the ones who didn't was night and day, in terms of programming knowledge. Plus, it looks great on your resume when you eventually graduate.

-Never let your skill set get stale. Always be willing to develop in a new language and expand your knowledge. Don't pigeonhole yourself into just doing C++ or Java... when I was in school I was mostly doing C++/Java and that's what I was most comfortable with... but eventually ended up doing stuff ranging from Ada, FORTRAN, ColdFusion, XAML/WPF, C#, SOAP, Visual Basic, and assorted simulation toolkits)

Good luck!

[WrikaWrek]

Thanks Tiesto

[demi]

tiesto gets mad pussy and owns every video game console under the sun. what's your excuse, borys? owned...

[CajoleJuice]

tiesto gets mad pussy and owns every video game console under the sun. what's your excuse, borys? owned...

tiesto

[Cerveza mas fina]

Tiesto forgot to add you have to move to the UK, you wont get this job studying in Portugal. Harsh but true. Uk is where it's at in Europe, skills wise. Sure there are some companies here and there, but UK is the heartland.

[WrikaWrek]

Tiesto forgot to add you have to move to the UK, you wont get this job studying in Portugal. Harsh but true. Uk is where it's at in Europe, skills wise. Sure there are some companies here and there, but UK is the heartland.

You think i should do the BS or the Masters there?

[tiesto]

Haha, thanks guys. 

Borys, I forgive your mistake, don't do it again though! 

[Cerveza mas fina]

You think i should do the BS or the Masters there?

Go for the BA, masters is for later! Getting a good internship or relevant internship would be so much easier in the UK then elsewhere. Also the people you'd meet in Uni might help out later with leads and jobs.

I'd do whatever I can to make it happen in the UK if I were serious about this.

[tiesto]

Tiesto forgot to add you have to move to the UK, you wont get this job studying in Portugal. Harsh but true. Uk is where it's at in Europe, skills wise. Sure there are some companies here and there, but UK is the heartland.

You think i should do the BS or the Masters there?

At least in America, you can get along fine with just a bachelor's in Comp Sci. Not really sure about the Europe situation, but UK seems like the most logical place to look if you want to work in the games industry.

[demi]

Look on the bright side, if you get a job you can finally afford to buy games.

[Madrun Badrun]

Assuming the first one isn't an art thing, you will need a BS in computer science to do those and as tiesto said make sure it is a BS compsci, not an IT program ect.  Just so you are aware graphics is one of the most math intensive areas of compsci.  Game mechanics is also more mathy than other areas of compsci.

Some schools offer degrees in both software engineering and computer science but they generally overlap heavily so you can decide which is right for you after your first or second year.

I would first learn more about compsci before you decide to enter into it.  The richard buckmen lectures on youtube are great.  There are also other ways into the game industry than compsci which would still let you end up in game/level design.

[Tasty]

Sort of a front end web developer guy... with gaming aspirations.

[demi]

Sort of a front end web developer guy... with gaming aspirations.

lol. Stand in line... take a real career. Like gaming journalism.

[Tasty]

Sort of a front end web developer guy... with gaming aspirations.

lol. Stand in line... take a real career. Like gaming journalism.

Lol yeah. I'll readily admit front end dev is a cakewalk compared to like systems programming or physics... ugh. Can't deal with those algorithms. >_<

[Maximus]

Graphics programmer
Gameplay programmer
Level Designer

The games industry is funny there all these titles but their meaning will change company to company
This is just from my understanding of these roles;

Graphics Programmer: Could be a few things but essentially it will involve a good bit of maths, I don't know if Shaders are generally considered part of graphics programming but those may help too to know HLSL and the like, now me I would see it as being the guy who gets things like the rendering engine, and the most bang for the buck in terms of what cool things we can get on the screen without incurring too much cost on the speed of the game.
This job will be incredibly boring and difficult unless you have an interest in the field of programming.

Gameplay Programmer; this guys is a different beast altogether; generally programmers are not great at critically looking at gameplay; they will see technical issues over gameplay issues, you have to be one of the few who has a good understanding of both as you will be a conduit for the game designer to the programmers and visa versa. This job will have a lot of tweak tweak tweak

Level Designer: This will depending on the company mean strictly sticking to whatever map you're given and make it exactly as your told, or develop it with gameplay in mind and slightly change and update the level as you go, you will most likely need some scripting knowledge for this post, but languages such as LUA and Python are much easier to learn than say C++. This job can be monotonous, but there is a great pay off when you make something really nice looking that plays well.

One other thing, if you're planning on going into the games industry, when deciding your role; think about whether you want to work in a big company or a small one, the more specialised the role the easier it is to get a high paying job in some of the bigger ones(there are always low level jobs if you don't mind working for cheap), the more general the role much easier in the smaller ones.

Oh and one final thing; A post which is too often undervalued is the technical artist role; this is someone who is a general all rounder in the art department, you don't necessarily have to be good at art, but the beauty in this role is the scripting knowledge and the Shader knowledge that comes with it. An artist than can program a little is a valuable commodity, and the role itself means the artists don't have to overly rely on the coders to do anything regarding the game. they also help the art department understand the limitations the programmers may be under when it comes to model poly counts, particle effects etc. Any one I knew who had this role had been snatched up by companies pretty quickly and they seem to enjoy their job too.

[Tasty]

I'd like to get into the games industry but I get the feeling that game design roles are: 1. highly saturated already and 2. seen as weaksauce compared to the programming.  :'( So I have to stick with web development for now.

[Van Cruncheon]

fuck game dev. i work in graphics now and get my nerd jones without dealing with shit pay, shit project management, shit working hours/conditions, and a shit product. (well, the latter may be disputable to certain of my internet peeps )

[Tasty]

What'd you work on?

[Madrun Badrun]

fuck game dev. i work in graphics now and get my nerd jones without dealing with shit pay, shit project management, shit working hours/conditions, and a shit product. (well, the latter may be disputable to certain of my internet peeps )

What exactly do you do?  I always thought you were a project manager.

[Van Cruncheon]

i was a  unix server dev, then a sql dev, then an open gl dev, then a programming writer, then a middle manager, and now i'm DOIN' SEKRET THINGS

[Tasty]

i was a  unix server dev, then a sql dev, then an open gl dev, then a programming writer, then a middle manager, and now i'm DOIN' SEKRET THINGS

Come on you can tell us. Stop being all self-important and thinking you matter. 

[Van Cruncheon]

And yes, whilst i studied at Liverpool i had some brief talks with Psygnosis and DiD were holding a few sessions. Whilst a fair few people from our courses went into video gaming, i looked on with my sad face as i went into IT in the music industry. I then had the long term plan to make cash and -then- switch to the gaming industry when i was around 40 or so.

i had that bright idea, too! "game dev would be cool!" said i, "but all my friends in the biz are miserable mongs and tell me not to join them, plus they are filthy poors. i shall wait until i am MATURE!" so i went into server software development, then did a stint in middle-tier web dev and then some visualization work and then became a PRO WELL-PAID BITCH and WHOAAAA HEY DADDY LIKES IT ROUGH, FUCK GAMES

[Van Cruncheon]

i was a  unix server dev, then a sql dev, then an open gl dev, then a programming writer, then a middle manager, and now i'm DOIN' SEKRET THINGS

Come on you can tell us. Stop being all self-important and thinking you matter. 

[Van Cruncheon]

admittedly, i am jealous of a certain someone who gets to play diablo 3 as part of his job :'(

[Tasty]

Another concern I had last year is that developing games would burn me out on playing them. And last year I was already feeling pretty burnt out on gaming on the whole. I'm more upbeat now, though. But I always wonder if making games every single day of my life will make me hate playing them, which would be one of my worst nightmares.

[Van Cruncheon]

no, it will make you depressed that good games are still being made and YOU AREN'T PART OF IT

because you won't be until you're old enough to want a real job with real pay

[cool breeze]

life plan: nintendo power > nintendo treehouse > successfully reboot starfy > bring captain rainbow to america > death > honored as an industry luminary

no math required

[Tasty]

I found this like 20 minutes ago: http://www.gamestartup101.com/

Going through all the content now. It's making my dreams too big. 

[pilonv1]

I would KILL for a job that wasn't the same job week to week. New and different ways to stress me out would be welcomed, instead of the same usual shit I deal with

[Cerveza mas fina]

I would KILL for a job that wasn't the same job week to week. New and different ways to stress me out would be welcomed, instead of the same usual shit I deal with

Where are these jobs?

no, it will make you depressed that good games are still being made and YOU AREN'T PART OF IT

Hey dude  :'(

[Maximus]

Another concern I had last year is that developing games would burn me out on playing them. And last year I was already feeling pretty burnt out on gaming on the whole. I'm more upbeat now, though. But I always wonder if making games every single day of my life will make me hate playing them, which would be one of my worst nightmares.

I guarantee this will happen if you go into crunch, the last thing you want to be doing after staring at a game for 12 hours a day is play more when you get home.
If you have reasonable hours you should be fine though.

[Cerveza mas fina]

It really depends on the country Borys. As some countries have very low taxes (UK, Ireland starting around 20%) some have very high (Denmark, Holland starting around 40%) and the costs of living vary hugely (difference between EU average of living cost and Denmark & Ireland is 40%!).

Look B. Luxmeburg doesn't count as it's a tiny tax haven bankers state where companies have puppet offices to evade taxes and it has like 100k people.

A good salary would be double the average I guess.

[Cerveza mas fina]

That doesn't say it all. Poland is doing fine and moving ahead. Low debt, single digit unemployment, 3rd highest GDP growth in EU...

Look, some of these countries that seem better off are fucked long term man. (Spain, Ireland, Greece, Portugal maybe)

[Cerveza mas fina]

And if you're like why would I care about long term: your kids and pension 

[Maximus]

Yeah if anyone is planning to move for software related jobs UK is probably the best. Ireland is unfortunately fucked for the next 5 years or so while the ECB pillages money from us to cover up their liabilities in their own banks. To be honest if you're planning to move stay out of the Eurozone as I'd expect it to go into freefall if Spain ends up like Ireland which it mostly likely will.

[WrikaWrek]

I'm moving the fuck away from Portugal. Game industry or not.

Isn't there a way to work in Montreal for example? Would love to just get out of Europe, kind of sick of it.

[Cerveza mas fina]

Of course there is a way to work in Montreal. But Ubisoft or Babel Media and whoever is there won't hire you without experience.

If you want a company to sponsor your move to Canada/US you got to bring something to the table, and much more then when you're just applying in Europe as there is a lot of stuff for them to do to make it happen (visas, paperwork etc.)

There are jobs all over the world in gaming, from Shanghai to Seattle. But thats like 4 years in the future for you so don't worry about it

[recursivelyenumerable]

what tiesto said, except algorithms and theory of computation are fun 

[Madrun Badrun]

Ya I don't get why anyone would take compsci if they didn't think those things were fun.

[recursivelyenumerable]

maybe he just had a bad teacher.

[Van Cruncheon]

Ya I don't get why anyone would take compsci if they didn't think those things were fun.

to get a job?

[Tasty]

I don't care for algorithms but I love programming. A shame the two are so tightly entwined usually. 

[recursivelyenumerable]

Ya I don't get why anyone would take compsci if they didn't think those things were fun.

to get a job?

why would anyone want to do that?

p.s. are you working on the new graphics tooling in dev11?

[Bocsius]

I don't believe I'm qualified to call myself a software engineer or anything, but I too am a programmer. I look forward to eventually... sometime... please let it be soon... working with people more seasoned than I am so I can actually learn how to develop good software.

My current job is the applying of the proverbial lipstick to the pig.

[recursivelyenumerable]

do make sure it's a proverbial pig as well, as the non-proverbial kind is incompatible.

[Bocsius]

That might explain a few things, actually.

I'm working as a contractor for Wells Fargo on a web application (ASP.NET) that is truly horrid. It's an internal-facing, legacy Wachovia app, originally developed offshore but now serviced in house. It functions thanks to magic. The original developers apparently had allergies to anything strongly typed, as passing around DataSets is the preferred answer to every problem. Methods typically run hundreds of lines of code, several are over a thousand. When I first started about this time last year, there was one method that clocked in at 3000. While we're trying to introduce improvements, new business requirements kind of supercede any effort to overhaul the existing code. And, truth be told, nobody on the team is truly qualified to lead such an effort, even if we could agree on what to do.

 

Oh well, I have at most 6 more months before Wells policy dictates I hit the door. Maybe my next stop will be different.

[Madrun Badrun]

I don't care for algorithms but I love programming. A shame the two are so tightly entwined usually. 

That's like saying you love playing chess but only when your oppenent is a first grader.

[Bocsius]

I had a coworker who had a love of programming but didn't care to write code that actually worked. Is that the same thing?

[Shaka Khan]

.

[Bocsius]

Absolutely, go back and finish your degree. 30 is the new 24, don't worry about the late start. Education, any degree, is more important than ever. Just be sure to actually be involved in development while in school, don't graduate and still be clueless. Well, completely clueless. You'll still be mostly clueless.

[Madrun Badrun]

Finish it now if that is an option though.

[recursivelyenumerable]

fwiw, I never got a degree and haven't had much trouble finding jobs, well-paying ones, in a while. I'm not sure it matters once you have a certain amount of work experience.

[Madrun Badrun]

Didn't you go to uni when you were like 15 though?  What degree did you get then?  Math?

[Tasty]

I don't care for algorithms but I love programming. A shame the two are so tightly entwined usually. 

That's like saying you love playing chess but only when your oppenent is a first grader.

Let me rephrase.

I love making software and websites. I like programming them, and designing the UI too. But algorithms...

[Shaka Khan]

.

[recursivelyenumerable]

I actually HATE programming, seriously. I like thinking about and studying it, and I like the sense of accomplishment when I get something working, but the actual process of writing the damn code is AGONIZING because it's a constant struggle with my own limitations, and constant deflation when some brilliant idea I had turns out to be not so great in practice.

However, I "have" to do it, I can't imagine getting some kind of management job where I'm not hands-on with the coding, I couldn't stand that. Basically my relationship with programming is captured perfectly by this:

[Shaka Khan]

The Sims 3: Ambitions is on sale today on Steam. I think I'm gonna grab it.