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Discussion on: I switched from software engineering to game development, ask me anything.

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strawz profile image
straw

What were the steps for transitioning?
I'm a web developer at the moment and want to become a game developer. My assumptions are that I need to work on my own projects so I have something to show since I have no professional experience. What did you do to get there?

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rapidnerd profile image
George • Edited

You're 100% correct. There was a few things that I had taken into consideration before doing this. There is many different types of games around, whether it be Sandbox, MMO-RPG, Indie Games and all sorts. There is also a lot of different languages used within game development. I wanted to develop Indie games & phone games so I started learning Java and used some sprites that a friend of mine had made.

I found it important to familiarise yourself with all the big platforms and utilities used within the industry. Even if you're not going to use them straight away it will be good to get a feel on how they work and what language they're using incase you need it in the future.

Software such as Unity and Unreal Engine are both brilliant engines that are heavily used in all sorts of games.

Getting to where I am now took a lot of work, learning an entire new language, I spent a lot of time around gaming communities to get a feel of how the people behind them interacted with their community. At the start I knew that I had to show off what I could do, so I made a couple of small games, provided the code and sent them off in my portfolio.

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papaponmx profile image
Jaime Rios

How long did it take?

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rapidnerd profile image
George

Switching in general took me a good few months to do, with learning everything I felt was necessary, I had a portfolio built around software engineering. While that was good to have on there I wanted to be able to provide some stuff around game development in order to show off what I could do in that field.

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papaponmx profile image
Jaime Rios

Did you explore the idea of developing games for VR?

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rapidnerd profile image
George

Not really, I focused more on indie games.

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strawz profile image
straw

Thanks! I had made that assumption without a lot of data, it is very reassuring to hear that was the same road you took :) Thank you for sharing knowledge!

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kapilsane profile image
#Kapil

For money and visa,
Which is best career
(Java) applications vs android vs (JavaScript &php)web vs games development

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lxlclash profile image
JustOTGFrames

Would My Roblox games be approved in the portfolio? They are scripted In lua so that works right?