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Comment by trilila | Hacker News Reader

I second this, and that is what i did. I still develop web apps in my day work, and do a lot of game development on the side. I recommend doing it as an indie rather than as a job, as the satisfaction is higher. Game development is something where if you spend long hours to perfect a technique your users will likely notice and reward it. To me it seems the perfect mix between engineering and art.

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I would +10 this, but would not prefer joining the game industry.

Instead join any related graphics domains: scientific visualisation, graphics drivers, jobs that involve writing game frameworks [1] for example. These jobs will give you both the fun of working in a hard domain combined with the stability that does not come with the intrinsic fickle nature of game industry. FWIW, I have followed this path of learning to write games on the side but not joining any game industry.

My 2$, I would say don't go to the extreme decision of leaving tech (that is also not a bad idea if you work it out) but before exploring all the other interesting options in tech and giving that a try, may make you think 'but if' in the future. Best!

[1] https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/113436938/game-developm...

Upvote! I'm transitioning from CRUD-ish stuff that while high-performance, cloud, ... requires a whiteboard to explain to friends and family. Joining a infrastructure unit at a local university shortly that help develop interactions between traditional humanities, culture and information technology in research, postgrad education and teaching.

Another idea is to join a small team, so that you have to become more of a jack-of-all-trades.

“A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.”

I think you are aiming rightly for ‘jack of (n - 1) trades, master of 1” :)

That's pretty expensive advice, I wouldn't pay more than .02$ for that :-)

https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/393950.html

alas, I don't even know the handy shortcut for the cent symbol of my butterfly keyboard, I expected that to have on my touch bar :-)

I'd love to learn all about the coding/mechanics etc that goes into game development, but I have zero imagination when it comes to good game ideas. I feel like I would need to partner with somebody a lot more creative to be effective.

Felt the same way, but if you look closely, good games are simple games. Heck you could even build simulators that don't involve much imagination as you base them on real life objects.

Nothing stopping you from doing just that!

Pick a game development technology that you like the look of (a language or framework or engine), do their basic tutorial, then drop by their forums. Almost all of them will have a "looking for collaborators" section where people with ideas but insufficient skill, or with skill but insufficient ideas, can shop around for partners to make something cool.

If you're not picky regarding tech, there's also TIGSource, which has a platform non-specific collaborators wanted forum: https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?board=8.0

Or, if you're looking for something a bit more time boxed, a lot of game jams (game development hackathons) will help you find a team to work with on a no-commitment once off project to get a feel for whether this is something you enjoy. See if there are any running near you, and drop on by. Global Game Jam is a great one for this, but it's not until early next year, which may be too long a wait for you.

Good idea(s), thanks!

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