Devlog #1: Is This A Huge Mistake?
I’m leaving my dream job in big tech—one of the most coveted roles in the world—and taking a huge leap of faith. With no source of income, my savings will dwindle, and I have a family. My plan? To solo develop indie games with no professional experience—a path fraught with hardship and no guarantee of future income. Have I made a huge mistake?
Let me answer that with my story.
The Rejection
My life started out with low expectations: small town you’ve never heard of, poor family, low-end school, middle of nowhere. On top of that, I was terrible at focusing and listening; my teachers told me I needed to apply myself more. I always eagerly took on challenges, though: videogames, science projects, extra-credit classes, advanced courses. And I bested them, one by one. I never expected to go far, but the more I reached, the more I realized I could do. Well, until I tried to become a game developer…
Fresh out of small-town college, I applied to every game studio I could remember playing a game from in the recent past. I’ve played countless videogames for innumerable hours from the time I was three years old. One by one, I sent out résumés, showing off the cool physics engine I made with another guy and a few games I developed as an undergrad, even some shadow algorithms I had coded up recently. Not one game studio would have me, though. Most never contacted me back, and the ones that did only gave short phone interviews before ghosting me. The starting salary they quoted me would barely cover my student loan payments. The dream I’ve had since I was seven years old had been shattered. I couldn’t get a job in game development.
Eventually I moved on to accept a software engineering job outside of the game industry with much better pay, one that at least paid enough for housing and food in addition to loan minimums. I didn’t shoot very high, though, just accepted whatever a recruiter lined me up with. Life was great; we paid the bills, made some great friends, even landed a few out-of-cycle raises; things were going objectively well. I eventually transferred to a second job: more money but less happy. And then, big tech called…
The Corporate Climb
One day, a recruiter asked me to fly out to California for on-site interviews. I was stunned; never before had I expected myself to match that level of talent. I studied for weeks. I flew out. It was like a child visiting Disney World. And I completely bombed the interviews.
At that point, that became my main goal in life; my dream. I wanted that job more than anything. Next year, I tried again, and again I failed. Interviews were open for a slightly different role, and again I failed. And then, one year after that, I sharpened my skills and studied up once more, and I finally got in. I took on the challenge, and I bested it: I landed a dream job in big tech.
For the next seven years, I strived and toiled. My knowledge grew to new heights, and my worldview shifted. I sampled the high life, and I made brilliant changes. I worked alongside some of the smartest minds in the world. I pioneered and landed one of the greatest features my team had ever seen. I had family; I had friends; life was amazing. But then one day, it wasn’t. One day, I realized I just wasn’t happy anymore.
The Leap
Despite my objective success and the stable comfort of future success, I felt empty. No matter how amazing an experience we could craft, no matter how smart I could be, no matter how hard I worked, no one outside that company would ever know. Users see that the company made a change, not the people who made it happen. Everyone could see my work but no one would ever know I did it outside of my close family and friends. I’m so grateful for the global stage on which I could perform, but it made me realize I wasn’t happy. No one knows I exist; it wasn’t my company, and it never would be.
They say money can’t buy happiness, but I had to live it before I truly understood. Somehow my seven-year-old self knew this decades ago, but that voice got ignored from the day I left behind my old dream—my dream to develop videogames. I let that dream die the day I accepted my first non-gaming job. But now, I’ve trained up, and I can cast 7th level spells, and I’m Resurrecting that dream. I’ve saved up for this opportunity for years, and honestly I couldn’t be more excited.
So, is this a huge mistake? No, absolutely not. My goal here is not to gamble with our life savings in the hopes of striking it rich; my goal here is happiness, for me and my family. Money won’t make me happy… but the pursuit of a long-held passion that could change the lives of others and inspire generations? That’s something worth my time. And if there’s one pattern that exists in my life, it’s that I seek out bold challenges beyond my reach, meet them head on, and overcome them. My passion for games has never faltered, and I will not stop at failure. I have the skills, the knowledge, and the passion. I will overcome the challenge.
The screenshots you see here are from the prototype of my first game. If you want to see more, please follow along here, so you'll be the first to know of the perials and triumphs along my journey to become an indie game developer.