About

Summary

I am a Game Designer & Developer aspiring to tell gripping stories and create engaging mechanics in the games I make.
I have a BSc in Game Design & Development and an MSc in Data Science.
I have commerical experience in software engineering and games development.
As far back as I can remember there were always video games in my life.

Bio

I have always had a deep love of video games for as long as I can remember _{literally, ever since I was old enough to hold a controller I was playing games}. The first games I ever played were Legend of Zelda: A link to the Past and Illusion of Gaia. They started me on a life long love of games and in particular RPGs and games with strong puzzle elements. After many a year playing these games on the SNES I began playing PC games, starting with none other than Tomb Raider. Well I loved the Tomb Raider series and have played almost every single game so far _{Yes even that weird GBA game "Tomb Raider: The Prophecy"}.

Those of you who are fans of the Tomb Raider series, particularly on a PC, will probably know that Tomb Raider: Chronicles came with a second CD which contained a level editor. I had no idea what a level editor was but I wanted to find out and, after installing it, I did... It. Was. Beautiful! I made several levels with that thing _{long lost now... I really wish I still had them}. It was here I learned that I loved making games even more than I did playing them and so I began the search for a college with a game design course.

I applied for the Games Design and Development course in what was at the time Tipperary Institute but was later renamed to LIT: Tipperary while I was studying there and since again renamed to TUS: Thurles _{Not related to Tús (community work placement initiative)}or: Technological University of the Shannon: Thurles Campus, quite the mouthful. I was accepted and I quickly came to love it. Besides all of the extracurricular activities I had in college I also really enjoyed many of the classes, especially the ones centring on algorithms, data structures, and graphics programming. Those classes really struck a chord with me since I have always loved maths. Years later I went back to college to get an MSc in Data Science since I have always been so fascinated by AI and data.

I have a done quite a few extracurricular projects over the years, even kept up some since graduating. Projects such as Game Jams which are amazing endurance events where people attempt to make games in quite a short amount of time based on some theme. I have had many different roles in these jams, in one I was the sole writer on a very interesting idea: A game with no visuals that must be navigated exclusively through sound and dialogue. In others I was part of a team, I have lead teams, and for one I even acted entirely alone, attempting to make an entire game on my own using only what I could make myself... except for music, I did decide to get some great tracks from the amazing Kevin McLeod for that one.

I have worked as a software engineer at three companies, becoming a technical lead at one of them, and a game developer at two studios where I worked on four games, one of which was Disney Melee Mania a casual 3v3 MOBA of Disney heroes and villains; Another game I worked on was a cross platform VR game called Sneaky Bears. I have worked on many different platforms, with many different technologies, and in many different languages and I have become incredibly comfortable working in any domain with any technologies and dealing with novel and difficult problems.

Thank you for reading about my life, I do appreciate it.

Tacitus