It's not often in life you have the opportunity to combine your passion with your work. It feels strange to write, but I've found myself in a position to do exactly that.
I now work on MakeCode, an open-source coding platform for helping students across the world learn Computer Science.
The best part? We teach through making games.
It goes without saying, MakeCode is perfect for me. Getting paid to work on a project that I actually care about is already a blessing. Being able to combine my passion for game design with my work is the cherry on top. It's honestly hard to believe I found my way onto this team in the first place.
Now this is great news and all, but it's not exactly the safest move to make right now.
You may or may not have heard, but this whole "economy" thing we have going on isn't doing so hot. Even the biggest tech companies are laying off developers, Microsoft included.
My last project, MSBuild, was stable. It's the most fundamental tool used in Visual Studio, which is a big source of revenue for Microsoft. It's also extremely difficult to learn, which is added job security.
MakeCode on the other hand is an open-source, education-focused product that generates no revenue for the company. Naturally it's much lower on the totem pole during a recession.
So with my job being at risk through the end of March and ramping up on a new tech stack, project, and team, it's been hard to focus on passions like game design.
Regardless, there's an opportunity here to combine my passion with my day job, and I'm going to find it.
P.S. We stream game-making for an hour every Mon, Wed, Fri at 1PM PST. I don't make it to every session, but check out the twitch stream if you can!