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> My tech stack is almost definitely irrelevant; Python, JS, Rust, Haskell, etc... FWIW, at least in larger studios, there are lots of tasks that involve scrip
by dahart 4y ago
> My tech stack is almost definitely irrelevant; Python, JS, Rust, Haskell, etc...
FWIW, at least in larger studios, there are lots of tasks that involve scripting, you can find people that use Python and JS and other languages every day.
Here are just a few examples I’ve seen (I was a lead game dev in a ~200 person studio for a decade):
- NPC, boss fight, level, and gameplay scripting.
- Automated gameplay testing & perf analysis, setting up playthrough and frame rate monitoring.
- Asset builds, converting file formats, compressing and packing data into bundles. (I had a large Python project on one game, for example, to convert audio into lip sync animation.)
- Code generation for shaders.
If you look around, you might be able to find roles that are pretty easy to transition into given your current skills.
- cgh 4y ago> Code generation for shaders. Interesting, I always assumed shader code was generated by the engine and tweaked by gurus. In all the talk here about backend vs frontend or which engine to use, you never hear about companies explicitly hiring shader programmers. And learning resources are scarce. It’s kind of a dark art.
- dahart 4y agoIt’s funny, I was a graphics person hired specifically to write shaders (20 years ago, in a studio that had their own in-house engine) but didn’t end up writing any at all for games, I did almost everything but shaders. :P There is definitely a consolidation of game engines happening in the industry. I don’t know how it’s affecting shader writing jobs, but I can imagine it’s quickly becoming less of a thing. Still, I hear a lot about people writing shaders for and doing customization on top of Unreal today.