About Me
I'm Kane, a postgraduate games programming student that has just finished my Master's degree with a merit and is currently looking for work.
I am a versatile and hardworking gameplay programmer with 5 years of Unity and C# experience through university that I have expanded on through part-time jobs such as at Code Ninjas where I taught children how to create their own games.
With my familiarity of Unity, I was able to teach myself Unreal Engine in 2 months to create Mobberville, a farming and cooking game. During those 2 months, I went from very limited knowledge of Unreal to creating the core gameplay loops, implementing art assets with functionality, and looking at ways to optimise the game.
I am looking to become a gameplay programmer but I also have an interest unconventional tech, such as VR and eye-tracking.
Professional Experience
While at school and university I have been able to use my game development skills as part of indie teams and in teaching jobs
Lead Programmer
Septagram Games
October 2022 - Present
I am self employed as one of the directors on a start-up indie studio that consists of 6 members of the Master's course.
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I Led programming team for Mobbers, a 2D rogue-like game with a focus on procedural dungeon generation. Showcased at multiple events including Insomnia twice, with a Steam demo.
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I Conceptualised and implemented core gameplay mechanics for Mobberville, a 3D farming and cooking prototype developed using UE5.2 in 8 weeks. I also Managed programming team and contributed to Kickstarter campaign.
Code Sensei
Code Ninjas
September 2021 - June 2023
I taught children coding through games development.
My main roles are to help debug the children's code and help them to create their own games.
Languages/Game Engines I teach:
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JavaScript
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Lua using Roblox studios
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C# and Unity
Software Developer
Firestorm Ltd
December 2021 - February 2022
Worked as a software developer on a DnD miniatures customisation app made in Unity. While working here, I focused on debugging existing problems. This includes:
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Fetching number of miniature kit folders in a server
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Game objects loaded from server not appearing in front of the camera
Gameplay Programmer
Coloured Perception
September 2020 - July 2021
Coloured Perception is a team created by myself and 3 other uni students as part of our self-directed placement where we create colourful games that utilise the Tobii eye-tracking controls.
I am one of the programmers with a focus adding mouse and keyboard functionality for Art is Opinion.
Coding Club Teacher
Komplete Genius
October 2016 - July 2018
I taught children Scratch and basic Lua (Roblox Studio) for games development.
While at university I have created mini games in scratch and created work booklets children and follow along to. I would create 10 games every academic term.
Coding Club Teacher
Rocket Coders
November 2017 - December 2017
I taught children foundations of coding in range of languages, including:
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Arduino
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Web development (HTML, CSS, JavaScript)
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2D game development using Stencyl and visual scripting
Education
MSc Games Development - Merit
University of Gloucesterhire
September 2022 - September 2023
While studying for my masters degree, I received 3 firsts in different modules which include:
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Individual Commercial Project - I worked as the lead programmer in the start-up indie studio, Septagram Games, where I taught myself Unreal Engine in 2 months to create the farming game Mobberville.
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Extended Collaborative Project - I worked as the lead programmer on a project continuation of the Dungeon Crawler game, Mobbers, which now has a demo out on Steam and has attended multiple conventions including Cheltenham science festival and Insomnia twice (i70 & i71)
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Procedural Generation Algorithms - I created a terrain generator using fractal perlin-noise and then used poisson disc sampling to populate the terrain with trees and rocks.
BSc (Hons) Computer Games Programming - 2:1
University of Gloucesterhire
September 2018 - July 2022
While studying my bachelors degree, I learnt Unity, starting with no experience then all the way up to being able to create game prototypes, both independently and in a team.
I received a first for my Experimental Games group module which was Art is Opinion, a painting game where you control the brush with your eyes, this project progressed to being what was worked on in a self-directed placement and was presented at the university's private convention. I continued working with eye-tracking technology in final year where my research project was on the use of eye-tracking to both improve gameplay in games as an optional feature but also to help with accessibility, create Puzzled Gaze to showcase this.
In final year on a VR prototype for my Creative Visualisation & Animation module that explores how zombies have progressed over the years through media, I received a first.