I'm David from Johannesburg and I posted a couple of games to the Game.Dev community ages ago. I have been working on a mobile game in Unity for a while, it will be ready to share soon!
I am André Jacobs, originally from Pretoria and used to be a SAGD member for a long time. I now live in the UK and work for myself.
To keep a long story shorter, like most of you I used to dream about being a game developer (in my case programmer) while being at school. Only problem was that there was at the time no games being developed in SA other than what Celestial was doing (oh there was that Cyril Cyberpunk game). So I got involved in the demoscene until it got eaten up by the game dev scene (SAGD). While I was working as a lecturer for CTI, a new company I-Imagine was started (of which Luke @AngryMooseZA was co-founder). This was it and I knew I had to follow my dream and get into the biz. Eventually I worked for I-Imagine (what a great team, to this day some of the best working moments) until they went bust and there was no more game dev work in Africa! So I managed to come to the UK and work for Climax Studios. Then went over to Criterion to work on Burnout Paradise. Worked for Lionhead studios as well before moving out of the biz (AAA biz that is) to the finance industry before finally settling on doing contract work and my own stuff.
I keep up to date with SA game dev from time to time and I am amazed to see how much talent and indie studios / aspiring developers there are now.
If there is only one bit of value I can contribute to the members here, is that if you have a dream (whether it be making indie games or joining AAA biz) is that you should work hard to accomplish that dream and not to listen to folk that doesn't share that dream and that would be trying to put you down. I remember all the times people used to tell me that I would never get into games (not in SA, not overseas, not work for AAA studios etc.), not only did I accomplish my dream but I also met lots of talented SA people that also followed their dreams. So keep dreaming, keep working and keep believing.
PS. Once you tick of a dream on your list, then it is time to dream a new dream.
Hey all! WelshPixie here ^.^ I'm sure I met a bunch of you this evening (or at least saw your faces peering at me through the haze of the projector light) at the MakeGamesSA meet-up in CT, but thought I should say hi here properly too. Thanks for listening to me speak too softly in a weird accent ^.^ Anyway - I'm Welsh, female, 30s, and I love writing. I don't code, but I've made some interactive fiction / 'choose your adventure' type games here -> http://welshpixie.com/interactive-fiction and I'm currently the writer for ScrewyLightbulb for our lovely little sci-fi noir point-and-click The Maker's Eden. I write opinionated game-related articles on Fridays for MWEB Gamezone if you like that sorta thing, but mostly I hang around on Twitter - WelshPixie - talking about making games and playing games and taking screenshots of games and buying games and upgrading my PC to play MOAR GAMES.
Emergehd - a writer whose actually made some interactive fiction :D. We HAVE to start seeing some Interactive Fiction on these here forums - reading some others might make me more productive on mine :/. I'll make sure to read yours - mostly to procrastinate from writing myself :(.
Welcome :D. Us Joburgers are sorry we missed your The Maker's Eden presentation :/.
@Tuism Me too, argh >.< It's on my real name too so anyone who knows me and searches it will find crappy drawings I did when I was too young to know any better!
Ahoy everyone, my names Simon Anderson. Im a programmer/business person at SIJO Studios.
Bit of background, I have worked in the film industry for the past 4 years as a rigger/pipeline developer on a few projects here and there, and before that I was a flash developer for 4 years. Recently returned back to SA and have started a games company, we are currently working on Khumba the game. Hope to show off some of the basic mechanics next month at the CT meet up.
Hey guys, I am Kobus Vd Walt. I live in Potchefstroom in NW. I am supposed to be a programmer but I like to think of myself as a designer that can program. I talk a lot about game design theory but never seem to make games. In the future I definitely like to make more games.
If your a nice person, follow me on twitter and we'll get in touch. @kobusvdwalt9
My name's Brendan. I'm a perpetual student. I studied aeronautical engineering, and I'm currently busy with a PhD in compressible gas flow. I program in my free time and also lecture part of an introductory programming course to 2nd year engineers at Wits.
Hi there everyone! I'm Marissa van Wyngaardt (a mouthful of a surname, I know), and I'm currently studying Game Design and electrical engineering at Wits. University is keeping me rather busy (luckily the game dev portion keeps me happily busy), but in my spare time I fiddle around on my drawing tablet. Hoping to improve on my digital art and stop being so fussy about perfecting everything (accuracy and art don't always see eye to eye). Also learning to use GameMaker. Looking forward to being part of the Forum! :)
Hi I'm Tim. Studying my Masters in Composition focusing on Indie video game music, specifically Braid, Fez and Journey. I also play in a band Fridge Poetry which gig quite often aroud jhb. Oh and I teach music at St. Stithians and basically all I do is play games and make music ;)
I'm currently in my 3rd year at UCT, studying computer science and computer games development. I love both the programming and creative side of game development. Really interested to get to know the South African gaming community a little better.
Hey guys, I'm Gerhardt, I'm a hobbiest game maker and Pixel art addict (wishes he could make pixel awesomeness ness), I currently use the old witchcraft that is c++ and other APIs to make prototypes (nothing solid enough to call a game yet). My life long dream is to become an independent game creator. I hope to make a positive contribution here!
Hi! I'm GraviPy, a 13 year old office chair jockey who loves web design/development and game programming. Currently I'm working on learning C++ and some other projects. I can program in Python, PHP, and Ruby, with some knowledge of Java. Since I'm into web design and development, I know HTML and CSS(3) too.
Wow this community awesomed up just when I though it was that awesome. The imaginary awesome glass ring and glass ceiling was struck. Welcome evryone I have not met yet. And cant wait to attend another meetup. Awesome community. Did I say awesome yet
I guess it's about time that I join the forum rather than lurking.
My name is Ben Geldenhuys and I'm a full-time illustrator, animator, designer and viking working at Themartist productions and a part-time closet musician. I'm based in Cape Town and as Danelle already mentioned, I work with her on our weekly webcomic called Cottonstar.
I know nothing of game dev, but I AM busy creating music for one :D
Hi everyone, it's great to see such an active local community in South Africa!
I'm Arno Bornman. I am currently studying Computer Science at the University of Pretoria with the aspiration of becoming a video game programmer, designer or developer.
I am Maikano. I work for TopSubscriber. I'm a content aggregator. I distribute games, apps & music on content protals. I'm also a podcaster, I'm super crazy about music.
Yo peoples I'm Tsitsi, 2nd year game design @ wits
I'm currently working on a resource management board game bout the life of taxi owners and how they manage the taxi business. Started building up on an idea i had last year hopefully it turns out awesome.
I have a long name, so to keep things simple we will stick with Nico Schoeman. I'm a dev at Celestial Games. Some of you already met me, and I'm looking forward to meeting the rest of you :)
I know I am late by a month. Just want to say hi and that I have enjoyed the community meetups so far. I am a programmer from the Java background and have a Bachelor Degree in Computing from Monash SA. I have been interested in game development since I was in primary school and decided to join this community to see how it will be with people with similar interests.
I will try and make an effort to see if I can start with small game concepts and work from there.
Everyone must enjoy themselves and have a pleasant great and eventful time on makegameSA.
Hey I'm Daniel. I'm studying third-year comp sci at Tuks, but I've been dabbling in game dev since high school.
I've mostly just mucked about with games for the hell of it, but I'm currently working on a game for my third-year project and it's been keeping me quite busy lately, although that hasn't stopped me from mucking about. I'm not a big fan of using pre-made game engine packages (like Unity and UDK, etc), because I have more of a sense of accomplishment and ownership if I build the game engine from scratch. I really enjoy coding, doesn't really matter what language although I primarily work in Java. Making games is usually more fun than playing them for me. xD
@jellyman Wow. That is scary how similar you sound to me (regarding building the game engine). I just add the fact that there is much more control when making your own engine.
@jellyman, @AntiVoid: I keep wondering what you're doing with that control. Are you actually doing unique, interesting stuff that you couldn't do any other way, or are you just implementing known algorithms from the internet? I remember that's what I kept getting stuck doing when I was writing my own engines during university... Except for the bit about it recompiling itself on the fly, that was kinda neat.
The one thing we all keep going on about around here is to take as little time as possible to get to the desired result - and that's usually "Make A Game" (and making it again, and better) for us.
If your goal is "Awesome programming" or "Cool code", it's typically not serving "Make A Game" as best it could.
I do like cool code :) I've created programs other than games which do interesting things and I quite enjoy doing so (web development can also be fun at times). I like the control I can give my game editor for example where I can put any feature I want in - to do exactly what I want. I remember long ago when I dabbled in 3D game studio - I wanted features which it just did not have. Now, I can create those features exactly the way I want. I really don't mind that it will take longer than with a pre-made game engine. I enjoy learning how to code things. Same reason I like messing around on Linux - that's what it's all about :D
I'm Alessandro Barbosa, and I'm ashamed it took me this long to sign-up :P
I'm a second year Game Design student at Wits, specializing mainly in the design and coding of games, and less on the art. I'm also an editor of a local gaming website called eGamer.
Also, I'm not dyslexic. My username is misspelt for dramatic effect :P
I like to know how things work when I make them. If I use a Game Engine I feel like I'm waving a magic wand around and awesome stuff happens. It's cool, I'll admit that, and I've seen a lot of neat stuff in Unity and GameMaker. But I don't want to wave a magic wand, I want to get in there and do it myself, get a deep understanding how things are done. I know people usually say "you're wasting time, just use XYZ" but if I did I wouldn't be able to explain in any kind of detail how something works, like shadow mapping, and post-processing, etc. Those things would have remained "mystical beings" if I hadn't sat down and written an OpenGL graphics engine from the ground up, right from my first triangle all the way to procedural volumetric clouds, real-time reflections, cascading shadow maps, each line hand-written from scratch using maths and common sense. Once you get a feel of how things are done underneath the hood of a AAA graphics engine, you will be able to enjoy all the awesome magic even more now that you know how it works and, importantly, how much bloody work goes into that sort of thing! And better still, it then doesn't seem so out of reach if you're thinking of developing a new way of doing motion blur or water reflections or whatever crazy new effect you think of.
Howzit, I'm Sasha Bii (or at least that's what I go by).
Currently a matric student playing around with game development and hoping to study game design at Wits next year. Interested in programming but also quite good with the art side of things.
I'm Johan van Staden. Systems Analyst by day, dad by night, gamer and ad-hoc writer by midnight. I've done a bit of Flash and Unreal Engine during my TUKS days many years ago. I've been a bit out of touch, but need to get my hands dirty again.
I'm Amy :D I'm the shy one from the meet up thingy the other night ^^ Erm, about me... Avid gamer, PR Guru and Scuba Diver :P haha trying my hand at animation this next year :) Errrrr, I love my RPG games, you'll often find me lurking on GW2. I'd love to get my hands on one of the artists from ArenaNet to pick their brain. Yip, I don't know what else to write. I can't even.
I'd love to get my hands on one of the artists from ArenaNet to pick their brain.
If you've got specific questions, toss 'em my way. I don't chat with them often, but I'm in contact with a concept artist and two tech artists there. Can maybe put you in contact with them.
Don't think I've introduced myself.. Been playing around with Game Maker 8, and now GMStudio master collection for a year or so....so yes I decided to quit my job as Chem Eng Sasol, so move back to Cape Town (Somerset West) and take a year off to see if I finally can make a cool indie game which people actually want to play. Still have to come to a meetup, which I will do soon.
Still pretty new here so hope to make some game maker friends and artist whom like to work with pixel art.
I'm currently working on a brand new game idea, RoboCraft, which will be a Robot Survival game (think Wall-e) with crafting and fixing stuff as main mechanic...
So everyone thinks I'm crazy to quit my career after 8years, I say they are all crazy! PS: Couldn't do it without my awesome wife's support!!
Looking forward to make some long lasting friendships here.
Comments
I'm David from Johannesburg and I posted a couple of games to the Game.Dev community ages ago.
I have been working on a mobile game in Unity for a while, it will be ready to share soon!
I am André Jacobs, originally from Pretoria and used to be a SAGD member for a long time. I now live in the UK and work for myself.
To keep a long story shorter, like most of you I used to dream about being a game developer (in my case programmer) while being at school. Only problem was that there was at the time no games being developed in SA other than what Celestial was doing (oh there was that Cyril Cyberpunk game). So I got involved in the demoscene until it got eaten up by the game dev scene (SAGD). While I was working as a lecturer for CTI, a new company I-Imagine was started (of which Luke @AngryMooseZA was co-founder). This was it and I knew I had to follow my dream and get into the biz. Eventually I worked for I-Imagine (what a great team, to this day some of the best working moments) until they went bust and there was no more game dev work in Africa! So I managed to come to the UK and work for Climax Studios. Then went over to Criterion to work on Burnout Paradise. Worked for Lionhead studios as well before moving out of the biz (AAA biz that is) to the finance industry before finally settling on doing contract work and my own stuff.
I keep up to date with SA game dev from time to time and I am amazed to see how much talent and indie studios / aspiring developers there are now.
If there is only one bit of value I can contribute to the members here, is that if you have a dream (whether it be making indie games or joining AAA biz) is that you should work hard to accomplish that dream and not to listen to folk that doesn't share that dream and that would be trying to put you down. I remember all the times people used to tell me that I would never get into games (not in SA, not overseas, not work for AAA studios etc.), not only did I accomplish my dream but I also met lots of talented SA people that also followed their dreams. So keep dreaming, keep working and keep believing.
PS. Once you tick of a dream on your list, then it is time to dream a new dream.
^.^
Welcome :D. Us Joburgers are sorry we missed your The Maker's Eden presentation :/.
Tuism - ALL THE LINKS! Only not all of them because the vast number of places I hang out online is shameful.
I am Dominic Obojkovits and I am the lead programmer on Pixel Boy for Giant Box games. I am also studying Games Design at UCT and am in first year.
Ahoy everyone, my names Simon Anderson. Im a programmer/business person at SIJO Studios.
Bit of background, I have worked in the film industry for the past 4 years as a rigger/pipeline developer on a few projects here and there, and before that I was a flash developer for 4 years. Recently returned back to SA and have started a games company, we are currently working on Khumba the game. Hope to show off some of the basic mechanics next month at the CT meet up.
if anyone wants to get in touch or follow us,
https://www.facebook.com/sijogames
https://twitter.com/SIJOstudio
Cheers
If your a nice person, follow me on twitter and we'll get in touch. @kobusvdwalt9
My name's Brendan. I'm a perpetual student. I studied aeronautical engineering, and I'm currently busy with a PhD in compressible gas flow. I program in my free time and also lecture part of an introductory programming course to 2nd year engineers at Wits.
I am Arie Roos, a C# and VB.NET programmer at Libralex. I am still hopefull to fullfill my lifetime dream of developing games.
I'm Marissa van Wyngaardt (a mouthful of a surname, I know), and I'm currently studying Game Design and electrical engineering at Wits.
University is keeping me rather busy (luckily the game dev portion keeps me happily busy), but in my spare time I fiddle around on my drawing tablet. Hoping to improve on my digital art and stop being so fussy about perfecting everything (accuracy and art don't always see eye to eye). Also learning to use GameMaker.
Looking forward to being part of the Forum! :)
I'm currently in my 3rd year at UCT, studying computer science and computer games development. I love both the programming and creative side of game development. Really interested to get to know the South African gaming community a little better.
My name is Ben Geldenhuys and I'm a full-time illustrator, animator, designer and viking working at Themartist productions and a part-time closet musician. I'm based in Cape Town and as Danelle already mentioned, I work with her on our weekly webcomic called Cottonstar.
I know nothing of game dev, but I AM busy creating music for one :D
I'm Daniel and I've been working on "hard mode" on a game engine for a reeaally long time and at some point I'll release a game on it :P
Thanks :D I'm having a total blast making music for Clash!
I'm Arno Bornman. I am currently studying Computer Science at the University of Pretoria with the aspiration of becoming a video game programmer, designer or developer.
I'm a content aggregator. I distribute games, apps & music on content protals.
I'm also a podcaster, I'm super crazy about music.
I am a long time lurker..rer, no time poster...rer...but that is about to change...see already made a post :-P
I'm currently working on a resource management board game bout the life of taxi owners and how they manage the taxi business. Started building up on an idea i had last year hopefully it turns out awesome.
I'm Etienne, a Sound guy by trade, would love to make sound for your games!
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/1143/audio-guy-in-the-house#Item_1
Guess it's time I do this thing.
I have a long name, so to keep things simple we will stick with Nico Schoeman. I'm a dev at Celestial Games. Some of you already met me, and I'm looking forward to meeting the rest of you :)
I know I am late by a month. Just want to say hi and that I have enjoyed the community meetups so far. I am a programmer from the Java background and have a Bachelor Degree in Computing from Monash SA. I have been interested in game development since I was in primary school and decided to join this community to see how it will be with people with similar interests.
I will try and make an effort to see if I can start with small game concepts and work from there.
Everyone must enjoy themselves and have a pleasant great and eventful time on makegameSA.
I've mostly just mucked about with games for the hell of it, but I'm currently working on a game for my third-year project and it's been keeping me quite busy lately, although that hasn't stopped me from mucking about. I'm not a big fan of using pre-made game engine packages (like Unity and UDK, etc), because I have more of a sense of accomplishment and ownership if I build the game engine from scratch. I really enjoy coding, doesn't really matter what language although I primarily work in Java. Making games is usually more fun than playing them for me. xD
Must be a Daniel thing :P
If your goal is "Awesome programming" or "Cool code", it's typically not serving "Make A Game" as best it could.
I'm Alessandro Barbosa, and I'm ashamed it took me this long to sign-up :P
I'm a second year Game Design student at Wits, specializing mainly in the design and coding of games, and less on the art. I'm also an editor of a local gaming website called eGamer.
Also, I'm not dyslexic. My username is misspelt for dramatic effect :P
Currently a matric student playing around with game development and hoping to study game design at Wits next year. Interested in programming but also quite good with the art side of things.
So ja, hiiiii :)
I'm Johan van Staden. Systems Analyst by day, dad by night, gamer and ad-hoc writer by midnight. I've done a bit of Flash and Unreal Engine during my TUKS days many years ago. I've been a bit out of touch, but need to get my hands dirty again.
I'm Amy :D I'm the shy one from the meet up thingy the other night ^^
Erm, about me... Avid gamer, PR Guru and Scuba Diver :P haha trying my hand at animation this next year :)
Errrrr, I love my RPG games, you'll often find me lurking on GW2. I'd love to get my hands on one of the artists from ArenaNet to pick their brain.
Yip, I don't know what else to write. I can't even.
Been playing around with Game Maker 8, and now GMStudio master collection for a year or so....so yes I decided to quit my job as Chem Eng Sasol, so move back to Cape Town (Somerset West) and take a year off to see if I finally can make a cool indie game which people actually want to play. Still have to come to a meetup, which I will do soon.
Still pretty new here so hope to make some game maker friends and artist whom like to work with pixel art.
I'm currently working on a brand new game idea, RoboCraft, which will be a Robot Survival game (think Wall-e) with crafting and fixing stuff as main mechanic...
So everyone thinks I'm crazy to quit my career after 8years, I say they are all crazy!
PS: Couldn't do it without my awesome wife's support!!
Looking forward to make some long lasting friendships here.