Ask The Experts: Professional Programmers PanelMike Acton, Brett Douville, Yilmaz Kiymaz, Noel Llopis, Jeff Ward

Our Experts●AAA Leads

● Mike Acton - Engine Director - Insomniac Games●Ratchet and Clank, Resistance, AltDevBlogADay.com

● Brett Douville - Lead Programmer – Bethesda●14-year vet, most recently: Skyrim

●Indies● Noel Llopis – Indie Game Developer – Snappy Touch

●iPhone Games: Casey’s Contraptions, Lorax Garden, Flower Garden● Yilmaz Kiymaz – Unity Oracle – Ex-Owlchemy Labs

●Snuggle / Smuggle Truck, Aaaaaaaaa for the Awesome●Fearless Leader

● Jeff Ward – Senior Programmer – Fire Hose Games

We’re WatchingTweet at #GCSPPP@mike_acton @brett_douville @VoxelBoy @noel_llopis @fuzzybinary

What is the best thing I can do if I’m looking for a career in game development?

The Language Question

What language do you recommend starting with?What language do you use?Do I have to use C++?

The College Question(s)

Do I / Did I need to go to college?Do I / Did I need to go to a game school?I really just want to make games. Do I need a traditional college?Is there room for a self taught programmer?

How do you learn to write a game engine? Do you just have to do it?

From @dbgamer

What’s the typical career path if you’re more interested in engine tech (and does such a junior position exist)?

From @jhasberstro

As somebody leaving school in X years, what technologies should I focus on?

What are you looking to hire?What tech do you see being dominant?HTML5? Mobile?C++0x / C++11?

Can I / Should I start my own company right out of college?

What advice would you give to this person?What type of talent do you need / not need?

What is the single most important skill for a programmer, especially a junior programmer?

And how do you test for it?

More QuestionsTweet at #GCSPPP

ResourcesWill Be Available Online

Books●C++ Coding Standards

● http://www.amazon.com/Coding-Standards-Rules-Guidelines-Practices/dp/0321113586/●The Pragmatic Programmer

● http://www.amazon.com/Pragmatic-Programmer-Journeyman-Master/dp/020161622X/●Code

● http://www.amazon.com/Code-Language-Computer-Hardware-Software/dp/0735611319/●Effective Series●Game Coding Complete

● http://www.amazon.com/Game-Coding-Complete-Third-McShaffry/dp/1584506806●Graphics Programming Black Book

● http://www.gamedev.net/page/resources/_/technical/graphics-programming-and-theory/graphics-programming-black-book-r1698

More Books●GPU Gems Series●Game Programming Gems

Talks / Slide●Deep C

● http://www.slideshare.net/olvemaudal/deep-c●Forensic Debugging

● http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014353/Forensic-Debugging-How-to-Autopsy●Writing modern C++ code: how C++ has evolved over the years

● http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/BUILD/BUILD2011/TOOL-835T●Practical Examples in Data Oriented Design

● https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=0AYqySQy4JUK1ZGNzNnZmNWpfMzJkaG5yM3pjZA&hl=en●Typical C++ Bullshit

● http://macton.smugmug.com/gallery/8936708_T6zQX#593426709_ZX4pZ●Three Big Lies

● http://cellperformance.beyond3d.com/articles/2008/03/three-big-lies.html

Blogs (Your Speakers)●http://altdevblogaday.com●http://www.brettdouville.com/●http://gamesfromwithin.com●http://jeffongames.com

Community●IGDA (www.igda.org)●GameDev.Net (www.gamedev.net)●Game Dev Stack Exchange (http://gamedev.stackexchange.com/)