About Me
Hi I’m Bill and I do game dev. I’ve been in the games industry for over a decade, mostly as a programmer. I started this blog to share my learning with the community.
I’ve done a lot of research to get you the info I have here. I’ll make mistakes and things will get out of date, but hopefully it’ll all be helpful. Feel free to read my disclaimer if you want more info on how wrong I could be, and to see that my current game-industry employer does not endorse this site.
I also have a YouTube channel with video versions of many of my tutorials.
The Purpose
I believe it’s important to understand the mission or values behind a given project. So I’ve spent some time trying to articulate the true mission of this blog. I’ve heard Unity say they believe “the world is a better place with more creators in it”.
Given what i put on this blog, that would actually fit relatively well for me. But it doesn’t quite match my exact motivation here. Really it’s that I believe people are happier when pursuing their passions. I want to help those whose passion is game dev.
The Content
Most of my posts will be technical in nature, and targeted at programmers and technical artists. The less technical ones will be focused on dealing with the cursory implications of doing game dev on the side (like US taxes).
I’d like to say that the tech posts will be engine agnostic where possible, but realistically they’ll all be fairly Unity specific. That’s what I know well, and where most of my experience lies.
The Hustle
The term side hustle has become quite popular these days. As well as much maligned. Some people view it as an over-commercialization of hobbies. Some as an overly hyped method of getting people away from standard 9 to 5 day jobs.
My thought, and the way I use “side hustle” in the context of this blog, is a really just a hobby you take seriously. Maybe that hobby can make money, but if that’s the sole motivation, there are probably better avenues than game dev.
Game dev, like many creative endeavors, is hard to pay the bills with. And many of those that land a day job in the space, still want to work their own thing on the side.
I personally have a job in the games industry, and enjoy it, but still like having side projects to scratch a creative itch. I also enjoy teaching, but I work with a crew of highly experienced people that really don’t need the kind of teaching I’m able to do on this site.
The Job
What is that game industry job mentioned above? Well, as i call out in my disclaimer, my employer does not endorse this site, and my employer is Unity. They know about it, but my writing here is solely mine.
I’ve been at unity for over three years, working on Addressables and other build pipeline systems. Which means I’ll mostly avoid those topics here. When i have something to teach in that area, I’ll post it through official channels. This site will be all the other things.
The Support
If you like the content, and care to support the site, here are three main ways:
First, would be to spread the word. Tweet about a post with an @gamedevbill or follow and up-vote my content on reddit.
Second would be reviewing (and when possible, buying) my content on the Unity Asset Store. As of today, the only content I have is free, so a 5 star review on my Polar to Cartesian Coordinate shader graph node would be hugely appreciated.
Third, but not least important, using some of my affiliate links would help actually bring in revenue. This project takes a large amount of time, as well as some funds to keep going. My goal is to not have ads on the site, and just do affiliate links to products I actually use. Here’s a link for you to get a great deal on web hosting from the people hosting my site: bluehost web hosting. As I’d imagine most of you don’t need that, the more useful links would be my Unity Asset Store affiliate links, such as this one for the WordPress plugin, or this one for helpful shader graph nodes.
And if you don’t need any of these things, that’s ok too. Just enjoy the site, and keep on learning.
Do something. Make progress. Have fun.