Hello World! My name is Kristin and today is my first day as a GameDev Intern for GameDevHQ. I’ll be documenting my journey through learning game development here, so be sure to check Medium for all of my latest adventures. It was only just a few days ago I was saving tiny little panda babies on Panda Pop for Android, and now I’m going to be learning how it’s all done. As an Myers-Briggs ENTP and Enneagram 5w4, this is right up my alley. I *love* learning and figuring exactly how things work and exploring all the different ways to solve problems. Not only do I get to do what energizes me, but I’m also exploring a way to solve a problem I’ve had for quite some time. What’s the problem you ask? Surviving 2020 Becoming free of depending on tourism for income. If it had not been for 2020, this wouldn’t have been a problem in the first place...and yet, here we are. Truthfully, I can’t really blame 2020. Technology careers are needed to move society forward and 2020 just reminded us all there’s no more time left to wait. I’m one of the lucky ones that I actually enjoy coding. "How can you say that on your first day," you ask? The answer is, because this isn’t necessarily my first rodeo- I started learning to code about five months ago on Coursera. For anyone wondering, the good news is that it’s self paced. For anyone still wondering, the bad news is that it’s self paced...you’re really on your own. You can send emails to your instructors and it might take a week to get an answer or several days. It’s a gamble everytime. There are student forums, but at times, it’s like the lost leading the lost. Although I’m highly self motivated- I also enjoy having access to live people as resources. I don’t need to be spoon fed answers, but it’s also nice to have an answer in general...whether an issue is a glitch or something that you just have to figure out on your own. I don’t mind that coding can be like a scavenger hunt- there’s a lot of things that are simply not said about coding that you have to find from sometimes vague language. And yet, that’s really the only way to learn. The skill you quietly pick up along the way is the skill that no one tells you to your face: how to solve problems. You can’t find what isn’t lost...and from my previous learning experience, I’m sure I won’t be at a loss for those moments. However, after 15 minutes to several hours of struggling on a problem, the beauty is the magical keys that mysteriously open solutions you’ve been looking for- there’s nothing like it. I’ve always wondered if coding instructors do that on purpose...there’s no way they’re on some secret, comprehensive email thread reminding them to leave their students slightly hanging....or is there? I suppose I will find out.
Stay well friends,
Kristin
#team-d
