Starting a Game Development Career with Barış Can Soy
Lindsay Schardon (Zenva)
September 10, 2019 in Success Stories

Hello everyone, and welcome to another Learner Success Story! Today we have Barış Can Soy with us, a university student from Estonia studying Game Design and Development.
Thank you so much for joining us, Barış! Let’s jump right into things, shall we? What got you into game design and development, and made you interested in pursuing it as a career?
I have always been interested in video games and computers since my childhood when I first used a computer. And to be fair, I have spent a lot of time gaming. However, until I started studying Game Design and Development, my main area of interest was not game development but mathematics and astrophysics. So, I started my college life with engineering. After a year I noticed that engineering was not what I wanted to. I wanted to be a game developer. I had a chance to transfer to a Game Design and Development program as well, so I took it!
Speaking of game design and development, what aspect of game development do you think is the most rewarding, and makes you feel proud to have mastered?
The things that fascinate me the most in game design and development are the logic and programming behind the games, the 3d models, visual effects and impact of the music to the player’s experience. I had the chance to get my hands on them all, but I mostly worked on the programming part. I think that is the most rewarding aspect of game development. It makes me feel proud that I could improve my programming skills a lot, and I could start seeing how the logic or a specific event could be implemented in games I was playing.

You definitely know what you want to do in life, which is not something everyone in university can say! When it comes to your studies at university, how have you used the courses here at Zenva to supplement those studies and better prepare you for life after school?
First of all, with Zenva courses, I got to get some practical experience and work on personal projects outside of school. I improved my programming skills in C# and got into a habit of writing clean code and commenting on my code, partly thanks to their RPG Academy. I also improved my skills in the Unity game engine – which I believe is a very important step in learning game programming, as I get hands-on experience with a nice game engine.
After this, I also started learning JavaScript with Zenva courses which also got me into web development and gave me fundamental knowledge there.
After gaining these skills, the university courses in which I had to make a game prototype or present a game I created (which was supposed to be challenging) were just fun and successful for me. I believe that it will be a similar experience with the future object-oriented programming courses I will be taking – with the skills I have gained from Zenva courses and the curiosity it created, it will lead me to do more research and improve further.

In addition to the classes in school, Global Game Jam 2019 Tallinn took place in my school and the game demo I created with my team, Twilight Smasher, got an award there. It was an enjoyable feeling to be ranked while hosting the event.
I believe that the skills I acquired so far (and will acquire) with studies at school and online Zenva courses will help me get to better places in the game development sector, get a nice developer job, or maybe even start my own company. There is always more to learn, so I will keep practicing and hopefully become a great game developer.
We’re glad to hear that our courses have provided such a benefit for you, both in your studies and with the Global Game Jam! Besides studying in university, you also interned as a .NET developer with a company that makes casino games. In general, what was the experience like, and how do you feel that experience has helped to prepare you for the future?
It was a great experience that I am very lucky to have experienced! I had a chance to see how teams of developers, testers, and designers work. I had a chance to work with very skillful programmers there and learned a lot from them by seeing their style of coding and best practices. I had a chance to release projects which went live. So, it was very much like working for 2-months experience-wise. I also am really proud that I could complete the tasks given to me in a much shorter time, coding while explaining what I am doing to the QA intern. For me, that was proof of my improvement in programming and understanding the logic behind the system they had.

Well, it looks like time is just about up! We can squeeze in one more question even so. Barış, given how prepared you are to start your future career, what advice would you give to other current and future university students who want to study game design?
It is a sector where there is always more to learn, more to discover, and more to improve yourself. So, there is always a need for practice. University will provide a base knowledge, but there is always a need for more studying and practice to get to a nice place in the game development sector.
This is where we have to end this Learner Success Story, so one last big thank you to Bariş, whose career and amazing games we can’t wait to see more of!
Feel like some virtual crime and interior decorating to blow off steam? Try out Twilight Smasher, Bariş’s team’s game from the Global Game Jam 2019 Tallinn!
Interested in following Bariş’ career? Check out his LinkedIn profile for all his work credentials!