Me!

Welcome to my portfolio page! If you’d like to know about projects I’ve completed, click on the link to “Projects.” Wondering about what I’ve been involved in? Check out my “Activities” page. Want to hear my thoughts regarding industry issues? Click on “Thoughts.” If you’re looking to contact me, you can click on “Contact;” for a plain-text look at my resume, visit “Resume.”

If you want to get in touch for any reason, please don’t hesitate to contact me! Let me know if there are any problems with my site’s navigation or if there’s additional information you’d like to know about. If you want to connect through Facebook or LinkedIn, all I ask is that you please let me know who you are and why you want to network with me.

Who I am

I’m a software designer/developer who recently graduated from Michigan State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Telecommunications, Information Studies & Media (and dual specializations in Game Development and Information Technology). Although most of my experience lies with game production, I love developing applications and working with clients to deliver a superior product.

PhotobucketMy spontaneous and occasionally overactive imagination allows me to hold whole worlds in my head while maturing and fleshing out their ideas to modify or strengthen storylines and content. I’m always curious as to how systems and rules work and what, if anything, can be done to improve them or make them more efficient. I strive to make the world a better and more meaningful place by honing my ability to think creatively and yet analytically as well as my urge to persuade and inform.

Why am I so excited about creating games and other applications? Because they allow me to use my imagination, to find out how things work, to communicate ideas and emotions… and, most importantly, to present my world and experiences to others.

What I’ve done

Along with getting my Bachelor of Arts at Michigan State, I tested, designed, developed and helped manage “Nightlife,” a CDC-funded health communication game for the University of Connecticut’s Health Department. I worked with artists, programmers and fellow designers to develop several games, among them “Man vs. Wild,” a project in which Michigan State’s game design students worked with Scientifically Proven Entertainment to make the game adaptation of the popular Discovery TV show. I participated in the 2011 Global Game Jam where my team and I made “Xenu’s Revenge” (a top-down scroller shooter) in just 48 hours.

I have built and edited assets, overseen testing groups, established bug reporting guidelines, streamlined game mechanics and content, planned the scope of projects and much more.

What I’m doing now

While I’m enthusiastic about the design and quality assurance side of game development, I’m also curious as to how software engineering fits in.

I was presented with many opportunities to work with programmers during my education at Michigan State. Whether it was to adjust a gameplay mechanic, report a bug or see if an element could be considered “in scope,” programmers represented a unique (and challenging) part of the development process, made especially difficult due to the limited knowledge of programming I had obtained up until then. It was difficult for me to think analytically and working with programmers helped me understand the logical skills they had learned.

Currently, I’m learning C++ and improving my knowledge of Java. I’ve moved my blog articles to TAP-Repeatedly.com; you can find my most recent posts there. I’m taking classes at Oakland Community College, learning the International Classification of Diseases v.10 (ICD-10) coding for electronic medical records and exploring career and/or future educational opportunities.