This happened to me at non-games tech companies too. I think the recruiters (often third-party contractors) need to hit a candidate recruitment quota before filling the role.

In case you need one of these ☝️ @catacalypto.bsky.social

But even as a senior engineer and CEO myself, I don't want to replace high quality work that engages people critically and emotionally with cheaper work that doesn't.

Having been an introverted software worker, I spent that year serving the community like never before. I started volunteering at events with people I had met on rides.

It ultimately inspired me to start a company teaching after-school classes at local schools and now I get to help people every day.

In 2022 when I gave up on corporate jobs, I started driving Uber while figuring out my next path.

I had conversations with 1200 strangers, carried people's groceries, comforted people through funerals and breakups. At the end of rides, people would often invite me to join them at their events.

After a decade of feeling the same about politics, where the stakes for failure are critical for so many people, we need to step up and take responsibility.

It's time for all the organized and capable people to start running for local positions and making a difference in our communities.

Think of all the extras that could have flipped over that 2nd floor railing every time the ship got hit.

While sticking up for your values will be tough in the short-term, over time the businesses that are hiring artists and writers to create nuanced and thoughtful creative work will outpace the others in sales and have more funds to reinvest in those creatives.

Piranesi was my favorite read this year but I have a hunch you've already read it.

Similarly, my phone started autocorrecting to "Ai" and I like that it's both diminutive of the intelligence and also sounds like a panicked yelp

I would love to add ice like this to our game... Black Ice

I've made social impact games about logical fallacies, feedback loops and climate change, and most recently community organizing to overcome systemic issues. Plus hackers helping people get healthcare.

I didn't realize you were working on this one! I just discovered it recently but I'm excited about it!

When I start teaching my university game design class next year, these graphs will be in my lectures with the before/after screenshots 😎

Biggest recent win was analytics proving my theory that bad UI was adding friction that caused consistent player drop-off.

My first UI replacement update has already shifted the data with each story segment getting a 5%+ bump in players.

Tackling inventory and RPG progression UIs next!

Nice! Big improvements it seems.

I'm waiting a little closer to the end to start profiling Black Ice, especially the shaders. So far, every update I release, players say frame rate gets better so I don't feel the need to dig too deep yet.

Are you optimizing Qud or mystery new game?