C++ · UE5 · ZBrush · Maya · Substance · French B2→C1 · RMIT 2030 · Remote-first · The Road
Phase 1Sunrise 2026–2029
Phase 2Sunset 2030–2033
ATAR Floor96.7+
Grad War Chest$92,854
French TargetB2 min · C1 goal
←→ navigate
The Big Picture
Overview
Total Timeline
8
Years · 2026 → 2033
Primary Goals — Co-equal, build both
★ Character Artist — ZBrush · Maya · Substance
★ Gameplay Programmer — C++ · UE5 · Blueprint
2 Technical Artist (Hybrid — emerges naturally)
2 Tools Programmer (Secondary, not a goal)
– Medicine / Research / Law — ruled out
Phase 01 · 2026–2029
Sunrise
Girton Grammar School · Year 9–12
2026 · The Awakening 🌅
2027 · The Forge 🔥
2028 · The Ascent ⛰️
2029 · The Zenith ☀️
Phase 02 · 2030–2033
Sunset
RMIT University · Melbourne City Campus
2030 · The Pilgrim 🌇
2031 · The Architect 🏗
2032 · The Engineer ⚙️
2033 · The Dead of Night 🌌
Your Pivot Surface
Gameplay programmer or character artist with C1 French, UE5, C++, ZBrush — international visa options across a dozen countries, remote-capable from day one of seniority. Doors that open: game tools programming, engine work, technical art, indie solo dev, game education, serious games, software dev broadly if games ever sours, freelance, your own studio eventually. Most people have two or three doors. You're building twelve. French adds geographic doors on top of career doors — Québec, France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Monaco, 23 African countries.
What determines your outcome
Not Time — These.
Non-Negotiable
Consistency
Showing up every day over months and years. Nothing else compounds like this. Boring is the point.
Non-Negotiable
Project Completion
Finishing things. Small things first. Then bigger things. The portfolio only cares about completed work.
Non-Negotiable
Depth of Fundamentals
C++, UE5 internals, anatomy for sculptors. No shortcuts on the ugly parts. Depth outlasts everyone who skipped.
Split & Output Targets
Portfolio Goals
Programming
2–3
Small gameplay systems. Actually working code — not concepts.
Character Art
1–2
Decent character pieces. Completed. Polished. Portfolio-quality finish.
Combined
1
One tiny playable prototype. Finished counts. Ambitious and incomplete doesn't.
Phase 1 · 2026–2029
Sunrise ☀️
2026 · Year 9 · Girton Grammar School
The Awakening 🌅
The foundation year. Robotics, French, and Next Gen Workshop are the three electives that matter here.
MANDATORY English
MANDATORY Mathematics
MANDATORY Geography
MANDATORY History
MANDATORY Physical Education
MANDATORY Science
MANDATORY Yr9 Achieve Program
⭐ ELECTIVE Robotics
ELECTIVE Standard / Advanced French
⭐ ELECTIVE Next Gen Workshop
BACKUP Media
⭐ BACKUP Business
BACKUP Philosophy
CO-CURR Girton Community Action Group — Advocacy
COMP Australian Informatics Olympiad (~1000 students/yr)
COMP AUSSEF (~400 students/yr)
2027 · Year 10 · Girton Grammar School
The Forge 🔥
Maths Methods preparation (not acceleration). VCE Systems Engineering begins early via acceleration.
MANDATORY English
MANDATORY History
MANDATORY Careers
MANDATORY Maths Methods — preparation, not acceleration
Peak VCE year. ATAR counts here. Average floor 96.7 based on subject scaling.
96.7+
ATAR Average Floor
+43 scaling points across subject selection. Units 3 & 4 — counts toward ATAR.
English Language (Mandatory)
+3
Specialist Mathematics
+13
Methods Mathematics
+6
Physics
+3
French
+10
Chemistry (Backup)
+4
CO-CURR Supervised Study Session (A) · GCAG · Debating (B)
Phase 2 · 2030–2033
Sunset 🌇
RMIT University · Melbourne City Campus · Bachelor of Computer Science (Professional) · 4 years
2030 · University Year 1
The Pilgrim 🌇
Arrive Melbourne. Scape Swanston studio ($331/wk — Scape Scholarship covers Year 1). Build your tribe. Java + C++ bootcamps from day one.
CORE Java Programming Bootcamp + Studio
CORE C++ Programming Bootcamp + Studio
CORE Introduction to Mathematics for Computing
CORE Mathematics for Computing 1
CLUB Games, Manga & Anime Society
CLUB CS & IT Society
⭐ CLUB Game Developer Club — Create this if it doesn't exist
2031 · University Year 2
The Architect 🏗
Depth builds. AI, Security, Software Engineering fundamentals. The page will fill in as this year approaches.
CORE Introduction to Cyber Security
CORE Essentials of Computing
CORE Software Engineering Fundamentals
CORE Foundations of Artificial Intelligence
CORE Algorithms and Analysis
2032 · University Year 3
The Engineer ⚙️
Project work begins. Industry-facing outputs. The portfolio starts becoming real.
CORE Programming Project 1
CORE Innovation Ecosystem and the Future of Work
CORE Software Engineering Process and Tools
2033 · University Year 4
The Dead of Night 🌌
Paid professional internship year. ~$48,000 salary. This is where it stops being theory.
CORE Industry Experience 3a + Reflection 1
CORE Industry Experience 3b + Reflection 2
Every Skill — Career + Life + Road
Skills 🗡
The Full Stack
Career skills fund the life. Life skills make it liveable. Survival skills make it antifragile. Every domain compounds. Click once → learning. Click twice → mastered. Click again → resets. Saves to your browser.
Marmoset or UE5 Lumen, lighting a character for presentation
Portfolio
🇫🇷
French Language — B2 min · C1 target
0%
Why It Stays
+10 VCE scaling → higher ATAR → Tech Ignite Scholarship. Opens Montréal studios, Québec immigration, France. The endgame location is personal — but French keeps every francophone door on the table. 2hrs daily, 7 days a week, indefinitely.
Core Vocabulary — 1000 words
Most frequent words, survival vocabulary, daily life
Registration across provinces, cross-border insurance, full-timer
Road Essential
Rural Property Purchasing
Freehold vs leasehold, title insurance, well and septic inspection
Property
Emergency Fund Architecture
3-tier: digital account + physical cash stash + war chest buffer
Foundation
Technical Arsenal
Skills & Roles
Primary Goals — Co-equal, Build Both
Character Artist and Gameplay Programmer are the two primary targets. Both are being built simultaneously. The goal at graduation: a realistic sculpt that gets you hired as a character artist, and a gameplay system that impresses recruiters as a programmer. Both, by the time you leave RMIT. Everything else on this page (Technical Artist, Tools Programmer, Engine work) is a door that opens as a byproduct — not a goal in itself. Note: remote senior work is more accessible through programming than through art — programming follows you anywhere, art direction tends to require physical studio presence at junior level.
Primary Goals
★ Character Artist
★ Gameplay Programmer
Doors That Open Naturally (Secondary)
Technical Artist
Tools Programmer
Engine Programmer
AI Programmer
Indie Solo Dev
Own Studio
Art Stack — Character Artist Track
★ Primary Art Tools
Sculpting
ZBrush
High-poly sculpting. Anatomy is the actual skill — ZBrush is just the tool it lives in.
Texturing
Substance Painter
PBR texturing. Industry standard. Free with student RMIT licence.
3D / Rigging
Maya
Retopology, UV mapping, rigging, animation. The professional pipeline standard.
Programming Stack — Gameplay Programmer Track
★ Primary Code Stack
Foundation — Non-negotiable
C++ Core
Data structures · Memory management · Pointers · The ugly parts · No shortcuts.
Engine Deep Work
UE5 Fluency
Gameplay Ability System · Character movement · Enhanced Input · Physics & collision · Behaviour trees.
Async written communication · Code review culture · Documentation (be good at this — it gets noticed) · Git discipline.
Languages Gained
Primary + Bonus
NEEDED
C++
UE5 Blueprint
BONUS — NOT NEEDED BUT EARNED
Python
C
GLSL
Java (degree)
JavaScript (likely)
C# (likely)
The Long Game
Life Plan 🏕️
🏔
Remote / Off-Grid Context
The life skills in this section apply if and when you pursue off-grid or remote cabin living — Lake Superior North Shore, Northern Québec, BC interior, rural France. High chance you will at some point. These aren't urgently required right now — they're on the list for when that chapter opens.
The Vision
Custom RV as primary residence. Remote gameplay programmer contract. Senior level, async-first, location irrelevant. Early career: Montréal — francophone, dense games industry, dark sky two hours north. Then the road. North America as the texture you move through indefinitely. Safehouse cabin in northern Québec or Lake Superior north shore as the invariant — always stocked, always ready, always yours. The endgame location is open: wherever the sky is darkest and the place feels right when standing in it. The schedule built around the life, not the other way around.
Where You Can Live
Countries Available
English Speaking
Australia
Canada
United States
United Kingdom
Ireland
New Zealand
French Unlocks
France
Belgium
Switzerland
Luxembourg
Monaco
+ 23 African countries
Career & Life Timeline
The Arc
Now → 2030
Foundation
C++, UE5, ZBrush, French in parallel. Financial planning. ATAR. Scholarship. Budget executing. The roadmap is being lived.
2030–2033
Degree — City Stint
Melbourne. Build credits, reputation, remote trust. 4 years of degree. Weekend escapes north or to dark sky zones.
2033–2036 (Est)
Early Career — City Toll
Montréal is the primary target — francophone, games industry concentrated (Ubisoft, EA, WB, Square Enix), dark sky two hours north when the week ends. Melbourne or Paris as alternatives depending on first role. Pay the price of entry. Build credits, reputation, remote trust. 2–3 years minimum. Non-negotiable price of admission. Weekend drives north to Bortle 1 territory.
~2036+ (Senior)
Go Remote — The Final Turn
Town under 1000. Dark sky. Starlink. Async-first. Northern Québec Laurentians, Lake Superior North Shore, BC interior, or rural France. The life starts here for real. Whatever city came first — this is always where it points after. No compromise on this.
Endgame
The Permanent Place
Land purchased. Cabin built or bought. Bortle 1–2 sky. North Québec, Lake Superior north shore, BC interior, or rural France — wherever the sky is darkest and the place feels right when standing in it.
Remote / Off-Grid Life Skills (When That Chapter Opens)
Cabin Skills
Land & Shelter
Basic Carpentry & Maintenance — Fix what breaks without calling someone 40 minutes away.
Plumbing Basics — Same reason as carpentry. The nearest plumber is far.
Electrical Fundamentals — Understand your own systems. Not enough to rewire a house — enough to not be helpless.
Power & Connectivity
Solar Setup & Battery Management — Off-grid or partial off-grid. Realistic and worth learning early.
Starlink Installation & Troubleshooting — Your livelihood depends on this connection. It cannot be a mystery.
Generator Backup Basics — When everything else fails.
Food
Vegetable Gardening — Even a small plot cuts supply runs and costs significantly.
Preservation — Freezing, canning, drying. Extend what you grow through the winter.
Hunting / Fishing Basics — Depending on region. Self-sufficiency, not necessity.
Water Filtering — Off-grid water sources need to be understood and managed.
Health & Emergency
Wilderness First Aid — Genuine skill. Not optional when you're 40 minutes from a hospital.
Navigation — Both digital and map-based. Always both. Phone dies; map doesn't.
Vehicle Maintenance Basics — Your supply run vehicle cannot be a mystery to you.
Legal & Financial
Foreign Property Ownership Laws — Each target country is different. Research early, not when you're trying to buy.
Tax Residency Rules — Remote workers can get caught between two tax systems badly if they don't plan it.
Basic Accounting — For freelance / contract income. Don't be surprised by your own money.
Visa Conditions — Understand which visas allow remote work for foreign employers.
If That Chapter Comes
Child Raising Philosophy 👶
The Core Principle
Raise them like it's the 1990s, not 2050s. Not deprivation — protection. The lake is right there. They look at it, not a screen of it. You play all three roles: parent, teacher, and mentor. Most kids get none of those properly.
Technology Model
Surgical, Not Blanket
TV allowed. Restricted laptop as a learning tool. Phone if ever given: hardware and software modified — call, message, basic search, maybe filtered YouTube. No open algorithm. No 3am TikTok. The frontal lobe doesn't finish developing until 25. You protect it.
Education Model
Apprenticeship
The oldest model of education. One-to-one. You know them. You have real skills to pass on. Deep, practical, personal — not curriculum filler delivered to a room of thirty at the pace of the median student.
Unlock System
Readiness, Not Age
Skills and freedoms unlocked by demonstrated maturity — not arbitrary year of birth. Start: survival, outdoor life, wayfinding, how physical things work. Progress: code, French, complex problem solving. You decide — you're there watching them develop.
What They Get
The Real Inheritance
Dark sky every night. Real seasons. Land they know. A parent who can teach C++, speak French, fix things, grow food, hunt, filter water, read a map. Two languages. Survival. How to think. How to build.
Ranch-Remote Sweet Spot
Not brutally isolated. Community exists nearby. Healthcare reachable. Other kids exist somewhere. But the default texture of life is land, sky, quiet, and work that means something. The algorithm doesn't reach this far.
Why Any of This
Philosophy 🧭
The Inversion
The schedule is built around the life — not the other way around. Most people get this backwards by default. The exit is built deliberately. Quietly. With code and French and compounding skill.
Core Statements
01
Career funds the freedom. Not rejecting the world — minimising surface area with the parts worth rejecting. Earn enough, spend little, live where the machine hasn't fully reached yet.
02
The schedule is built around the life. Not the other way around. You decide when. The work fits inside the life. Work 8 hours, close the laptop, done. No commute. No open plan office. No performance review theatre.
03
Ideology is not a reason to refuse a useful tool. Evaluate by what it does for your life, not purely by who made it. The satellite gets you the sky. Use it.
04
The loop — same desk, same city, same office, same home, 30 years — is a choice made by default because people never built an exit. The work to build the exit is already underway at 18.
05
Remote isn't escape. It's insistence on actually living. The people who do it aren't the ones who rage against the system endlessly — they're the ones who quietly build the skills and finances that make dependence on it optional.
06
The wealthy and corporations slowly destroy what's worth having. You can't fight it directly. So you go to the places it hasn't reached yet and live well there — on your terms, not theirs.
07
You're not designing an exit from life. You're designing an insistence on having one. Road 96 — French-made, appropriately. The road is the point.
08
The clay is yours. C++, UE5, ZBrush, French are the founding blocks. Everything after — where, how, with whom, what shape the life takes — is carved from whatever those build.
The Work Model
What Senior Remote Actually Looks Like
Async-First
Output, Not Hours
The studio cares that the feature ships by Wednesday. Not when, where, or how the hours were arranged. Two hour session outside. Kid walks up — you pause. Hike calls — you go. Come back and finish. The output is contractual. The process is yours.
Location
Wherever the Sky Is
Cabin in northern Québec. Field in rural France. Shore of Lake Superior. Starlink handles the uplink. Git handles the code. The studio is wherever the repo is. Occasional flight if the studio needs it — not a dealbreaker, just a trip.
The Gap
Earning vs Spending
Senior programmer salary. Rural remote cost of living. The person in the Montreal apartment earning the same is treading water. You bank the difference every month while watching the Milky Way for free. That gap is where wealth actually builds.
Dark Sky Science
Location Filter — The Hard Number
Target Threshold
21.8+ magnitude/arcsec² zenith sky brightness. Bortle 1–2. That is the threshold where stepping outside means the Milky Way is just there — overhead — the way it looked before electricity existed. Canada passes this across vast areas by default. Europe hunts for dark pockets.
T1
Northern Québec — Laurentians / Abitibi BORTLE 1
Francophone. Montréal games industry 2hrs south for early career. Québec immigration favours French speakers. Ancient shield rock, black mirror lakes, violent autumn colour. Wins every filter simultaneously.
T1
Lake Superior North Shore, Ontario BORTLE 1–2
That lake is an inland sea. Pink granite cliffs dropping into cold clear water. Sounds like an ocean. Empty highway. One of the most visually dramatic and underrated landscapes on earth.
T2
BC / Alberta Interior BORTLE 1–2 NORTH
Mountain scale that recalibrates sense of size. Dark in the deep north. Less francophone — that's the only real tradeoff here.
T3
French Alps / Rural France BORTLE 2 AT ELEV.
Beautiful in a completely different way — old, soft, layered with history. Early career Paris is viable. But Europe is compromised at scale on the light pollution map. The dark pockets must be hunted. Canada's darkness is just the default.
The Pivot Surface
Doors Being Built
What This Skill Stack Actually Opens
Gameplay Programmer · Character Artist · Technical Artist · Tools Programmer · Engine Programmer · AI Programmer · Indie Solo Dev · Own Studio · Game Education · Serious Games · Software Dev Broadly · Freelance / Contract. Most programmers have two or three doors. You're building twelve. French adds geographic doors on top of career doors.
Compiled from One Conversation
Blueprint 📋
Studio Preferences
Where You Work
Sweet Spot
AA Narrative
Craft-focused. Smaller, more intentional. The game is the point, not the metrics.
Selectively
AAA Narrative
Studio dependent. Track record and culture evaluated individually — not blanket yes/no.
Case by Case
Indie
Structure and payroll stability evaluated per studio. Some are extraordinary. Some are a garage fire.
Hard No — Live Service
Engagement metrics over craft. Philosophically incompatible. Full stop.
Hard No — Instability
No inconsistent payroll. No burning-out-in-a-garage operations with no runway.
Work Model
How the Days Look
Async-First, Output-Driven
The studio cares that the feature ships by Wednesday. Not when, where, or how the hours were arranged. Work when the light is good. Stop when you need to. Go for the hike. Come back and finish. The output is contractual. The process is yours.
Location Irrelevant at Senior Level
Cabin in northern Québec. Field in rural France. Shore of Lake Superior. Starlink handles the uplink. Git handles the code. The studio is wherever the repo is.
Target Regions — Ranked
Dark Sky Tier List
T1
Northern Québec BORTLE 1
Francophone. Laurentians. Montréal games industry for early career. Québec immigration favours French speakers. Wins every filter.
T1
Lake Superior North Shore, Ontario BORTLE 1–2
Co-equal with Québec. An inland sea — 563km long, 10% of the world's surface fresh water. Pink granite cliffs dropping into Caribbean-clear glacier-cold water. Sounds like an ocean at night. The most underrated landscape on earth. Endgame location genuinely open between here and Québec — wherever feels right.
T2
BC / Alberta Interior BORTLE 1–2 NORTH
Mountain scale that recalibrates sense of size. Less francophone — that's the tradeoff. Dark in the deep north.
T3
French Alps / Rural France BORTLE 2 AT ELEV.
Beautiful differently — old, soft, layered with history. Europe simply can't match Canada on darkness at scale.
Milky Way visible — 21.8+ mag/arcsec²
Bortle 1–2 target
Genuine remoteness
Town <1000 people nearby
Starlink coverage
Airport reachable for studio trips
Core Philosophy
The Foundation
Career funds the freedom. Not rejecting the world — minimising surface area with the parts worth rejecting. Earn enough, spend little, live where the machine hasn't fully reached yet.
The schedule is built around the life. Not the other way around. You decide when. The work fits inside the life — not the life shrinking around the work.
Ideology is not a reason to refuse a useful tool. Evaluate by what it does for your life, not purely by who made it. The satellite gets you the sky. Use it.
The loop — same desk, same city, same office, same home, 30 years — is a choice made by default because people never built an exit. Exits are built deliberately. The work is already underway.
Remote isn't escape. It's insistence on actually living. The people who do it aren't the ones who rage against the system endlessly — they're the ones who quietly build the skills and finances that make dependence on it optional.
The clay is yours. C++, UE5, ZBrush, French are the founding blocks. Everything after — where, how, with whom, what shape the life takes — is carved from whatever those make possible.
You're not designing an exit from life. You're designing an insistence on having one. Road 96. The road is the point.
Phase 2 · 2030–2033 · Melbourne City Campus
RMIT 🎓
Bachelor of Computer Science (Professional) · 4 years · Tech Ignite Scholarship · All figures AUD
Graduation War Chest
$92,854
Post-tax · Yr 4 internship salary included
Tuition
$0
Tech Ignite Scholarship · $10k/yr covered
Accommodation
$0
Scape Swanston · Parents covered all 4 years
Yr 4 Internship
$48k
Paid professional year · Real studio · Real work
Year 1 — 2030 · The Pilgrim 🌇
Java Programming Bootcamp + Studio
C++ Programming Bootcamp + Studio
Introduction to Mathematics for Computing
Mathematics for Computing 1
Club: Games, Manga & Anime Society
Club: CS & IT Society · Game Developer Club (create if absent)
Year 2 — 2031 · The Architect 🏗
Introduction to Cyber Security
Essentials of Computing
Software Engineering Fundamentals
Foundations of Artificial Intelligence
Algorithms and Analysis
Year 3 — 2032 · The Engineer ⚙️
Programming Project 1
Innovation Ecosystem and the Future of Work
Software Engineering Process and Tools
Year 4 — 2033 · The Dead of Night 🌌 — Internship
Industry Experience 3a + Reflection 1
Industry Experience 3b + Reflection 2
Major — Advanced Computer Science (96cp)
Computing Theory · Operating Systems Principles · Artificial Intelligence
Cloud Computing · Machine Learning · Deep Learning
Managing Semi-structured & Unstructured Data · Intelligent Decision Making
Minor — Creative Computing (48cp)
Games Studio 1 · Games Studio 2
Mixed Reality · Games & Artificial Intelligence Techniques
Electives
Games Portfolio · Real-Time Rendering and 3D Games Programming
Game Character Design · Game Assets
Scholarships & Funding
★ TECH IGNITE Full tuition $10k/yr — primary funding target
★ SCAPE ACCOMMODATION Yr1 studio covered — Scape Swanston
★ YOUTH ALLOWANCE $17,607/yr income through Yr 1–4
Backup Degrees
1. Bachelor of Design (Games)
2. Bachelor of Computer Science
3. Bachelor of Information Technology
4. Bachelor of Software Engineering
Financial Projection 2030–2034
Item2030 Yr12031 Yr22032 Yr32033 Yr44-Year Total
⬆ Income
Youth Allowance
$17,607
$17,607
$17,607
$17,607
$70,428
Tech Ignite Surplus
Scholarship surplus after tuition
$5,000
$5,000
$5,000
$5,000
$20,000
Internship Salary
Paid professional internship — Yr 4 only
—
—
—
$48,000
$48,000
TOTAL INCOME
$22,607
$22,607
$22,607
$70,607
$138,428
✓ Covered — $0 Out of Pocket
Tuition ($10k/yr)
$0
$0
$0
$0
Tech Ignite
Accommodation (SCAPE)
$0
$0
$0
$0
Parents
Gym, Utilities, WiFi
Included in SCAPE
$0
$0
$0
$0
Included
Transport
Free Tram Zone — Melbourne CBD
$0
$0
$0
$0
Free Zone
Phone · Entertainment · Medical
Parents · Pre-purchased PS5 Pro · Medicare Bulk Bill
$0
$0
$0
$0
Covered
↓ Personal Expenses
Food — ALDI Franklin
$85/week
$4,420
$4,420
$4,420
$4,420
$17,680
Clothing & Shoes
DFO South Wharf twice yearly
$400
$400
$400
$400
$1,600
Haircuts
6 cuts/yr @ $45
$270
$270
$270
$270
$1,080
Toiletries & Dental
$340
$340
$340
$340
$1,360
Software
Maxon One $109/yr · Maya & Substance free with RMIT
$250
$250
$250
$250
$1,000
Laundry
~$6.50/load × 52 weeks
$338
$338
$338
$338
$1,352
Misc / Emergency Buffer
$2,000
$2,000
$2,000
$2,000
$8,000
TOTAL EXPENSES
$8,018
$8,018
$8,018
$8,018
$32,072
◈ Savings
Tax & Medicare
Yr 1–3: $0 (under $18,200) · Yr 4: $13,382
$0
$0
$0
$13,382
$13,382
Annual Savings (Post-Tax)
$14,589
$14,589
$14,589
$49,207
$92,974
Cumulative
$14,589
$29,178
$43,767
$92,974
—
🎓 Graduation War Chest
Post-tax · 2034 · Yr 4 tax already deducted · RV fund ready
$92,854
Document the Journey
Devlog 📟
The Point
The journey from zero is the most compelling content. Start earlier than you think. The person who figured it out is less interesting than the person figuring it out in public.
Platform
YouTube or Blog or Both
Figure out which format suits your personality and commit to one before adding the second. YouTube = higher reach ceiling. Blog = lower friction, searchable forever. Both = most professional presence once established.
Cadence
Realistic, Not Aspirational
One post every two weeks done consistently destroys three posts in week one then silence. Sustainable beats impressive. Set the cadence lower than you think you can do — then exceed it.
What to Document
The Real Stuff
Design decisions · Bugs solved (and how) · Art progress · Milestone moments · French progress · Setbacks that got fixed. The struggle is the content — not just the wins.
When to Start
Earlier Than You Think
The zero-to-something arc is the content. Don't wait until you have something impressive. The rough start is what makes the later work meaningful in context.
Portfolio Output Targets
Gameplay Systems
2–3
Small, actually working. Not concepts. Code running in engine.
Tiny. But finished. Ambitious and incomplete doesn't count.
The Life Architecture — Finalised
The Road 🛣
The Core Idea
Not a holiday. Not a gap year. A deliberately engineered life with a remote gameplay programmer contract, a custom RV as primary residence, a safehouse cabin as fallback, and North America as the texture you move through indefinitely. The continent is so large you could do this for decades and never repeat a month. The skills being built right now are the engine. The road is what they fund.
~2036
Road Start Target
$92K
War Chest at Grad
2
Countries · Full Access
$0
Rent / Mortgage
∞
No End Date
Primary Residence
RV
Custom-modified · Fully self-contained · Home on wheels
Secondary Base
Cabin
Northern Québec or Lake Superior North Shore · Fallback · Always ready
Resident of Canada · Free movement between both · Entire continent available
Why This Role, Why This Life
Gameplay Programmer — The Only Role That Survives
Why It Works On The Road
The entire job is a laptop, a repo, and a connection. Git handles the code. Unreal handles the engine. The output is a pull request. Nobody cares where you were sitting when you wrote it. Character art at serious level needs a workstation and calibrated monitor — doable from a fixed remote location but not from the road. Gameplay programming follows you anywhere. It's the only primary role in the stack that is genuinely, completely location-independent in the fullest sense.
The Impact
Work That Matters
Gameplay systems are what players remember. "The combat felt incredible" — that's a gameplay programmer's work. You're making the actual thing, not supporting it. The craft is the point.
The Freedom
Truly Portable
A senior gameplay programmer with remote credentials is not a drifter. You have a skill the world pays serious money for, delivered from wherever you parked last night. The studio doesn't know or care.
The Economics
The Gap Is Wealth
Senior programmer salary against RV running costs. No rent. No mortgage. The person in the Montréal apartment earning the same is treading water. You bank the difference every month watching the Milky Way for free.
The Sequence — Non-Negotiable
How You Get There
2026–2033
Build The Foundation
Girton → RMIT. C++, UE5, ZBrush, French. The war chest accumulating. Every skill being built right now is the infrastructure the road life runs on. You don't try to skip this part.
2033–2036 (Est)
Pay The City Toll — Montréal
Junior role. Build the reputation. Demonstrate the output. Get the studio to trust your remote work. This is where you earn the long leash. 2–3 years minimum — not optional, not negotiable. Weekend drives north to dark sky territory while you wait it out.
~2036 (Senior)
The Leash Gets Long — Buy The RV
Remote credentials established. Contract doesn't care where you are. War chest plus salary covers the vehicle outright or near enough. The cabin goes up around the same time. The architecture is complete. The road starts.
2036+ — Indefinite
The Road Life — No End Date
North America as texture. Every state, every province, every corner. You'd never run out in a lifetime. The cabin sits waiting. The contract runs. The sky changes every night depending on where you parked.
Primary Residence
The RV — Custom Built 🚐
Brand new base vehicle. Modified the hell out of it. Every system chosen deliberately. Nothing stock that should be custom. Think of it like the custom arch laptop — same philosophy, larger scale.
Connectivity — The Lifeline
Starlink Roam
Roof-mounted dish. The entire life depends on this connection — it cannot be an afterthought. Hardware + monthly plan. Backed up by a cellular booster pulling weak signals in marginal areas and a Garmin inReach satellite communicator as the final fallback when everything else fails.
Power — Full Independence
Solar + Lithium
Serious lithium battery bank — Battle Born or Renogy, properly sized. Solar panels that actually recharge it, not decorative. Generator as final backup for extended cloudy periods. Know every system completely — what each thing draws, what your bank holds, how long everything runs before recharge is needed.
Work Setup
Proper Workstation
Not a cramped laptop shelf. A real desk, monitor arm, high-spec PC or laptop, drawing tablet mounted for art work. This is where serious C++ and UE5 work gets done. It's a professional environment that happens to be mobile — same standard as any studio desk.
Living
The Interior
Same bed. Same layout. Same morning routine. The inside is a known quantity — identical whether parked on Superior shore or a street in Austin. The structure travels with you. The world outside changes constantly. The interior stays the same. That balance is what makes it sustainable long term.
Food & Water
Self-Sufficient
Serious water tank + filtration for natural sources. Freezer not just minifridge — hunt or buy bulk and store properly. Dry goods for 3–4 weeks without resupply. Camp stove as kitchen backup. Goal: park somewhere truly remote for weeks without needing to move.
Mechanical
Know Your Vehicle
Full tool kit. Spare belts, filters, fluids. Jump pack. High lift jack for off-road situations. Tyre repair + compressor. Know how to diagnose and fix your own alternator in the middle of nowhere. The gearhead angle is practical survival, not just hobby.
Cost
War Chest Covers It
New RV ~$80–120k AUD. Modifications ~$10k. War chest at graduation: $92,854. Vehicle paid outright or near enough before earning a single programmer salary. No mortgage. No rent. Eliminated from day one.
Security Layer
Deep-embedded tracker in the gearwork — not the obvious one, the one they'd never find. Locks on everything worth locking. Reinforced entry points for truly remote areas. Dashcam running constantly. The vehicle looks lived in but not flashy — you don't advertise what's inside. A PC and a Starlink dish are worth stealing. Presentation matters.
Build Checklist — Plan Ahead
RV Systems Planner 🔧
Click each system to mark it as planned. Saves in your browser — survives reload.
0 / 0 systems planned
Power & Connectivity
Lithium Battery Bank (200–300Ah)
Battle Born or Renogy · properly sized to daily draw · know your budget to the amp-hour
~$3K
Rooftop Solar Array (400–600W)
Not decorative — sized to actually recharge the bank on a winter day at lower sun angle
~$2K
Inverter / Charger (2000W+ pure sine)
Victron MultiPlus recommended · handles shore power + generator seamlessly
~$1.5K
Starlink Roam — Roof Mount
Hardwired roof mount, not temporary placement · the lifeline · non-negotiable priority
~$900
Cellular Booster (weBoost or SureCall)
Pulls weak signals in marginal coverage zones · secondary net when Starlink unavailable
~$600
Generator — Portable (Honda EU2200i)
Extended cloudy periods, emergency recharge · quiet enough not to attract attention
~$1.2K
Work Setup
Proper Desk Setup — Fixed Mount
Not a folding shelf. Real desk surface, monitor arm, proper ergonomics. You work 8hrs/day here.
~$800
High-Spec Laptop / eGPU Setup
UE5 requires serious GPU. eGPU dock when stationary for art work. Disconnects cleanly for travel.
~$5K
Drawing Tablet — Wall-Mounted
ZBrush and Substance work. Wacom Cintiq or similar. Fixed mount so it doesn't shift.
~$1.5K
Safety & Navigation
Garmin inReach — Satellite Communicator
SOS + two-way messaging when all else fails · $35/month plan · not negotiable for remote areas
~$600
Trauma Kit + WFA Certification
Tourniquet, chest seal, wound packing. Real first aid — not a drug store kit. Get certified first.
~$400
Paper Maps — Every Region
Benchmark road atlases US + Canada + province-level maps for Shield, BC, etc. Never rely on only digital.
~$150
Security — Hidden Tracker + Camera
Deep-embedded GPS tracker in gearwork, not the obvious position. Dashcam always running.
~$500
Self-Sufficiency
Water System — Tank + Filtration
Serious freshwater tank + multi-stage filtration for natural sources. Goal: weeks without resupply.
~$1K
Freezer (not minifridge) + Dry Storage
Chest freezer wired to the bank. Hunt or buy bulk. 3–4 weeks of food without resupply target.
~$700
Full Tool Kit + Spare Parts
Spare belts, filters, fluids, jump pack, hi-lift jack, tyre repair + compressor. Know the vehicle cold.
~$1.5K
Firearms — PAL + State Research Done
Canadian PAL obtained. US carry laws researched per state. Rifle for hunting. Know the rules everywhere.
—
Safety & Survival Layer
Prepared, Not Paranoid ⚔️
Not a holiday. An expedition with a home base on wheels. Every failure mode thought through in advance. Every scenario has a response.
Medical
Wilderness First Aid
Proper WFA or WAFA certification — not basic, the level where you manage serious situations for hours before help arrives. Trauma kit: tourniquet, chest seal, wound packing. Garmin inReach SOS connects to rescue coordination globally. The nearest help in northern Ontario or Abitibi can be an hour away. This is not optional.
Firearms — Canada + USA
Hunting & Protection
A rifle for hunting is practical — feeds you and connects you to the place. A handgun or shotgun for self-defence is legal across most jurisdictions with correct licensing. Canadian PAL license. US laws vary by state — manageable, researched per region. The road can be wild. Genuinely remote areas have no fast response. Reasonable and correct.
Navigation
Always Both
Digital and paper maps of every region. Compass. Phone dies — map doesn't. No single point of failure in navigation. Know where you are independently of any device.
Fire & Water
Multiple Methods
Fire: multiple starting methods, not one lighter. Water: Sawyer or Katadyn filtration, multiple redundancies. Spare fuel carried. These are the basics that matter when everything else fails.
Communication
Three Layers
Starlink primary. Cellular booster secondary. Garmin inReach final fallback — two-way satellite messaging and global SOS. A physical radio for weather and emergency broadcasts. Never truly unreachable.
Secondary Base — The Invariant
The Safehouse Cabin 🏕️
The thing that cannot be taken from you regardless of what happens on the road. The RV is the primary life. The cabin is the antifragile layer underneath it.
Location
Northern Québec (Laurentians / Abitibi) or Lake Superior North Shore, Ontario. Both are genuine contenders — the endgame location is open, not Québec-locked, because the life choice is yours alone and doesn't require anyone else's language to unlock. It goes where the sky is darkest and the place feels right when standing in it. Cheap rural land in both regions. Bought outright. Yours permanently.
Systems
Self-Running
Solar + lithium battery. Fridge stocked. Bed made. Bathroom functional. CCTV on cellular upload — check the cameras from Arizona the same way you'd check them from next door. Trail camera setup on solar costs almost nothing and tells you immediately if anything changes. Runs itself while you're gone for months.
Contents
Always Ready
Spare laptop. Copy of every important document. Medical supplies. Chest freezer stocked with basics. Dry goods for weeks. A physical cash stash — $2–3k USD in mixed bills, fireproof lockbox bolted to structure. Works when every digital system fails. Nobody is breaking into a remote northern cabin for an unknown amount in a bolted box.
Why It Completes The Architecture
No Single Point of Failure
RV fails → Cabin. Contract pauses → War chest buffer. Road gets dangerous → Skills and equipment handle it. Cabin compromised → Already mobile. Most people's lives have enormous single points of failure they've never identified. Job goes — everything goes. Yours at that point has none of that fragility. It's been engineered out deliberately from Year 9 at Girton.
Emergency Protocol — Executed, Not Figured Out
Worst Case Scenario 🚨
RV totalled, stolen, or catastrophically damaged. You are in Arizona. Protocol activates immediately — no decisions, just steps.
1
Call a cab from wherever you are to the nearest international airport. Don't wait. Don't assess the vehicle. The vehicle is gone — move.
2
Fetch a flight to the major city nearest your cabin. Montréal for Québec cabin. Thunder Bay or Sault Ste Marie for Superior north shore. Route confirmed in advance — not assumed.
3
Rent a car at the airport or take an Uber. Drive to the cabin. You know this route. You've done it before.
4
Reach the cabin. Spare laptop is there. Open it. You are back online.
5
Notify the studio. Report the incident. File insurance. The output didn't stop — you missed at most a day. The contract survives.
6
Begin sourcing replacement vehicle from the cabin. You have the war chest buffer. You have the knowledge to spec it correctly. You've done this once already.
Why The Protocol Works
In an actual emergency your brain doesn't want to make decisions — it wants to execute a procedure it already knows. The steps are written. The route is confirmed in advance. The cabin is stocked and ready. You are never starting from zero when something goes wrong. You are executing step one of a plan you already wrote at 15.
The Territory
North America — The Full Picture 🌎
You'd have both countries. Every state. Every province. Every territory. The scale is genuinely incomprehensible until you're moving through it. You would never run out. Ever.
Games Industry Nodes — Stay Connected
Studio Cities
Montréal — Ubisoft, Eidos, WB, Square Enix Vancouver — EA, Activision, Capcom Austin — Certain Affinity, Retro Studios Seattle — Xbox, Valve, Bungie nearby Los Angeles — Naughty Dog, Insomniac, Riot
You pass through all of them periodically. Professional network maintained. Studio relationships live. Then you disappear back into the wilderness.
Nature — The Real Reason
Dark Sky Zones
Lake Superior North Shore — inland sea, Bortle 1–2 Québec Shield / Laurentians — ancient, black lakes, Bortle 1 UP Michigan — Pictured Rocks, old growth, Superior south shore Utah / Arizona desert — canyon country, alien landscape Banff / Jasper corridor — Rockies at maximum scale Pacific Northwest coast — rainforest, fjords, cold ocean Appalachians in autumn — ancient, underrated, violent colour
The Weather Advantage
Follow The Good Weather
Canadian winters are serious and beautiful but you don't have to sit in them. You drive south. Spend winter in the American southwest desert — warm, dry, dark sky, empty. Drive north in May when the Shield thaws and the lakes open up. You're following the good weather around the continent on your own schedule. The RV makes the seasons optional in a way no fixed residence ever could.
A Single Year — What It Actually Looks Like
The Loop — Never Repeats Exactly
January — February
Sonoran Desert, Arizona → New Orleans
BLM land, 20 degrees, saguaro cactus, Bortle 1 desert sky with no moisture to scatter the light. Then east — New Orleans, jazz on Frenchmen Street, the Mississippi wide and brown, food that exists nowhere else on earth.
March — April
Texas Hill Country → Appalachians
Limestone country, clear rivers, Austin for studio contact. Then northeast — the Blue Ridge Parkway, 750 km of ridge road through ancient mountains, spring green that only lasts two weeks.
May — June
Maine Coast → Maritimes
Cold Atlantic, fishing villages, sharp northern light. Cross into Canada — New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Cape Breton. The Cabot Trail with Atlantic on both sides. Celtic and Acadian. Old world texture.
July
Montréal → Laurentians
City week — see the studio contacts, maintain professional relationships, eat well. Then north into the Laurentians. Lakes everywhere, canoe routes that go days without seeing another person, 9pm light because the days are that long.
August
Abitibi / The Shield
Truly remote. Towns of 400 people. Roads that go a long way between anything. Park on a lake — work in the morning, swim in the afternoon, the sky at night is the whole point of being alive. Bortle 1 overhead.
September — October
Québec Autumn → Lake Superior North Shore
The Québec autumn hits and it's violent — every sugar maple simultaneously, colours that look digitally enhanced but aren't. Move west following it. October on Superior: big waves, cold wind off the water, the lake filling the entire horizon. Nowhere on earth you'd rather be.
November — December
Prairies → BC Coast → Oregon
Prairie sky — biggest on earth, unobstructed, sunsets that go on forever. Then BC interior, pine-forested and cold. Coast: Oregon sea stacks, Pacific Highway, rainforest. Then the decision — back to the desert for January and the whole loop starts again, different roads, different stops.
The Truth Of It
That's one year. A loop you could do a hundred times and never repeat exactly because you'd go deeper into different places, find the roads off the main route, discover the specific lake or town or stretch of highway that nobody talks about. Every state has its own character. Every province its own texture. Every small town its own specific story. The whole continent is like that feeling walking into Girton for the first time — so much to discover, learn and know. Except it never runs out.
The Foundation That Makes It Real
Why This Isn't A Fantasy
The Skills
C++ · UE5 · French
The remote contract requires them. The visa pathway is eased by them. The geographic freedom is expanded by them. Built deliberately from Year 9. Compounding every day.
The War Chest
$92,854
Covers the vehicle outright at graduation. No debt taken on to start the life. The first month of programmer salary is pure accumulation, not repayment.
The Timing
Started At 15
Most people figure out what they actually wanted at 45. You rejected the default before it ever had a chance to claim you. The exit is being built deliberately. Quietly. Right now.
You'd be 26, 27 years old, debt free, asset owned, skilled, bilingual, with a reputation at a studio that trusts your output — driving into Moab on a Tuesday morning because you felt like it. That's not a fantasy at that point. That's just what you built.
Right Now — Daily Milestones
Today's Work 📌
Gameplay Programming
0 / 6
Opened IDE and ran at least one compile
Wrote new C++ code (not just reading)
Committed to Git at least once
Read / watched one UE5 or C++ resource
Fixed or understood a bug (documented)
Reviewed or planned tomorrow's session
Character Art Foundations
0 / 5
Opened ZBrush and completed introductory navigation
Studied human anatomy — skull, torso, limb proportions
Sculpted first full head or bust (however rough)
Opened Maya and understood basic mesh / UV workflow
Textured a model in Substance Painter and exported it
French — Daily Session
0 / 5
Completed today's 2hr minimum French session
Did Anki review (40 cards minimum)
Did at least 25 min of YouTube immersion listening
Spoke out loud in French for 30+ minutes
Recorded a weekly speaking sample
School / VCE Milestones
0 / 4
Confirmed Year 9 elective selections (Robotics, French, Next Gen)