So I am in my 4th year of taking a computer science Master's degree. I heard before that the opportunities are great once you are nearing the end of your education, and while this is a very 1st world complaint, I am now struggling with what paths I should really pursue, so I hope for some input from some experienced developers here. I've been interested in Dolphin for some years obviously, though I have only done a language translation yet. There is an obvious split in doing high level/low level programming, and since I've been doing mostly high level stuff (My degree is in artificial intelligence where I've mostly used Java/javascript), I'm also trying to do some C++ stuff closer to hardware (I am now on a project doing a plasma physics simulation, hoping to utilize openCL and potentially a super computer from the university). However, my master thesis will be some theoretical AI stuff (text mining is the current plan) since I can't just drop my scientist ambitions so easily. One of my options is to take a phd and try to do some serious AI stuff. (I would obviously like to see general artificial intelligence being developed).
Back to the physics, (I studied it my 1st year) most of my programming experience so far is the game Lost Ball, where I wrote a 2D physics engine and won the Norwegian Game Awards last year. This was a huge opportunity, as the judge suggested I should work on a commercial release, as he was very impressed with the gameplay design despite the graphics being shit. However, one graphics guy that was interested in working on the game after the awards, kinda disappeared as he already had a deal with a previous winner that ended up making them rich. So I kinda suspended the commercial plans and just released it on newgrounds. This year however I was with a team that had a concept document for an online coop RTS, that won the "concept of the year" prize. I have been a bit skeptical, as I didn't know the scope of the project when I first joined it, however once again the judge said the potential is great. I consider myself not fully committed yet (development hasn't even started), the project will take a long time, however the boss of the team is an economy student who is getting actual investors etc. and is pretty serious about it.
Now after coming home after winning this award, it's obviously a huge opportunity, I see I got this email from some people I talked to that is making a component monitor that monitors wires for faults, for use with important equipment such as medical machines etc. they need a programmer and said I sounded interesting and wanted a talk. I don't really know much about the business market for such a component, but they are getting support from the university just like our game team, so I can only assume this component monitor must be important.
Also I am working on an educational app to teach solving of math equations, as I see educational software as a very huge untapped opportunity. (See for example this project that drastically increased learning efficiency for math).
So what I usually would do, is just talk to these component developers and see if I can get into even more action. But I am worried if I could be making a mistake, like with Lost Ball, it was a huge opportunity I kinda neglected as I added newer ones. I can't really decide what is the best option. My master thesis professor asked me if I wanted an integrated master/phd (obviously she would want more researchers), but I am really worried I might not become a scientist now, with so much more immediate stuff being tempting, and requiring my full attention potentially. I know this isn't exactly a sob story but I am asking for some emphatic advice;_;
Back to the physics, (I studied it my 1st year) most of my programming experience so far is the game Lost Ball, where I wrote a 2D physics engine and won the Norwegian Game Awards last year. This was a huge opportunity, as the judge suggested I should work on a commercial release, as he was very impressed with the gameplay design despite the graphics being shit. However, one graphics guy that was interested in working on the game after the awards, kinda disappeared as he already had a deal with a previous winner that ended up making them rich. So I kinda suspended the commercial plans and just released it on newgrounds. This year however I was with a team that had a concept document for an online coop RTS, that won the "concept of the year" prize. I have been a bit skeptical, as I didn't know the scope of the project when I first joined it, however once again the judge said the potential is great. I consider myself not fully committed yet (development hasn't even started), the project will take a long time, however the boss of the team is an economy student who is getting actual investors etc. and is pretty serious about it.
Now after coming home after winning this award, it's obviously a huge opportunity, I see I got this email from some people I talked to that is making a component monitor that monitors wires for faults, for use with important equipment such as medical machines etc. they need a programmer and said I sounded interesting and wanted a talk. I don't really know much about the business market for such a component, but they are getting support from the university just like our game team, so I can only assume this component monitor must be important.
Also I am working on an educational app to teach solving of math equations, as I see educational software as a very huge untapped opportunity. (See for example this project that drastically increased learning efficiency for math).
So what I usually would do, is just talk to these component developers and see if I can get into even more action. But I am worried if I could be making a mistake, like with Lost Ball, it was a huge opportunity I kinda neglected as I added newer ones. I can't really decide what is the best option. My master thesis professor asked me if I wanted an integrated master/phd (obviously she would want more researchers), but I am really worried I might not become a scientist now, with so much more immediate stuff being tempting, and requiring my full attention potentially. I know this isn't exactly a sob story but I am asking for some emphatic advice;_;
Specs: intel i5 3570k @ 3.4GHz;
16Gb RAM; Raedon HD 7900;
Win8 64-Bit
16Gb RAM; Raedon HD 7900;
Win8 64-Bit