We proudly introduce Šimon, our talent in Unreal Engine Game Development. After finishing his remarkable university thesis in VR, Šimon found out that game development is something that floats his boat - there was no going back. What else to do than embark on a game studio journey?
Šimon did just that, and it’s been almost two years since he powers our Unreal forces. Dig into his interview and learn more about the duties of Unreal Engine development, the upcoming Citizen Conflict Alpha 3.0 release, and his passion for games.
Hi, Šimon! To kick this off, tell me, how did you enter the world of IT?
Well, I played video games since early childhood, from the times before primary school, even. This opened the door for computers and IT as such; I always knew that I wanted to study information technology, which led me to graduate from high school in that particular discipline. It’s safe to say that I have always had a connection with IT, computers, coding, and, of course, gaming.
So your high school specialization sealed your career choice. Correct?
It certainly played a role in my university choice. Right after my graduation, I followed up to university. My place of choice was the faculty of information technology at Masaryk University in Brno. To be honest, I didn’t quite like it. I wasn’t a big fan of coding there and the curriculum in general.
Why? So far, it seems that you’ve always been passionate about coding.
The studies were too focused on the theoretical aspects of the technologies. The overall focus wasn’t that much to my liking, but it wasn’t time spent in vain, though. In my last year of studies, right before my Bachelor’s, I had an opportunity to enroll in a game development course at the university. It wasn’t mandatory at all; kind of a voluntary subject of choice, you’re free to join.
Fortunately, I did that, and it changed my perspective on my being there. The course revolved around Unity development, and it got me hooked quickly. This choice also turned out to be a gateway for my Bachelor’s project - a VR paragliding simulator.
A VR paragliding simulator? That sounds amazing. Tell me more about it.
Yes, it was great to be a part of it. The whole simulator was poised to be a real-life training console for paragliding pilots. It felt satisfying to work on a project with the potential for real impact instead of publishing some ordinary academic paper. Honestly, I can’t say for sure how the implementation turned out since I finished my studies right after my Bachelor thesis, yet still, it was certainly worth the effort.
Is this how you realized that gaming and possibly virtual reality is your thing?
You can say that. As I stated, I have been meddling with IT since high school, but I hated it. The coding bored me to death until I realized that what matters is the project you work on. Programming can be annoying and exciting based on what you work on. Ever since I discovered game development, I wanted to do just that.
That’s exactly how I got to QORPO Game Studio. I wanted to put my newly-acquired skills into practice and earn real-life experience in game development instead of wasting my time with Master's. Luckily, at the time, QORPO had plenty of vacancies. I applied and was hired. This November, it will be two years since I joined.
What have you worked on since?
I joined at the breaking point, in which we were refocusing from Unity to Unreal Engine. So continuously, I got onboarded on the Citizen Conflict project. I’m still developing it until this day.
What are you personally responsible for in Citizen Conflict development?
I do anything that’s needed at the moment. Aside from that, I specialize in hero abilities first of all. In other words, I bring game design documents to life on screen. So when some particular hero, let’s say Thunder, gets a new ability, such as Ground Slam, which has certain specifications on paper - how it should work - I am the one who’s marking it work in practice the way it’s supposed to be. All in all, I work on gameplay.
Great! Give me some insight into Alpha 3.0, then. Any sneak peek?
Besides many more things, it’s going to have plenty of new abilities. There are going to be healing grenades and specific abilities per hero class; currently, we are working on the support class, implementing the game design into practice.
Tell me something about your hobbies.
Mostly I play games. From multiplayer games, I a fan of Counter-Strike, but I’m also huge on single-player titles. One of my favorites are Elden Ring or Dark Souls.
What are some of your future career goals?
To make great games and to be a part of a highly successful game development project.
