It is about time for me to surface.
As I write this, we are mere hours from the end of 2025, and this is my first blog post of the calendar year. Several factors contributed to the extended silence, including many identified in my most recent ‘Year in Review’ post. Ultimately, the business circumstances, both within the company and in the broader game development industry at large, forced a reprioritization of resources, especially time, which meant that certain outwardly facing activities, such as social media and blogging, were scaled back or suspended completely.
I was recently reminded of a business (n.b., not dating 😉) term that applies here: submarining. In this context, it refers to encapsulating the team and responsibilities to focus on the core of the company or project, without providing much external information nor receiving (or accepting) much external feedback. I suspected that this might be the case for a while, which is why I posted the (evergreen) Hire us. Hire me. post to reside at the top of the blog for the duration. Of course, I was still fully available to clients (and prospects), though those projects continued to be more, or frankly less, of the same thing.
Well, things have certainly changed during this year, and mostly (but definitely not entirely) for the better. However, what does not change (and probably never will) is the upswell of difficult emotions at this time of year, as the New Year marks the anniversary of the worst day of my life, this year being 7 years since the sudden, unexpected death of my wife.
Continuing on that theme, unfortunately, this year was marred by the death of Carter Lipscomb (Beloved game veteran Carter Lipscomb passes away – GamesBeat), one of my very best friends in the game industry; we had been good friends for more than 30 years, since we worked (and suffered) together at Spectrum HoloByte. In the penultimate conversation we had, he reminded me of qualities that he appreciated in me, at a time when I was really not feeling it, and it was just the sort of connection and compassion that made him “beloved” in the industry as a whole. Of course, per our little joke, if you are reading this, you probably knew Carter yourself, because “Everybody knows Carter!“
The timing of that coincided with my first couple of weeks at a new position applying my game development skills in an adjacent field, developing simulation software in Unreal Engine. Despite a befuddling number of different work statuses over these many months (i.e., “contract” paid via W-2, then a poor job offer received and declined, then a new, proper contract paid via 1099, then a very relaxing weekend of official unemployment, and finally a decent job offer and remote employment), I am now Principal Interactive Software Developer in the design group of a known company during the day, and continuing my game development and related work in the evenings and weekends.
I really enjoy working with the team I am in and the work I do, and it is really nice, frankly, to remind myself of the skills I have and get to practice and improve them in pursuit of a virtuous goal. As with any “large” (to me) company, there are some aspects that chafe at my entrepreneurial spirit, and I am still getting used to not having full control of my own time. However, the loss of time is reasonably rewarded, financially, so while I remain at this position, I should not be (as) worried about cash flow. Note that, while it would be easy to determine the name, I will not be publicly announcing nor acknowledging my association with this company because my words do not represent them, and their corporate policies most definitely do not always reflect my values.
In the category of “no good deed goes unpunished”, my new position allowed me to assist when a family member and their (not my) chosen family hit troubles, which (long story short) resulted in two more adults, plus two cats, taking up residence in my home on a temporary basis. It is safe to say that their lifestyle is incompatible with my own, and it is probably best to leave it at that. 😉
In a similar way, from a practical standpoint, I have managed to get back on my feet during 2025. I started the year in the red and unsure of the future, and now through hard work, connections, and a bit of luck, I am confident in the future of both myself and the company. Personally, I am dangerously close to having a positive net worth 😳 as the year comes to a close (depending, of course, on how one looks at the figures), and the business now has a cash runway of nearly a year (and credit for almost 3 years) with active clients, one major product release about to be announced (and released) in 2026, and two more projects to follow.
By the time that most of you read this, it will already be 2026, so…