“Originally, I was an electrical engineering major. But I realized I didn’t like it, so I decided to change to something I actually enjoy. And I like video games. Not just as entertainment, but as an actual art form. So I’m majoring in game design.

“It’s a two-year program that should, once I finish, allow me to work in the industry. Then, maybe if I get a four-year degree, I can rise up in the ranks. This program seems to mostly focus on the development part, like modeling characters and programming. What I hope to work my way up to is designing the overall way games are built, the more ethereal part of it.”

Any ideas for games you’d like to develop?
“Oh, yeah. Too many. One idea is for a series called Tales Gone Arhye, with Arhye being the name of the setting it takes place in. It would be a fantasy series, with each game being a self-contained story. It’s meant to be an homage to different forms of fantasy. The first game would be sword and sorcery, like Conan the Barbarian, Elric of Melniboné, stuff like that. The second game would be epic fantasy, like Lord of the Rings, the Wheel of Time, and so on and so forth. Just kind of chronicle different time periods in that setting.

“I’ve put a lot of thought into how each culture in the setting would work, and how the characters would interact with one another. Right now, it’s mostly all in my head. The hard part is putting pen to paper. One day.”

— Daniel Western

The post He sets his sights on designing video games appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“We actually met on a gaming console, Xbox. We were playing Grand Theft Auto.

“We like all the same things. I mean, we just kind of think the same way. A lot of our opinions, like on world matters, are really similar. So we don’t really have to argue about anything. If there is a certain decision that needs to be made, we pretty much know what we’re going to think about it before we even ask.

“And we both kind of came into this relationship with nothing. So there was never any, this is my stuff, this is your stuff. We’ve kind of just built our whole lives together.”

— Katie Rehkopf

Related:

• ‘We’re pretty much married, just without the paper’

The post Relationship partners on the same wavelength appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“But now I’m thinking about changing. The market is kind of hard to get into and make money right now. Plus I discovered that coding is really boring. Having to put in lines and lines of code, I’m just not feeling it.

“I’m thinking about changing to architecture. I’ve always appreciated the design of buildings and seeing how they’re made. When I think of art and I see a building, I relate to it so much. I want to make something like that. I’ve always liked really old-school buildings like Greek and Roman architecture; just the beauty of it. Everything about it was meant to be appealing to the eye.”

The post Greek, Roman architecture ‘appealing to the eye’ appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“I’m more accepting of my own weirdness these days. That wasn’t the case when I was younger.

“When I was a kid, no one talked about watching anime. No one talked about the video games I liked. No one talked about reading manga or reading Japanese comics. I just felt like, ‘Oh, I’m so weird. Why don’t I have very many friends who like this stuff? OK, I’ll just read it by myself.’

“When I was in elementary school, I remember waking up at 5 a.m. to watch ‘Sailor Moon.’ In junior high, I really got into the video games, comics, manga, stuff like that. But I was pretty shy about it.

“Nowadays, thankfully, it’s more mainstream to have that type of hobby. It’s OK to like that kind of stuff, so that’s cool. And that stuff is paying my rent now, too. I guess I’m feeling more at peace with the weirdness.”

— Jennifer Challenger

Jennifer is a translator at a company that deals with anime. She translates shows from Japanese to English, and she answers questions about translations or untranslated text and speech. She also helps with pronunciation and culture questions for shows the company works on.

Related:

• ‘They were going to have to pay me to go to college’
• Early interest in Japanese leads to teaching abroad
• Daughter ready to step up to help with Alzheimer’s

The post Anime, manga lover at peace with her ‘weirdness’ appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“I always wanted to learn languages, ever since I was a kid. This is embarrassing, but I used to pretend I could speak Spanish. I’d watch Telemundo and be like, ‘Oh, I understand.’ I just really liked the sound of it. Maybe it was because my parents both spoke a different language. They speak French Patois because they’re from the West Indies, Dominica.

“Then I started to develop this interest in Japanese. Originally, I liked the video games. Then I became interested in the cartoons, the anime and manga. But what I think really made me decide to commit was listening to the music. I had a lot of favorite Japanese musical artists, and I wanted to be able to understand what they were singing. So I studied Japanese at UT, including a year abroad in Japan.”

She moved to Japan following graduation, and taught English to junior high students and adult women.

“Working with the women one-on-one was pretty cool, but teaching the junior high kids took a lot of getting used to. Honestly, I didn’t like teaching. I care about helping people reach their goals, but I just didn’t think I was a very good teacher.

“I was a shy, kind of nervous person. So it was hard for me to go up to someone and ask questions, especially if I didn’t know the person. But I made myself do it. I just forced myself. There’s that thing that says the more you do something, the more you get used to it, and the less scary or difficult it becomes. So I made it a habit every day to find some kid who I’d never talked to before and go talk to him.

“When I first got to the school I was thinking, ‘Why am I here? I don’t even like kids that much.’ But by the end of my second year I was like, ‘My babies. I’m going to miss my babies.’”

— Jennifer Challenger

Related:

• ‘They were going to have to pay me to go to college’
• Anime, manga lover at peace with her ‘weirdness’
• Daughter ready to step up to help with Alzheimer’s

The post Early interest in Japanese leads to teaching abroad appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“A lot of people think I’m older than 16, but I don’t feel like it. I’ve been handed alcoholic beverages before, but I say, ‘Hey, I’m only 16, man. I don’t want you to get in trouble.’ I think it’s kind of cool and flattering in some sense. Maybe it’s my build or my facial hair that fools them.”

Do you consider yourself a mature person?
“I think so, although I can turn it off and on. For instance, I was just playing Pokémon Go. And I really like funny-looking backpacks, video games and stuff like that. I can be pretty immature sometimes. But when it comes to school and work, I can just (snaps his finger) turn on the switch and be mature. I think it has a lot to do with parenting. My dad told me, ‘If you have a job to do, do it. If you don’t do it right, they’re not going to trust you to do the job again.’ I haven’t forgotten that.”

— Brandon Galvan

The post Maturity kicks in when it comes to work, school appeared first on The Baytown Project.

What are you doing this summer?
“I like to play video games and watch TV.”

What games do you like to play?
“Lego video games. My dad has a PlayStation and my grandma has an Xbox.”

Which do you like better?
“Xbox, because my dad doesn’t usually let me play with the PlayStation.”

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