Career advice: what would you do?

[Kyteland]

I have basically made up my mind, but I'm curious what you would do in this situation.

I'll start with some background information. I have a degree in Computer Science with a focus in Mathematics from the University of Illinois Urbana/Champaign. I graduated 2 years ago and for the past 1.5 years I have been working as a mathematician designing slot machines. For the past 6 months I have been working 2 jobs, although I am only paid for 1. I was asked to temporarily pick up programming some games because we needed them at the anual trade show, and I was the only person with both the time and the background to get them done by then. As it turned out I ended up doing a lot more work on these games than was initially anticipated and as of now I am currently supporting a framework for a number of our games in addition to my math job.

Apparently I did a decent enough job programming these games to get noticed. I have been asked to join the framework group to continue programming these games and doing some other programming work. The framework group is in charge of developing all middleware on our platform. They are in charge of our "slot game api" that the game developers use to write slot games on. If you've been in a casino lately you know just how high tech slot games are (they're not really) and there are a lot of cool projects down the road to work on (such as support for real time 3D). And this is where my choice comes in. My stint at working 2 jobs is coming to an end and I can either stay where I'm at as a Mathematician, or I can switch over to working in the Framework group as a Software Developer.

I like the math job and the people I work with. I also like programming and like the people in the framework group. I would probably get a small pay increase moving to the software job. I like my current boss, and I would like my new boss. There are 5 other Mathematicians, all of whom I get along with and enjoy working with. There are a lot of programmers and the framework group supports them all, so I would have to deal with all of them regularly. I can't say as I like every single one of them. I'm the math guy with a software background, so I would still get to do lots of programming if I stayed where I'm at. If I ever left this company I highly doubt I would continue working in the math field, I would find a programming job, and I would get a lot of experience in the Framework group.

Oh, and the real downside is that if I moved to the framework group I wouldn't have much (if any) time to browse AT during the day.



Cliffs Notes:
1) I was offered another job within the same company.
2) I like my current job a lot.
3) I like the new job a lot (I've basically been doing it for the last 3 months)
4) I have to choose one or the other.
5) My life sucks doesn't it.

 

[her209]

It all comes down to $$$.

 

[Jzero]

Take the slot machine job. And program them to give the "bonus game" more often,at least on the dime and less slots. Seriously. I don't care if I lose all my money, just let me play the goddam bonus game once in every 200 credits or so.

I think the programming job would be more fun, but I greatly prefer programming to math.

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: her209
It all comes down to $$$.

For me it doesn't. I took the math job for about $10,000/year less than what I could have gotten for a programming job out of college. I took it because it was an interesting job at a neat company doing something completely unexpected with my life. I haven't regretted it for a second.

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: Jzero
Take the slot machine job. And program them to give the "bonus game" more often,at least on the dime and less slots. Seriously. I don't care if I lose all my money, just let me play the goddam bonus game once in every 200 credits or so.

I think the programming job would be more fun, but I greatly prefer programming to math.

That is all the math right there. The programming has nothing to do with it. That is what I'm currently doing.

 

[Ameesh]

if it were me i'd take the software job, but thats because i love creating new software

 

[Kyteland]

Anyone else want to chime in? So far it is unanimous. (I'm the 1 results vote )

 

[her209]

Originally posted by: Kyteland

Originally posted by: her209
It all comes down to $$$.

For me it doesn't. I took the math job for about $10,000/year less than what I could have gotten for a programming job out of college. I took it because it was an interesting job at a neat company doing something completely unexpected with my life. I haven't regretted it for a second.

True, but if you were offered two equally interesting jobs, at equally neat companies, doing something equally completely unexpected with your life, but one paid more than the other, you wouldn't pick the one that paid more money?

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: her209

Originally posted by: Kyteland

Originally posted by: her209
It all comes down to $$$.

For me it doesn't. I took the math job for about $10,000/year less than what I could have gotten for a programming job out of college. I took it because it was an interesting job at a neat company doing something completely unexpected with my life. I haven't regretted it for a second.

True, but if you were offered two equally interesting jobs, at equally neat companies, doing something equally completely unexpected with your life, but one paid more than the other, you wouldn't pick the one that paid more money?

True. All things being equal, I would take the one paying more. But you can say that about anything. If everything was the same except commute distance I would take the one closer to home, etc. To me $$$ is not the overriding factor. I could have been paid more taking a crappy code monkey job (no offence to you code monkeys ) but to me the extra cash isn't worth it to suffer in a sh!tty job.

But that's just me.

 

[TubStain]

Do what your heart desires and do it well... the money will follow. Gain experience and become a "professional" at it and people ill pay you for your knowledge. If you are bored and unmotivated at your current job and think that programming will raise your eyebrows a little and make you more interested in learning something new, then do it.

I'm pretty much in your boat as well. I'm working in software development, but my interests lie in finance and investments. I've been learning for the past 2 years about investing and have played the stock market for over a year and a half and love it.. make easy money and it's fun, but it took time (year and a half) to make mistakes and learn. anyway, I digress...

Enjoy what you do and as Mr. Trump says "If you dont have passion for your work, you will never be successful in it".

good luck

 

[TGregg]

Think outside the box for your answer. One outside idea (may not work) is to do both - spend part of your time on the Math job, and part on the programming job. Perhaps you could have one guy who worked for you on both sides. The key might be to not think of this as either-or, rather two goals that need accomplishing.

 

[Jzero]

Originally posted by: Kyteland

Originally posted by: Jzero
Take the slot machine job. And program them to give the "bonus game" more often,at least on the dime and less slots. Seriously. I don't care if I lose all my money, just let me play the goddam bonus game once in every 200 credits or so.

I think the programming job would be more fun, but I greatly prefer programming to math.

That is all the math right there. The programming has nothing to do with it. That is what I'm currently doing.

Of course the programming has something to do with it. SOMETHING tells the slot machine OS what conditions trigger the bonus game. There might currently be some complex probability model that governs it, but I am not satisfied with this. If I play 200 credits, I want to see the bonus game come down at least once, and I want YOU, KYTELAND, TO MAKE IT HAPPEN! AT ALL COSTS!

At some point the programmer has to implement whatever the mathematicians cook up. You can do it. Don't let me down.

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: Jzero

Originally posted by: Kyteland

Originally posted by: Jzero
Take the slot machine job. And program them to give the "bonus game" more often,at least on the dime and less slots. Seriously. I don't care if I lose all my money, just let me play the goddam bonus game once in every 200 credits or so.

I think the programming job would be more fun, but I greatly prefer programming to math.

That is all the math right there. The programming has nothing to do with it. That is what I'm currently doing.

Of course the programming has something to do with it. SOMETHING tells the slot machine OS what conditions trigger the bonus game. There might currently be some complex probability model that governs it, but I am not satisfied with this. If I play 200 credits, I want to see the bonus game come down at least once, and I want YOU, KYTELAND, TO MAKE IT HAPPEN! AT ALL COSTS!

At some point the programmer has to implement whatever the mathematicians cook up. You can do it. Don't let me down.

You must not max bet on penny slots. On a 20 line game you can bet 200 credits a shot.

If you want a bonus every 200 plays, that is a different story. I can give you that. Even on our most volitile games the bonus hits an average of 1 in 140 spins. Nobody would play a game that the bonus only hit 1 in 200. You would never see the bonus round, which is a huge turn off to most gamblers.

 

[bleeb]

This is indeed a tough decision. My 2 cents are to consider and assess your long-term career goal(s). Choose the option that would be the most conducive to achieving those goals...

Dude, can you believe 0.9999... != 1 actually got LOCKED???? Insane!

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: bleeb
This is indeed a tough decision. My 2 cents are to consider and assess your long-term career goal(s). Choose the option that would be the most conducive to achieving those goals...

Dude, can you believe 0.9999... != 1 actually got LOCKED???? Insane!

I don't recall that thread.

At least dkxj got a nice long vacation for that.

 

[bleeb]

Originally posted by: Kyteland

Originally posted by: bleeb
This is indeed a tough decision. My 2 cents are to consider and assess your long-term career goal(s). Choose the option that would be the most conducive to achieving those goals...

Dude, can you believe 0.9999... != 1 actually got LOCKED???? Insane!

I don't recall that thread.

At least dkxj got a nice long vacation for that.

Teh title of the thread should have been 0.9999... != 1.

 

[JServ]

Forget the money and just consider which job has more potential to be interesting and fun to you.

On a side not, I was wondering what the market was like coming out of college with a Math/comp sci degree...I'm doing something simliar except math major with a comp sci minor, but I'm a little worried about what kind of market a math major would face.

Good luck with the new job

 

[Kyteland]

OK, one more bump for the morning crowd.

 

[maddogchen]

whats gonna happen to the software group after its finished programming the games and other projects? That might be a thing to consider about switching. Which has a longer future.

 

[CPA]

Whichever you do they both sound damn cool

I read an article once on the creation of slot machines and the programming required. it was in Computer Gaming Design magazine. It was an interesting read.

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: maddogchen
whats gonna happen to the software group after its finished programming the games and other projects? That might be a thing to consider about switching. Which has a longer future.

They will never be done. When they get the current platform operational then they have to start on the next generation platform.

That's like asking what Sony does when it gets done building the Playstation 2. Move right on to 3. There is always the next big thing. There will always be new games and there will always be a need for more system features. The math job is more of a game design job and the software is more of a system design job. As long as one exists, so does the other.