The Next Step

Today, October 16 2026, is my last day working at Disbelief. What started as a chance post-Unity3D meetup bar catch-up chat with Steve Anichini turned into an 11.5 year journey. I joined Disbelief with one basic goal, to make a workplace where people felt safe, supported, and could achieve their best, all while having fun. After the comments I got at the office yesterday, and today, I can safely say the goal was achieved (with a lot of help). It is hard to leave the wonderful Disbelief family. But it is also exciting to move on to the next step in my life. Starting Monday, the 19th, I will be joining the team at OPeNDAP.org advancing the software that is behind an oceans worth of satellite science data. I already know the people there are also wonderful. My only goal this time.. To help people, even if in minor behind the scenes ways, solve pressing world problems. As to why this shift, read more after he fold..

Games?

For a long time now playing the video games I used to play stopped being fun. I suffered from an inability to detach myself from work and play. When I tried playing games, and when I watched others play games I would be constantly observing and dissecting the experience. But I was okay with that. It was a different way to enjoy games. Speculating how things work is fun. Learning from such thoughts is useful. A couple of years ago something else happened. I stopped finding anything new in games. Most times my reactions would be that of recognition, instead of intrigue. The work followed the same trend. Most of the work became recognizing what patch to apply. Instead of how do I solve this gnarly problem to get the effect the game needs. I can´t say I’m alone in this respect. I see similar sentiments in other game developer’s posts. I won’t bother speculating what has brought the industry to this point.

Family!

A couple of years ago my family went through a trauma. The kind of trauma that makes you think about your self worth. The kind that needs help from a therapist. The experience made me reflect. And made me recognize that game dev work was not fun nor satisfying any longer. The reflection led me to something I knew but hadn´t seen. That what I enjoyed most was helping others with their problems. Starting with the family. And to the extreme, extending to helping the world. It’s work I had done and was already doing, in my spare time. I looked for change away from games at this point. Disbelief heard me and worked towards making it possible. But ultimately it wasn´t possible for them to shift to such non-games opportunities soon enough. Disbelief is an incredible workplace for even trying!

Future..

It’s a Friday. On Monday I start working for OPeNDAP. It’s an ideal job for what I want. And I knew so as soon as I read the posting that someone (I don´t know who you are) mentioned in the cpplang Slack I help run. As I write this I continue to reflect of the choice I made. Will I ever see the effects on others of my work as directly as I did with games? Maybe, and at that time I’ll reflect on the one time I walked into a computer store, decades ago, and started a brief conversation with someone who happened to be playing the game I had been working on a couple months before.