Jake Sharples

Welcome to my portfolio

Game Developer // Masters Graduate // Lecturer // VR and UI Specialist

Introduction

I am Masters graduate from the University of Staffordshire, where I studyied Computer Game Development. I currently work at South Staffordshire College, teaching softwares such as Unity, Unreal Engine 5, Blender and Photoshop to level 2-5 students. Part of my teaching takes place on the Games Design Foundation Degree course in association with the Univeristy of Staffordshire.

Portfolio

I have made a variety of games and projects, all finished projects are avalible on my Github or Itch.io page.

Qualifications

I am a highly qualified developer, specialising in VR and UI development. I am a certified VR developer, and my masters thesis focused on procedurally generating VR environments. I graduated from my masters degree in video game development with a distinction, and graduated from my undergraduate degree with first-class honours.

Most Recent Game Jam

My most recent Game Jam project was a rouge like dungeon crawler made with a group of 5. The game featured stealth and combat mechanics, and my role on the team was to create Procedurally Generated dungeons, spawning props, enemies and lock and key systems.

Personal Projects

"In The Walls" is a personal project I have been working on for a while. The game isn't designed for commercial use, but is used to test my skills in coding. This game features online multiplayer and basic mechanics to make a "stranger things" inspired game. Still a work in progress, and will continue to be updated.

Research Projects

Working alongside other researchers at the University of Staffordshire, I have published 2 papers looking at the design of VR games and environments. I am currently working towards publishing a 3rd paper alongside the univerity.

Skills

As a game developer, I am versitile when making different sections of games. While I can undertake any task, here are some of my specialities:

User Interfaces

UI is my primary specialty, with many of my larger projects focusing on it. I was the UI lead on Disc-Go, a TIGA award nominated game created by the Staffs Games Institute - with the majorty of UI within the game being designed and created by me.

Horror Design

My undergratuate disseration looked at the approaches to horror within VR. This unique research is currently being taken further by a small reasearch team I lead, with plans to publish in the near future.

Virtual Reality

During my time at the University of Staffordshire, I have lead numerous reasearch projects based in a VR capacity. I have heavily researched VR topics such as locomotion, UI implementations and horror design. I am highly skilled when it comes to designing and developing for a VR environment.

Procedural Content Generation

I have undertaken numerous projects focusing on Procedural Content Generation. I have created systems with the capacity for full dungeon generation and population, and have undertaken research attempting to design an algorithm capable of passing the turing test.

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