Virginia, USA · transmutrix@hey.com · linkedin.com/in/transmutrix

SUMMARY

Gameplay engineer with 15+ years of experience building games, tools, and engines across macOS, Linux, Windows, and the web. I enjoy digging into unfamiliar codebases and learning about them, especially when I can step through something in LLDB or Chrome dev tools.

Professionally, I spent 5.5 years writing online multiplayer games in the browser in a custom JS/TS engine, writing unique network code for each game, doing continuous play tests, profiling, optimization work, designing games under challenging constraints on mobile hardware, and considering cross-browser JavaScript runtime differences on desktop.

SKILLS

Languages: C, C++, JS, TS, Lua, MoonScript, Nim

Systems & Platforms: macOS, Linux, Windows, Win32, SDL, GameMaker, Playdate, Godot

Performance & Tooling: Debugging, profiling, optimization (load times, frame times, memory), live coding / asset editing

Other: Steamworks API, source control, in-house engines, multiplayer games, web games

EXPERIENCE

Senior Gameplay / Systems Engineer — Adytum Laboratories LLC

• Freelance work helping indie studios with performance, gamefeel, developer iteration time, and gameplay systems across a range of engines and setups.
• Shipped optimization, pathfinding, collision, gamepad support, and polish work on Pixel Washer for Matt Hackett, integrating cleanly into a complex existing codebase.
• Cut load times by 50–80% across maps in WireWalk() (Playdate) for Danilo Ganzella.

Senior Software Engineer — Remote Legal Court Reporting

• Front-end and test automation work in Flutter on a teleconferencing application for legal professionals.

Community Engineer — ControlZee

• Built and shipped multiplayer web games in JS/TS on an in-house game engine with a legacy codebase, with millions of cumulative plays.
• Wrote a lot of custom net code and did a lot of multiplayer testing and refinement under challenging constraints (web games for mobile devices).
• Collaborated with professional streamers like Day9TV on live Twitch and YouTube events, occasionally having to do live bug fixes in net code on games in production being actively played.
• Mentored third party engineers and community members building on our platform; debugged issues across the stack in third party games.
• Interviewed potential hires and mentored new members and interns on my team. Collaborated closely across disciplines and under tight deadlines to ship games on time for scheduled events.

Software Development Intern — Atomicorp, Inc.

• Built a vanilla JS security dashboard (logging, graphs, monitoring) for a custom Linux kernel running on client servers.

Computer Science Tutor — UVA's College at Wise / Tutor Connection

• Tutored and encouraged students in C, C++, C#, Python, discrete math, logic, and number theory. Some of our CS courses were very "sink or swim" and I tried to bridge the gap for struggling students that usually just needed more direct conversation to learn.

Software Development Intern — Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy

• Built and maintained ASP.NET forms used by Virginia mining site inspectors. Wrote a tool to organize and deduplicate thousands of individual miners' licensing files across a server bank.

Software Development Intern — Stilwell Technology and Robotics

• Led a small team of interns; set up source control and trained others to use it. Wrote a C# / OpenGL visualization of simulated robot agents in the field.

SELECTED PROJECTS

• LINOVICTUS — Won the LÖVE Jam this year! My wife made the soundtrack. I just released a Steam demo for the more fleshed out version today.
• Wizwag — In-progress GBC-inspired Zelda-like, written in C with SDL3. Uses a completely custom software raster engine, with shader-like effects in C. Is kept sane so thousands of enemies pouring into a room is fine. Devlog post.
• Cave Dig 3 source port — Recreating an obscure Mac shareware-era game from scratch in C11; original was written in FutureBasic 3.
• PQ-93 — A Lua-based fantasy console I wrote in 2017 (C++, then C). Itch page.
• R.A.W. — A loop based music-making program in Love2D.

EDUCATION

B.S. Computer Science — The University of Virginia's College at Wise