tl;dr: I'm now getting paid to make Unity games for educational purposes.
After Microsoft punched in the loving kidneys, things were looking pretty bleak on the employment front. Rather than rush to get my resume all cleaned up so I could do another shipment, I got a bit lazy and depressed and just played video games instead. During a particularly invigorating GTA V mod session, I got a headup from an ex-lecturer who I hadn't heard from in a while; she had started work at a new company that was looking for interns, and she had passed my name on as a recommendation.
That night I completely aced their test; the next day I was asked to come in whenever for a chat. I came in today, and after a brief convo, I got the good news.
Starting next Monday, for the next three months, I'm going to be working as an intern building Unity games (and a platform for these games) for educational purposes. The work is full-time (9AM - 5PM every day of the week) and is paid (my pay-rate will be a part of the contract which I'll be reading and signing next week). After that, if I don't progress into a full-time employee with them, my name will be passed on to several other studios so I can start some real work.
The company is called 2and2; they have a number of studios around the place and a whole stack of international awards. From what I've learned, their internship program is pretty good and they've had some pretty successful people pass through them. For me, I'm just absolutely thrilled I'm going to be getting paid to make games finally, although it does mean I'm going to be far less active on these forums and the various Discords as you forgeters are only awake and online when I'll be at work.
Now, I gotta figure out a way to pay back my teacher one. She's done me a pure solid and it's paid off beautifully.
