Hi everybody; I'm a long time lurker, first time poster, looking for some career advice

I'm a US citizen and I've been making games in my spare time on and off for the last 6 years- first making warcraft III mods, then flash games, and recently i've been building a game in C using OpenGL. I just graduated with a BA in Mathematics (CS Minor), and now I'm traveling/living in SE Asia. I've always coded as a hobby, but I recently started thinking about doing it professionally.

Presently, I don't have much to show potential employers besides my non-CS degree, and some proof-of-concept looking game demos- I've never actually built a game from start to finish (if i weren't distracted by school and other bits of life, then a new idea would seduce me away from my current project), and from what I've read this looks bad to potential employers. And I don't have any professional programming experience or internships on my resume (besides a Flash port of a crappy iphone game I did for somebody over the course of a week, but it's not that good and I've read that you're better off not showing people such things)

I'm considering two options: one would be coming back to the states and looking for an entry-level job with a game company as a junior programmer. The other would be finding a startup company and working for them remotely from here in SE Asia- my cost of living here is only 600 bucks a month, and I'd be willing to work my ass off for that much if I could also get some equity and I believe in the game that they're building.

Do either of these options sound the least bit feasible, or are they pipe-dreams given my current credentials? And if they're pipe dreams, what would be some good ways to improve my credentials? Working on (and completing) a game on my own? Finding a team and working with them on a freeware game? Or seeking out a non-gaming programming job and getting some professional experience?

Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated, even if it's negative. Thanks!

Thanks for the quick reply- I'm putting together a decision grid now. The two main options so far are "stay in SE Asia and work on portfolio" and "move to SF bay area and look for work" (that's still one of the main Game Programming hotbeds right?)

When you say "no one will hire you remotely", do you mean for working remotely, or that even if it's a job where i'll work on-site (and i'll relocate at my own expense) they won't hire me until they've seen me in the flesh? The bay area is expensive (especially compared to here), so if I could conduct my job search from here it would probably save me a good chunk of cash!

hehe nevermind, you've already answered my question: http://www.sloperama.com/advice/m73.htm