Hiyas. I am a 25 year old graduate student, my major is genetics and bioinformetics. So I know exactly what underpaid overqualified slave labor is:) I am wondering about getting involved in some sort of MMORPG project either as a coder or a content adder. I am currently learning 3dSmax and should have it down pat in mabey a month or so. I was wondering if there were any projects out there that actually have a chance in hell of seeing the light of day that needed people? I am a fair programmer. My code looks like swiss cheese but it works well. I have made several mods for NWN and CS for fun, refrences available upon request. Anyway, what would you all suggest that I do to go about perhaps getting a part-time job in the gameing industry while I work on my docterate?

I recommend checking the Help Wanted forum here at gamedev. Though alot of the projects there do end up as failures, there are a handful of successful ones, which have come a long way. There's a sticky thread there you should check out.

Thanks that is pretty much what I was looking for. Something I can work on for free in my spare time for my own edification.

I wasn't looking to get paid or anything. Although a small stipend would help me work harder.

The problem is that looking over those posts most are written by teenage kids "OMG I wunt to start a MMORPG!! Help me plzplz!". I am really looking more for a project run by someone with some sort of experiance in programming who understands how much time these things require.

I make no illusions, I am not a stellar programmer right now. The idea was to get into something I was intrested in doing and working my ass off to learn the things I need to know to be a stellar programmer.

So basically: Industiral programmer seeks to work for free on a MMORPG project. Experiance in labratory settings, genetic engineering, experimental protocol and compilation, understanding of hirustic algorythems, math, and implementation. No newb projects plz. Currently resideing in Dallas attending college, willing to telecommute.

Perhaps you have a suggestion as to which project I should look more closely at?

There's always people looking for MMORPG staff for sure. As James said, they might not always be suitable for your needs but part of finding a job is knowing how to assess if it'll be a good venture for you or not, so perhaps joining an established team will be more beneficial to you.

Well the only project I found in a couple hours searching was PlaneShift, and they want 2 years programming experiance in games before they look at you. Everything else seems extreamly amatureish, I doubt I could learn anythin from such projects. There may be something I overlooked. As I said I am here fishing for suggestions:)

There is an expression I am reminded of about "the blind leading the blind". Were I to get involved in such an amatureish project I wouldn't really learn the things I need to know. Good programming practices, directX implementation, ect.

Nor am I intrested in writeing my own game. While I could very wekk pick up a book on directX and read it(then a book on efficency codeing, ectera) that would take much too long for me to produce any sort of output. Also I don't work well in a vacumme.

Quote:There is an expression I am reminded of about "the blind leading the blind". Were I to get involved in such an amatureish project I wouldn't really learn the things I need to know. Good programming practices, directX implementation, ect.

Then just stick around on this forum and read and read like I have been doing for the last week. All the stuff you want is covered. At the moment I am not actually coding because I have found the current gradient of my learning curve is 37.4. Until it falls to below 26.8 I will get more out of reading this forum than randomly coding.