I spoke to Train2Game student Shaun Steer last week. Shaun discussed with me how his career has progressed from being a Chef to the games industry and how he finds time to study whilst looking after five children.

You can listen to the interview here: http://audioboo.fm/boos/1274977-train2game-student-shaun-steer-talks-to-t2g-radio

Or read the transcript below:

My name is Shaun Steer, I’m doing the Game Designer course and the nearest town to me Ashford

Hi Shaun, how you doing mate?

Yeah not to bad, you?

I’m very well cheers mate. So what’s your story? What are the past experiences that have shaped your life?

Work wise, I’ve always been a chef. So it’s a bit of a drastic change to what I am doing now. I’ve been doing that since I was about 15 years old.

So why did you decide to change from being a chef?

Well a few years ago I had a few health issues which made me go out of main stream cooking and just take little jobs, in smaller kitchens. That was my chosen career path, pretty much, finished there. Last year I was getting fed up with where I was working and I just happened to come across a Train2Game advert. So I clicked on it, forgot about it, requested more information, a few more months down the line they contacted me and the rest is history. It’s all going really well at the moment, it’s all going very well.

Excellent, I understand that you’ve got quite a hectic family life as well?

Yeah, that’s one way to put it! Yeah I’ve got a house with five children to look after as well so that can take up a lot of your time.

Yeah it sounds like it! So how do you find the time to study with your five kids?

It’s a mystery to me as well! Sometimes I’ve actually got the little one you see there in my picture, little Zak, sometimes he’s just sitting on my lap while I’m studying away through the books and making the games. He was a tester for me actually on the Game Maker games I made.

That’s got to be quite good! Your own in house testers?

Oh yeah! He loved it, he loved the shooter and he is obsessed with Mario so when I did the platformer he was in his element.

I have seen you on the Train2Game forum and you get quite passionate about the course. Where did that passion come from?

I think it’s about gaming in general really. Well the first console I had was a SEGA Master System, way back when, what was it ’91 or something?

Yeah it was about that

I’ve had every console under the sun since then. So gaming has always been quite a passion. Well being able to learn how to put my input in on it, well it’s something I feel quite strongly about!

So it’s 2013 now Shaun so what objectives have you got in your course?

Well it’s funny you should mention that really. I’ve obviously been talking to quite a lot of people with in the course and we’ve just recently set up a student studio.

Oh really?

Yeah, we’ve started doing some concept work on a couple of game ideas already.

What’s the studio called?

The studio? We’ve named it Devils Ink Studios.

Very nice!

We’ve got a Facebook page up if anyone wants to click on it and like it for us! It will help get the word out.

What’s the address?

I think if you just search Devils Ink Studios and it will take you straight to the page.

Very nice so have you got a game in development at the minute or is it just ideas throwing around at the minute?

We are in concept stages at the minute. So we are just drawing up the concept documents and we’ve got some environments being drawn up and characters. We are just going to be writing the back story and everything like that well, today. We have been for the past few hours actually. There’s five of us at the moment but we will probably need more people to join the team so if anyone’s interested, just drop me a line! Just get in touch via our Facebook page, that’s Devils Ink Studios, thank you!

Well that’s perfect Shaun! I think that’s probably all we’ve got time for today so thank you very much for your time!

Excellent, thank you!