Software Engineer · Game Developer
Engineering playable worlds with AI.
Software engineer and game developer combining 15+ years of engineering experience with simulation, gameplay systems and AI-assisted production.
15+ years software engineering · Unity · Simulation · AI-assisted production
Contact Rick →
A Unity horror project inspired by Hong Kong folklore and abandoned rural environments, combining atmospheric exploration, bounded encounters, enemy AI and modern real-time rendering.
A hospital-management game where patient flow, staffing, diagnosis, treatment and finance interact as one simulation — with automated agents testing whether the economy remains viable under different player strategies.
Balance experiments: automated runs track survival time, cash, reputation and win rate to expose difficulty and economy problems before manual playtesting.
An experimental Unity racing prototype exploring voice as a gameplay input — from microphone detection and recognition states to action feedback and cooldown behaviour.
Proof in numbers
Why I keep building
I started making games as a teenager because I wanted to turn imagined worlds into something people could actually experience.
Software engineering became my career, but that instinct never really disappeared.
Today, games, simulation and AI are bringing those two paths back together. I want to explore how a small team can build ambitious interactive worlds with the discipline of software engineering and the creative freedom of independent game development.
Keep learning. Keep building. Keep ideas playable.
My approach
Software doesn’t have to feel like software.
I use game-system thinking, visual feedback and interactive 3D to make complex operations easier to understand — whether I’m building a gameplay system, a simulation or production software.
01 · Clarity
Turn workflows, data and system states into experiences people can understand at a glance.
02 · Interaction
Use clear goals, responsive feedback and game design principles to make every action feel purposeful.
03 · Delivery
Take ideas from prototype to production across Unity, web platforms and real-time 3D.
AI-assisted production
AI can generate ideas and assets quickly. The harder problem is turning those outputs into reliable, editable and performant game content.
I’m experimenting with AI agents, Unity automation, validation and simulation to make that production layer more dependable.
The goal isn’t to automate creativity away. It’s to shorten the distance between an idea and a working game while keeping engineering discipline, performance and creative control.
The engineering foundation behind the games: production systems where reliability, testing and performance mattered.
Laravel · Vue · TypeScript · PHPUnit · Vitest
Real-time customer–provider messaging and a structured Resolution Centre for disputes, protected by automated regression tests and tuned for Core Web Vitals in a large production codebase.
2010–12 · 2023–25PHP · Vue · Swift · WebSockets · APIs
Repayment schedules and balances on the backend; live market data streamed over WebSockets into web and iOS trading interfaces, with secure authentication and payment integrations.
2016–23.NET · Java · MSSQL · OCR · APIs
A facial-tracking API that auto-crops and straightens ID photos, document-capture and OCR integrations, and ownership from UAT through production and disaster recovery for public-service systems.
2007–09C++ · DirectX · OpenGL · Lua
Commercial maths games for Hong Kong primary schools — the start of the game-development path I’m building on today.
Experiments in game systems, simulation and AI-assisted production.
Software engineer and game developer — based in Liverpool, with roots in Hong Kong.
Games came first: experiments as a teenager, then educational titles in C++ and DirectX. After that came more than a decade of commercial software across web, enterprise, fintech and public services.
Now those paths are coming back together, with that engineering foundation applied to gameplay systems, simulation and AI-assisted game production.
How can small teams use AI and better tools to build ambitious games without sacrificing reliability, performance or creative control?
Career journey
2007
Early game development
C++ · DirectX · OpenGL · Lua
2008–2026
Commercial software engineering
Web · Enterprise · Fintech · Government · Realtime systems
Today
Games · simulation · AI-assisted production
Unity · Gameplay systems · Simulation · AI-assisted production
Skills
Work with me
I’m interested in game engineering, simulation, AI-assisted production and collaborations with teams exploring new ways to build interactive experiences.
rickchow.uk@gmail.com
