Meet Squanch: Dan Weiss, Senior Gameplay Programmer

Hey Squanchies,
For today’s employee spotlight in our Meet Squanch Series, we’re speaking with…. DAN WEISS! WOO!!!

Senior Gameplay Programmer by day, Dan is also a chill, hockey loving guy who can sleep through cat wails in the night… Read on to learn more about DAN!

What do you do at Squanch?

I guess the best description is that I’m one of the people that takes design’s ideas and makes them work.  We wrangle the ideas that come through, and work out the tech needed to get those ideas on screen in a way that the design team can then reuse for as many things as possible.  I’m also a bit of an Unreal Engine generalist, so I’ve been helping out with some engine and platform stuff for our current projects as well.

What is the best part about your job?

There’s very rarely challenges that I’ve dealt with before, and in a lot of cases the challenges we deal with are things that nobody has dealt with before.  Videogames in general, and especially high quality 3D games, are still fairly new enough that we’re still discovering new things to do with them so we’re always having to make things up on the fly.  It can cause a lot of stress at times, but it’s very rarely boring.

What Trover character would you like to chill on your porch with?

I can appreciate the laziness that comes with the Chairopian race, so I suspect I’d get along with them.  Chilling on the porch seems like kind of a natural state for them.

What got you into the industry?

I was lucky enough to go to a high school that actually had programming classes, so I kind of dipped my toes into that early.  I started messing around with modding in Unreal Tournament 2003 with a mod called Unreal Demolition (I was surprised to find that our ModDB page still exists, even if I can’t find any old videos of it). That led to me getting into and going to DigiPen and into the industry.

What is your superpower? 

Sleeping through my two cats’ 4am wails for food while my wife wakes up to feed them.

Where is the coolest place you’ve ever been?

This is pretty specifically a time and place, but I was at game seven of the 2003 Stanley Cup Final at the old Continental Airlines Arena in NJ.  I can only wish that hockey fans get a chance to see a cup final win in person.

Unless they’re Rangers fans.

Or Flyers fans.

What’s the last song you listened to?

This turned on while I was answering some of these questions, so I suppose that counts. The Main Squeeze is incredible.

Jaguar or Leopard?

I don’t know that I want either of them in particular.  I saw this comic yesterday, and I think a giant ass cat is what I really want.  Jaguar/Leopard size, still capable of being as much of a jerk, but a normal cat face.

How do you eat your eggs?

If I’m feeling lazy, over medium.  If I’m not feeling lazy, I’ve been working on the stereotypical Gordan Ramsay scrambled egg. They’re incredible over toast.  Shout out to the Squanch Slack cooking channel.

Anything else you’d like to share about yourself? 

If any of you have played Rocket League, Smite, or Killing Floor 2, I’ve been involved in those among others at some point in my career, so hopefully Squanch is in good hands with the project I’m working on now.  I’ve been pretty lucky to work on some pretty cool stuff in the past, and I’m just as excited about what Squanch is working on now as I was any of those games.