ZİYA BAHÇECİ
I've been writing code since my early teens and taking things apart even longer. With over 5 years of professional experience across game development, web, cybersecurity, and leading teams, I've shipped titles on Steam, built VR experiences for brands like Ford and Disney, and ran my own offensive security startup in London. I'm big on open source, I love brainstorming ridiculous side projects at 3 AM. When I'm not at my desk, you'll find me at the boxing gym where I volunteer as an instructor for young fighters or behind a drum kit recording your favourite local metal band's next album.
Digital Metahuman
My Work
Portfolio
Games & Simulations
14 projectsShipped Titles & Products
6Contain
Contain is a tactical FPS game with horror & sci-fi elements that supports COOP up to 4 players developed in Unreal Engine 5. I've started working on this title around late December 2023 and have led the engineering team to maintain and improve it.
Revenge of the Mage
RotM is a singleplayer old school FPS/boomer shooter developed in Unreal Engine 5. I've worked on this game as a generalist programmer for 4 months.
EvilPunk
EvilPunk is a VR fantasy shooter developed in Unreal Engine 5. I was in the development team as a VR programmer for 3 months.
Beach Invasion 1945: Pacific
The sequel game to Beach Invasion 1944, a WW2 tower-defense FPS game. This time it supports 2-players COOP. I've worked on this title as a generalist programmer during its entire development phase.
Interactive Real Estate
This is the first of Configgo's series of ArchViz/Digital Twin products. The entire development process with Unreal Engine 5 was led by me. The product works embedded on a web browser, working together with Pixel Streaming and Arcware streaming services. The units data is pulled live from a Zoho database, using VaRest Plugin.
Hit and Boom
Hit and Boom is a brand new MOBA/Battle Royale game. I've worked on this game's UI side for 8 months.
Released Educational Games
2Atom Mixer
Atom Mixer is an educational chemistry game developed by me for the Legends of Learning platforms. It is designed for K-8 students in the US.
Galaxy Explorer
Galaxy Explorer is an educational astronomy game developed by me for the Legends of Learning platforms. It is designed for K-8 students in the US.
My Other Games
6Mücahit (MagaraJam#5)
Mücahit is a game made for the Turkish game jam "Mağara Jam #5". It is a top down shooter game designed with lots of humor, where the player is an antagonist alien mastermind invading earth. As a team of 3, we developed this game with Unreal Engine 4.27 within 72 hours.
War In Grey
This is the first project I've developed on Unreal Engine. I've done all of the design and development as well as creation of all assets (except for the audio). It is an incomplete demo and is discontinued.
Fantasy Topdown Shooter Project
An abandoned Unreal Engine 4 top down shooter game designed and developed by me. I had started this project to enhance my Unreal Engine mobile development skills.
Kill 'em All
A simple space themed 3D Shoot'em up game I've developed with Unreal Engine 4. It has spaceships, kamikaze aliens, alien motherships, asteroids and a leaderboard.
Pong 3D
A 3D Pong clone made in Unreal Engine 4. Contains simple pong rules. Player 2 is AI. First to score 10 wins.
Experience
Curriculum Vitae
Employment History
Founder & Director
Gardenlight Ltd · London
We were an offensive cybersecurity startup specialized in various industries. Majority of our work has been confidential.
Software Engineer
Prime Global Investment · Podgorica
Was an overseas seasonal contract. I've designed and developed a foreign exchange trading system and several marketing websites.
Lead Software Engineer
Configgo · İstanbul
Led the development of Real Estate Digital Twin/ArchViz projects built in Unreal Engine 5. Integrated CRM databases, Pixel Streaming with Azure, and created UML diagrams for DB architectures.
Lead Software Engineer
Singingiant · İstanbul
In charge of maintenance and improvements of the early access title "Contain". Led the UE programming team for bug fixes and new features, network & back-end programming, store integrations. Also led the TBA boomer-shooter "Revenge of the Mage".
Gameplay Programmer
AIx2 Games · İstanbul
Shipped the title "Beach Invasion 1945 - Pacific". Was in the Unreal Engine 4 development process from start to end.
VR Developer
DIGIVEGA · İstanbul
Designed and developed VR/XR games and gamified apps for agency clients such as Ford, Disney, Teknosa, Kiptaş, Nesine.com. Mainly worked with Unreal Engine 5 for PC & Meta Quest 2.
Game UI Programmer
Funverse Games · İstanbul
4 months of Unreal Engine bootcamp internship followed by 8 months of UI, Database & Sound programming for the MOBA title "Hit and Boom".
PLC Programmer
Atlas Tobacco · İstanbul
Played role in a project which aimed to replace factory machinery's operating software from PLC to C++.
Software Development Specialist
Teknofinal Trading · İstanbul
Ported an e-commerce website as an Android application, developed a UI system for a photo printing machinery, and maintained company databases.
Internships
Intern Game Programmer
Crytek · İstanbul
Learned shader technologies on CryEngine.
Intern Game Programmer
Gram Games · Istanbul
Published the hypercasual game "Crowd Assassin". Learned mobile game advertisement, revenue management, retention and Game Analytics.
Education
Master — Game Technologies
Gazi University · Istanbul
Dropped Out
Bachelor — Software Engineering
Istanbul Bahçeşehir University · İstanbul
100% Scholarship · 2.46 GPA · Board member of Software and IT Club (BUYABİ) for 2 years
High School
Nazilli Science Highschool · Nazilli
Certificates
CEFR B2
IELTS · Jul 2023
Project Management
Google · Mar 2022 — Apr 2022
Agile Development Specialization
University of Virginia · Apr 2022 — Jun 2022
C++ Programming for Unreal Game Development
University of Colorado · Nov 2021 — Dec 2021
Hackathons
EVE Frontier Hackathon
The hackathon is currently ongoing.
Guido Game Jam
Warsaw
As a team of 3, developed a horror game set in an abandoned coal mine using Unreal Engine 5.
MagaraJam #5
İstanbul
As a team of 3, developed a top-down shooter game using Unreal Engine 5, where the player is the antagonist.