2025 Graduating Executive Interview

Hello everyone! Welcome to our interview featuring graduating members of VGDC's executive board! This week, we're joined by Chase, Kiichi and Chanel as they share some of their insight on running VGDC.

Chase: "I'm Chase, I'm the Treasurer and Tech Director of the club. I've been here for the last two years, I deal with finances and I lead the Tech Committee."

Chanel: "My name is Chanel Lim, I'm the Projects Director for VGDC, leading TCP and workshops. I've also been here two years - I think all three of us have, and we're also graduating at the same time."

Kiichi: "Hello hello, I'm Kiichi. I'm the President, and I've been enjoying my last year as this club fades away without me."

Chanel: "When I joined VGDC, I went to a GBM, and it lasted about ten minutes because all they did was introduce themselves. No events, nothing. And I was like, I want a community."

Chase: "We all want to bring people together to make games. There's gonna be differences in how much we focus on getting you into the industry or supporting independent developers, but our core vision is mostly the same."

Kiichi: "I came into the club looking to find people to make games with, and there was something lacking about that when I got here."

Kiichi: "We all have a shared goal of building a community, and there's such a minimal amount of friction present because of that."

Chanel: "I've always expected it to change. No matter what, every year is going to be different from the last. Bottom line, what I want for it is to match my original vision for the club: a way for members and officers to have this connection, and for them to find their own friends."

Chanel: "At a previous university, I worked on a long term game, and I thought we could do it too. Then, we didn't talk about it until right before the Winter GBM, where I was like…are we gonna do this? They were like, why not?"

Chase: "I just like the people here a lot. When everyone's around, I just wanna spend more time with them - it's not like I'm going out of my way to like, plan socials or events. It's just that everyone's around and I'm like, can we do more stuff?"

Chase: "I think the earliest exec meetings might've been my favorite. We had a picture of us in the room after we had made a bunch of recruitment decisions. It was like, oh my gosh, I think we're forming into a really cohesive team."

Kiichi: "One thing recently that made me super happy was that, being here in fall, we had some insane numbers. It made the club feel so alive."

Kiichi: "This spring, almost all of the TritonWare teams were from people saying they wanted to team with specific people. I think that was the most visual indication of like, woah, this is a community that we made."

Kiichi: "I think what helped me the most has been my early exposure to other clubs. Meeting other niches of people and experiencing how other teams work has helped me so much, even outside of administrative stuff."

Kiichi: "If you find some place you really appreciate and belong in, definitely stick to it, but do not get tunnel vision. Know that there's so many other people and communities."

Chanel: "I'm gonna steal something that Ethan Carter said during an interview, who's one of our tech officers. What he said was, I think a beginner who has passion can one day outcompete an experienced person."

Chanel: "We really encourage beginners and people who just want to be involved to join. Oftentimes, they do really well in the club and reach heights they probably wouldn't have expected."

Chase: "If you're involved in a club for the first time, it doesn't take much to contribute a lot. If you do what you're supposed to do, and just a tiny bit extra, people notice."

Thank you to Jess for helping edit this interview. And of course, thank you to Kiichi, Chase and Chanel for taking the time to speak for this blog post.

Join us next time for a quick recap breaking down everything that's happened this past spring quarter; as always, thank you for reading!