Some episodes of Dev to Dev reveal a journey that feels instantly relatable, and Zac’s story is one of those. We talk about growing up in a small UK town, carrying an original Xbox across miles to make a LAN party happen, and the strange internal push-and-pull between wanting everything to be perfect and wanting everyone around you to succeed.

Zac’s competitive streak runs through his whole life—football, board games, Halo ranking grinds—but what's fascinating is how it sits alongside sincere empathy. He’s the kind of engineer who builds tools so other developers can thrive, even if it means rewriting systems others would ignore. That duality shaped his transition from years of grinding through Flash and HTML5 at a gambling studio to finally stepping into a AAA Codev team where he felt creatively at home.

We talked openly about imposter syndrome, the pressure of submitting code you know isn’t perfect, and how becoming a developer can make you both more introspective and more forgiving of other games’ flaws. We close on family: the early doubts, the pride, and the dream of one day making a game his daughters will get to play.

• Growing up in a small town and navigating early identity duality between his football and gaming passions

• Competitive roots formed through Mario, GoldenEye, & Halo

• Discovering game development via the Halo 2 dev diaries

• Evolving from Flash/HTML5 slots work into modern C++ engineering

• Learning to balance perfectionism with iteration

• Finding belonging at a Codev studio filled with creative, passionate developers

• Navigating imposter syndrome and learning to reflect with kindness

• Family support, pride, and the hope of eventually making games for his kids

PODCAST DETAILS

Find the Podcast at:

• Patreon: DevToDevPodcast
• RSS: https://feeds.castos.com/r37p9
• Instagram: @devto.devpodcast
• Bluesky: @devtodevpodcast.bsky.social‬
• TikTok: @devtodevpodcast
• YouTube: @DevToDevPodcast
• Email: DevToDevPodcast@Gmail.com

Find Zac At:

• ⁠https://www.instagram.com/zfm7/⁠
• ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachary-markham/⁠

• (00:00:00) - Dev to Dev: An Interview With Former colleague and friend
• (00:00:57) - What First Influenced You To Play Video Games?
• (00:07:33) - Football and gaming in the UK
• (00:13:15) - Zach Gets Real About His Competitiveness
• (00:17:29) - Starting Out: Learning to Make Video Games
• (00:20:54) - Tutorials in computing before university
• (00:27:30) - How to get your foot in the game industry with a degree
• (00:35:56) - How to Get Out of a Rut
• (00:36:25) - How to get out of your 'Luck'
• (00:40:36) - MPG Studios: The Dream realized
• (00:43:34) - Moving from mpg to Blueprint
• (00:48:55) - The Process of Design and Engineering
• (00:54:43) - Does Competition Play a Part in Your Work?
• (00:59:24) - How has being a developer changed you as a gamer?
• (01:02:00) - How Having Been a Developer Changed You
• (01:04:07) - How does your family relate to your job?
• (01:06:54) - In the Elevator With Adam Levine