I have a similar experience. Got fascinated with computers before school offered classes. Learned QBASIC, then VB (3?), then C (the basics of each, not mastery!).

Eventually majored in CS and graduated with the degree. But I find a complete lack of passion for 80% or more of my colleagues. I mean, I don't really care that much about the product I am making, but I still want to do a good job and learn something I can use for myself (or my future career).

Other people just seem to "write code to make it work". Don't follow tech news, don't follow security news, etc. Just a job to them I guess, no interest in side projects.

I think the problem you describe exists not only in programming, but wherever people do work for other people. And its not only that, also if 'you' get a promise to get paid every time, like in socialism, than 'you' wont have enough incentives to be productive or do quality work again. There are a lot of economics and politics concepts there.

I do little self programming, but the task I want to do is more important. When I finish I dont care much about the code just like I dont think about the inventor of electricity when I use it. Also programming alone is huge area and takes all my time, and I dont understand how employers sometimes ask for so many jobs in a single job title.

I really dont know much about programmers as employees as I have never worked in the same department with them, but I wish to work in a technology company again.

The visualization aspect of working on game related projects definitely adds to the motivation to learn. Instead of a game engine, I got my start in a less legal/savory area: botting. MMORPGs like Runescape and WoW were huge when I was a teen. Obviously I joined the botting communities to get some relief from the grind-playstyle that is involved in that type of game; but eventually I was writing code just because it was so satisfying to watch something I created work.

D2 LoD Bots paid my high school addiction to Magic trading cards. That I ever convinced a girl to touch me will never cease to amaze me.

I got my start by writing mods for Morrowind. The easy learning curve and ability to see my work in near-real time definitely sparked my interest in programming. Modding (and interacting with the Morrowind mod community) also taught me how to A) ask questions the smart way and B) deal with toxic internet folks very early in my internet career. I honestly wish I could thank the people who helped me and dealt with my 12-year-old self.

Kind of the same, but much less hardcore.

When I was younger, I really loved games. So I spent a lot of time reading books about Kevin Mitnick and hackers, and also played around with C++ and a little bit of game development. It never really came to fruition.

In college, I was premed and then a Narrative Studies major, and also worked as a lighting designer and lighting technician. However, a lot of the logic flows I learned as young teen helped with lighting programming. It was really easy to pick up front end web development... and then eventually, become a back end engineer. Definitely not the traditional path since I never was a CS major, but learning a lot of the fundamentals as a kid helped.

I'm going to take a wild guess and say it was a MUD. Got into programming and the open source world the same way.

Yep that's right! When I got out of academia and started interviewing around for CS it was quite interesting how many former MUDders there are in hiring positions :D

ha it was SMAUG for me too coincidentally enough. I still hack on it occasionally and eventually went on to make my own shitty codebase (RanvierMUD)

RunUO for me ;)

I can still find a post from 2001 on their forums where I was overwhelmed with all of the { and } squiggles

This comment brings me so much joy. Ultima Online is my favorite game of all time, having played since T2A (I was nine years old at the time). I have fond memories of hacking away at my own shard, cobbling together scripts and editing MUL files (a custom file format that the game used to store binary content) to add new creatures and items. My first exposure to "programming" was SphereServer, which used one of the worst scripting languages I've ever written in retrospect. Later I took a stab at C# with RunUO and while my attempts never manifested into anything noteworthy, they did establish a foundation for the career in software I have today. It warms my heart to see kids embracing this sort of creative spirit for games like Minecraft. The modders of today could be the engineers of tomorrow.

RunUO here too. I'm still in touch with many of the people I met between the RunUO and UOGamers communities, and lots of us have gone on to work in industry. Don't know where I'd be without it honestly.

I wonder how many programmers came up through the mod scene? Bethesda RPGs, especially Morrowind and Oblivion, had very lively modding ecosystems. The Skyrim mod community seems less active, relative to # of installs.

Which game engine?

SMAUG.

Not on Github, but this fork is: https://github.com/InfiniteAxis/SmaugFUSS