Where it started

I’ve never had a formal degree in design. No structured lessons, no teachers guiding me through typography or color theory. I never really studied design—and yet, somehow, I figured out how it all works (well, most of it). It was never about following a set path, but rather about following curiosity, one obsession at a time.

It started all in one magic place

Picture a war-torn Middle Eastern town, with a downed helicopter in the middle. It all started in a very special place: Crash. For many, just another FPS map - for me, it was where I spent an unhealthy amount of my teenage years.

Gaming was my sanctuary. While school and other responsibilities drained my motivation, video games did the exact opposite. I felt driven, challenged, and eager to improve. Unlike schoolwork, where success felt arbitrary, games had clear goals, and I could see myself getting better.

LAN Parties and the Birth of a Passion

Every other weekend, my best friend from school and I would set up for a LAN party. We’d haul our bulky desktop towers to each other’s houses, ready to dive into a night filled with gaming.

During those nights, we stumbled upon Macromedia Fireworks, which led us to envisioning to build something. We didn’t know exactly what we wanted to build (many attempts were made), but the idea of creating was exhilarating. Those nights weren’t just about gaming; they were the first sparks of a new interest that would eventually lead us down the path of design and development.

Getting into Competitive Gaming

I joined the Electronic Sports League (ESL) and discovered the world of competitive gaming. It kinda changed everything. Suddenly, I wasn’t just playing — I was studying. Watching demos, analyzing strategies, learning sound mappings of maps, studying flight paths of block grenades, optimizing every tiny movement. It wasn’t just about reflexes; it was about systems, teamwork, and efficiency. I became obsessed with improvement, finding joy in the details.

It was also the era of Teamspeak, Xfire and Ventrilo. My social life shifted online. We were a bunch of cringy, overconfident teenagers, but we had a community. This was where life happened. We hung out in voice chat and played matches deep into the night.

First steps into Web Design

Joining gaming clans meant one thing: you needed a website, how else could you show off your clan’s glory? That was the spark. I wanted to create a homepage for my clan, which meant learning how to be a webmaster.

I fired up the cracked version of Macromedia Fireworks, and started learning the basics of PHP, HTML, and CSS. My first projects were laughably bad, but I was hooked. What had started as a necessity for gaming had turned into something else entirely—a new passion.

Back then, there were no YouTube tutorials. If you wanted to learn, you had to dig through forums, follow tutorials on personal blogs, and—above all—brute-force your way through trial and error. I spent my nights chasing design trends, figuring out Fireworks tricks, and battling the nightmare that was Internet Explorer 6. Every new technique I learned felt like a superpower.

DeviantArt

Like many designers of that time, I found my way to DeviantArt. Before Behance and Dribbble existed, this was the place for digital artists, web designers, and theme modders to share work, get feedback, and improve together.

I started following other designers, borrowing ideas (or straight up stealing them, not gonna lie), reverse-engineering their CSS layouts, and recreating their layouts pixel by pixel just to understand how they worked.

One day, out of nowhere, I got a message from a stranger on DeviantArt. He asked if I could design an interface for a new CMS admin panel. I had no clue what I was doing, but I agreed. I charged 25€ the hour, which seemed like I just made a fortune at the time.

It was a turning point. I had been designing for fun, just for the thrill of creating. But now, someone was willing to pay me. It changed my entire perspective. Design wasn’t just something cool to do, it was valuable. It was a skill that people needed. And it was something I could build a career around.

The never-ending Journey

I never stopped learning. That’s the beauty of design. Just like in competitive gaming, the meta is always evolving, the strategies keep shifting, and there’s always a new challenge waiting around the corner.