I'm finding that dedicating yourself to working on your own game can be a detriment to finding an actual job in the industry? It feels like employers are wary about your intentions and whether or not you will stick around.

Employers also don't seem to take home-grown experience seriously? Even if you know more about the niche side of things like networking, graphics, AI programming. If you don't have exact experience in whatever tools/framework they use (UE blueprints, Unity, etc), they think you won't be a good fit. Even though tools are just tools and concepts are more important.

>> dedicating yourself to working on your own game can be a detriment to finding an actual job in the industry

That's why I say to make small games that already exist. There's no need to even innovate, you're learning. As soon as it's "your game" the focus is elsewhere and the scope usually gets out of hand. Nothing wrong with showing an original idea, but is it finished and polished?

>> employers are wary about your intentions and whether or not you will stick around

I guess it depends on what the person is showing. If what they show is some big design for a game they want to make and some unfinished pieces of code relating to that that doesn't inspire the confidence that they can finish the work, that they can commit and see it to the end.

>> If you don't have exact experience in whatever tools/framework they use (UE blueprints, Unity, etc), they think you won't be a good fit.

I personally think that's a huge mistake the industry is doing. I have seen it and agree with you that those are tools, and they change often. Being (or only hiring) Unreal programmers will limit you