When Alex Hutchinson was just another kid playing Nintendo in his lounge room, he didn't dream of leading a team of several hundred people at the biggest video games studio in the world.
Even as a teenager in the early '90s, he sent game reviews by snail mail to magazines like PC Zone in the UK and had his first article published at 16.
"I didn't see any path to working in the business," he says. "I couldn't draw, and I couldn't code."
There were no game design courses at Australian universities back then, so Hutchinson studied archaeology at Melbourne University, followed by a masters in creative writing.
It wasn't until new job titles began popping up in the games sector - such as designer and producer - that the door to his dream career finally opened.
"This was back in the day when the 'producer' bought pizza," Hutchinson says. "I didn't know what it was but it sounded like something I could do."
After landing a job as a designer at Torus Games in Melbourne, Hutchinson's big break almost eluded him.
Some of his Torus co-workers had moved over to Electronic Arts (EA) in the US - one of the largest games studios in the world along with Ubisoft - and were urging him to apply for jobs there.
"On a whim late at night, very grumpy with the way things were going, I fired off a CV," Hutchinson says. "The next week I was doing interviews with [EA subsidiary] Maxis", to work on Sim City for console.
He got the job - only to find, upon landing in San Francisco, that the position had been cancelled.
"It sounds like a terrible thing but it happens far more than you'd think," Hutchinson says. "Before a project really gets going, it can be very fluid."
Hutchinson decided to stay on in California - a bet that paid off when he eventually landed a different job at Maxis as a lead designer on The Sims, a wildly popular franchise.
From there, it was success after success, with Hutchinson moving up into the role of creative director at EA Montreal, before eventually switching over to Ubisoft.
With a staff of 2800 across four adjacent offices, Ubisoft Montreal is the largest video game studio in the world. .
At Ubisoft and EA, Hutchinson, now 38, has led the creative side of what the industry calls "Triple A" games - big budget games that take years to make, akin to a Hollywood blockbuster.
Among Hutchinson's achievements are Far Cry 4, released on Wednesday; Assassin's Creed III, which finally allowed him to make good use of his archaeology degree; and Army of Two: The 40th Day.
While Hutchinson may be one of Australia's biggest gaming exports, he maintains his successes would have been "impossible" to achieve if he'd stayed in the country.
"Pretty much every job I did after I left was on a bigger scale than any jobs that were happening in Australia," he says.
Nevertheless, the local industry continues to grow. In Melbourne last month for the PAX Australia international games showcase, Hutchinson said the industry was more vibrant and diverse than ever.
"Now there are smaller teams - indie teams - building unique things, and I'm more excited about gaming in Australia than I've ever been."
He said the Victorian government had been supportive of the emerging indie games scene through initiatives like The Arcade, a recently set up co-working space for small games studios.
Hutchinson's advice to aspiring games developers is straightforward: be prepared to do the grunt work.
"I love my job, but I think it's important to ask yourself: do you want to have made a game, or do you want to make a game? Because they're very different things," he says.
"Everyone wants to work on giant titles; everyone wants to work on their favourite franchise.
"The reality is you've got to start anywhere you can. Work on games that aren't necessarily your personal taste. Get to work earlier, leave later - and be prepared to get on a plane."
