Fingers fly across the keys and Python code fills the screen illuminating the dark monitor. Beads of sweat roll down his forehead.
Sina Shojaee, sophomore, computer science major, is working to expand his interest in web design, AI, gaming and tech, creating a website called, Brawdle, a coaching platform for the web game: Brawlhalla.
Shojaee’s efforts are focused on filling the need for easily accessible, affordable and expert coaching in Brawlhalla, a platform fighting game.
Brawlhalla (www.brawlhalla.com) has over 30,000 players globally. It was created in 2017 by Blue Mammoth Games, and “allows up to eight local or online players to play together.”
“Me and a few of my friends decided to make a website to offer coaching. Top players often charge exorbitant amounts for coaching, and for the average player stuck in the middle ranks, it’s not necessary to pay that. From experience it takes hours on hours to understand that [information],” Shojaee says.
“We have the same knowledge base. We’ll convey the same knowledge to you, and instead of $80 an hour, it’s $15.
“I try to keep my prices affordable for people who don’t want to invest much into a video game.
“And the coaches are independent of the website, they’re just hosted there, [so they’re] paid in full. We also offer a $5 a month website wide subscription with more than thousands of hours worth of knowledge,” Shojaee says.
Miles Bagoly, president of E-sports on campus, says the service Shojaee supplies is beneficial to players.
“[Coaching] is already a pretty popular thing. There are coaches just for your mental state and how to navigate your mental state, so it’s definitely cool that he made his own website,” Bagoly says.
“Our coaches try to get people progressively better over time. We prepare players for any type of scenario they may face in the game, from how to use certain weapons, how to counter certain attacks and to learn how to perform certain moves,” says Shojaee.
“It’s more dependent on how far you want to go. If you’re a beginner and you have no time, and you pay for a coaching session you probably skip 50–100 hours of stuff you have to figure out on your own.It’s beneficial for all levels,” Bagoly says.
Shojaee says he believes, that despite his work on this project being more than just a little extraordinary, there is more than just the product. What he says is important to him is that people learn. And it’s vital to always be putting out new things to learn. He says he learned web design on his own, putting in several hours before even starting it. Because the site is worldwide he also had to work through changes because of different time zones.
It has taken him over 300 hours, he says he has much more coming.
Shojaee looks up to his father and credits him for what he is today.
“I very much admire my father, he’s very intelligent, he has some very good ideas. I’m creating a project with him,” Shojaee says.
“Outside of Brawlhalla what made me create this, there was just a hunger for something to call mine. I enjoy using my computer.
“It comes from [his father], one of the reasons admire him is he’ll start something, and until he’s done, and he will not stop.”
Shojaee says, “This world should provide enough opportunities so you can pursue whatever you want to pursue, and so you can make something great.”
For Shojaee’s website, visit: brawldle.com
By Junior Laforest
