I am currently a freshman in Computer Science. I'm not really sure what I want to do with my life.

For the last year, I've been working on a game in my spare time. I like games, but I'm not sure it will ever be more then a hobby. From what I've read here, game development jobs tend to have harsh working conditions with relatively low pay, on the assumption that people will work just because of the satisfaction from making games.
I think I want to work on interesting or cutting edge problems, particularly ones that can put my math skills to use as well. Is this actually a viable goal, or is it some cliche that everyone wants? I doubt there are many people that wake up one morning and say, "I want to write cookie cutter enterprise code for the rest of my life!"

As for my skills, I've been programming in C++ for the last two years, after teaching myself with online tutorials and reading posts here at GameDev. I'm currently learning Java in school. I only have minimal if any knowledge of the non curly brace languages, although I could probably learn. Python looks interesting, but it is really confusing due to the lack of explicit variable types.

Quote: Original post by Storyyeller
I think I want to work on interesting or cutting edge problems, particularly ones that can put my math skills to use as well. Is this actually a viable goal, or is it some cliche that everyone wants?

Yes. Yes.