mynameismiek

Any simple game usually does the trick: snake, Yahtzee, black jack. The rules (requirements) are well defined. The pieces (UI) are well defined. That way you can focus on actually implementing the logic in the language/framework of choice. For websites, pick your favorite restaurant and make it. Borrow the text, pictures, etc. and just focus on the code that creates it and not get off on a rabbit trail doing images in paint.net or making up items.

You don't get a lot of the more advanced/business/enterprise-y features like advanced debugging features, very little code metrics, only the more basic unit testing things, no MSDN subscription benefits, no Azure credits.

You can still still use Nuget, write unit tests, debug, all of the basic stuff you need to write programs for .NET. The Unreal Engine 4 source works just fine with VS 2013 Express. Xamarin Business and its Visual Studio plugin works just fine in express. You can still connect to TFS, Perforce, or Git repo.

edit: to clarify that this is for VS Express compared to VS Pro/Premium/Ultimate not compared to Sharp Develop.

edit2: removed that it supports add-ins like Resharper.

Epic is still offering other licensing structures as needed/requested for their larger clients. I'm sure if you had a game explode and start selling millions of copies they would work with you to come up with a different licensing scheme so you weren't paying them millions (plural) of dollars, but possibly some smaller set amount and a smaller royalty.

Do I need more karma to down vote people? Because, I would totally down vote this guy if I could.

You mean, like, Furcadia?

"This 'dream' is trying to tell someone something. I just can't figure out what 'yiffing' is..."

This is blocked at work. :( I assume its some sort of geek website?

It is a good thing I don't eat money!! There are plenty of fat programmers out there that program just as well as the skinny ones.

Using VS would be a huge plus. You don't have to buy a bunch of pricey macs, just 1. You don't have to retrain C# coders to use a Mac. You can use ReSharper! You can open two code windows side by side, something monodevelop cannot do (not sure about Xamarin Studio as I am still waiting on the download). VS integration with Team Foundation is much better than git-tf, so if your company is already using Team Foundation you can tack on iOS development/ports with out much trouble. There are a lot of reasons it makes sense.

Genetics play a role. I had 23 and Me sequence my DNA two years ago and one of the things they check for is caffeine tolerance. I don't have it. I can drink a 20oz Mountain Dew for lunch (11:30 AM) and it will keep me awake till at least 10:30 PM if not 11 or 12 or even later, without fail. Some people do not metabolize it. Often, I'll get jitters after a single cup of coffee. I restrict my caffeine intake because of this.