Charlie Helman — Engineer, PM & Indie Founder

ABOUT

Fifteen years at the intersection of engineering and product.

I started as a software engineer, shipping UI systems for République before growing from 2nd engineer to lead on MTG Arena, prototype through open beta to millions of players.

Then I crossed into product management. At Wizards of the Coast I owned the publishing platform powering accounts, social, and monetization across their game portfolio. At Oooh, Inc., a social media startup co-founded by Twitch's founders, I ran the developer platform and scaled it to support hundreds of partners.

Today I'm building again. Co-founding engineer on Once Upon a Galaxy. And now obsessed with agentic tooling. What happens when AI agents can run your workflows and ship real work while you sleep? That question is Vibery.

CONSULTING

Fractional CTO for founders and studios that need senior technical leadership without the full-time hire.

I've shipped as both the engineer writing production code and the product manager owning the roadmap, at companies from two-person studios to Wizards of the Coast. That combination is rare: I can work with your engineers in the morning and present to your investors in the afternoon.

Technology Strategy

Roadmap development, build vs. buy decisions, vendor evaluation, and aligning tech investments with business goals.

Technical Leadership

Engineering team guidance, hiring support, code standards, and mentorship for early-stage or under-resourced technical teams.

Shipping & Delivery

Accelerate delivery, fix broken processes, or get a stalled product unstuck. I've shipped across every major platform.

Technical Due Diligence

Honest assessment of codebases, architecture, and engineering teams for investors or acquirers. No spin.

Especially well-suited for game studios, games-adjacent platforms, and technical founders navigating growth or a fundraise.

Get in touch →

PROJECTS

Vibery CURRENT

I'm obsessed with agentic tooling: what becomes possible when AI agents can run autonomously, work your pipelines, and ship real work while you sleep. Vibery is that obsession as a product: an AI OS in the cloud wrapped in a space station game set in 2526. Command your orbital base. Your crew handles the backlog.

Agentic Tooling AI OS Defold Cloud Platform Indie

Visit vibery.gg →

Once Upon a Galaxy

Shipped on Steam, iOS, and Android. As co-founding engineer, built the cross-platform account system (98%+ success rate), IAP across three storefronts, battle pass, and CDN architecture that cut install times by 80%.

Defold Lua FMOD Steam iOS Android

Steam

defold-cloth

Shader-driven 2D cloth simulation for Defold. Capes, flags, banners — real physics, used in shipped games.

Defold Lua Shaders Physics

View on GitHub →

Magic: The Gathering Arena

2nd engineer on prototype through open beta launch to millions of players. Grew from building the core duel scene to Lead Developer managing 7 engineers, then product owner for monetization. Co-designed the Pets system.

Unity C# Wwise Engineering Leadership

Steam

Oooh Developer Platform

Led product for the developer platform, SDK, and creator tools at Oooh, Inc., a social media startup co-founded by Twitch.tv's founders. Scaled the platform to support hundreds of developer partners. Rebuilt the developer portal and documentation from scratch.

Product Management SDK Development Developer Experience Partner Onboarding

Wizards Publishing Platform

Built and led the team delivering accounts, social, and monetization services for Wizards' game portfolio — MTG Arena, Spellslingers, D&D: Dark Alliance. Greenlit Wizards Game Store & Launcher.

Product Management Unity SDK Partner Integrations Developer Tools

République

UI Engineer on an award-winning stealth game. Shipped a cross-platform UI system with localization across 6+ languages. Featured in Unity 5's official showcase.

Unity C# Multi-platform Localization

Steam

CONTACT

Building something interesting? Want to talk consulting, compare notes, or just say hello?

Email charlie.helman@gmail.com GitHub /ChuckMayo LinkedIn /in/charliehelman Vibery vibery.gg