Meet the Team Monday

Ryan Canuel, CEO

This week I got to interview our CEO and co-founder, Ryan Canuel!

Question #1) What do you do at Petricore?

Technically, I’m the co-founder and CEO of Petricore. My day-to-day is always different (which I like): sales, project management, I used to take out the trash at the old office but I don’t have to do that anymore at our new one. I went to a lot of Networking events too when there wasn’t a pandemic.

Question #2) Where are you from, and where did you go to school?

Art from Mind the Arrow

I’m from Swansea Massachusetts, and I went to Becker College to study game design with a focus in art originally. I did all the original UI for Mind the Arrow and sometimes for museum exhibits I do the wireframes, but I don’t flex my art degree very much. My life drawing I was pretty decent at, so if I had wanted a career drawing naked people I could have done that but I probably wouldn’t have made much money.

Question #3) What do you like to do outside work?

I like to play games (obviously), I watch a lot of TV and movies, and listen to a lot of music. I also love to go on hikes in the woods around Massachusetts. I like to garden as well. This year was a lazy garden, with tomatoes, herbs and flowers mostly. Sunflowers. I tried to grow carrots but they all died.

Question #4) What’s a fond memory you have from the first year of Petricore?

My happiest memory from Petricore was when we had first signed our client project and the first check came for the company. I was on my way to deposit it and I ran into Monty, my mentor who had advised me to start Petricore. I think I said “Look, money!” Going into Bank of America as a 21 year old with a check for 15,000 felt pretty good. 

Question #5) If you didn’t work in games or any kind of software anymore, what would you do instead?

I would probably follow my dreams and, this isn’t realistic, but I would want to go make a horror movie. I’m a big fan of the horror genre. 

Artist depiction of Ryan’s thumb

Question #6) What’s a hidden talent of yours that people might not know about?

Well, I know a lot about plants, I can keep plants alive pretty well.

Question #7) As the CEO of Petricore you use many productivity apps to keep us all organized, if those apps were people, what would they be like (personalities, names, anything that comes to mind)?

Google Calendar is one of my favorites, I think Google Calendar would be a really uptight, type-A kind of person. They would be very aware of the time, no meetings would run over. Not someone you’d want to hang out with at a party but probably good to work with.

I use Pipedrive to keep track of all of our sales. Pipedrive would be very money-obsessed. They would be the kind of person who would spend a ton at a restaurant and then want to split the bill equally. 

Gusto we use for HR (which is wonderful), Gusto is fun! Gusto would be the friend who’s always doing new fun things, and knows a bunch of strange facts.

Question #8) What are some of your favorite games?

I love the Mass Effect series, the Dragon Age series, Civilization and all those games. I get pretty much every game from Nintendo (especially Mario games). 

Question #9) Did any of those games influence you in wanting to become a game developer?

Art from Dragon Age

I’d always liked games but once I played Dragon Age I saw that it was like a movie that you could control. I was always interested in film and theater all through highschool. Then when I played games I realized that this is the next level of that. Games were like movies, but you can influence what happens. 

What led me to start Petricore was Monty giving the advice that now is the perfect time to do it. I didn’t know what I was doing, but I had so little to lose – so I might as well try.

Question #10) Someone notifies you that you will be having 3 life sized wax statues installed in your home, but you get to choose who they depict. What do you choose?

I think about this all the time (he said, politely). As a conversation piece it would be pretty cool to have Neil Young. (long pause) I’ll also take Homer Simpson and President Dwight David Eisenhower.

Question #11) What’s a favorite saying of yours?

There’s one I heard recently on the top of my mind – “you should always remember that every dead body that’s on Mount Everest once belonged to a highly motivated person.” It’s dark, but I like it because a lot of people get really caught up in that aspect of being successful, but it takes a lot more than motivation to be successful.

Question #12) Someone is introducing you at a prestigious game development event 25 years from now. How do they describe you, and what you’ve accomplished in your career?

My hope would be that they describe me as someone who ran a successful company, and somewhere that a large number of people, current or former employees, can say that they’ve been happy and proud of working there.