Both the course and the book are phenomenal. In my opinion they are up there as one of the best CS resources. I finished it two years ago and still think about it fairly often.
The compiler exercise is beyond excellent and cracking it feels like a milestone.
I remember being so excited for Bloodlines because I had no way to play AC2. It was really impressive what you and your team managed to accomplish on a handheld. Now knowing that you built it from the ground up makes it even more amazing.
Can you share more about the experience, the development process, and any other PSP titles you worked on?
The two books that really stayed with me the most this year are Father and Sons by Turgenev and 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez.
Both are classics and fairly well known.
The former is a dive into niihilism and how destructive some of the ideas might be. It has some really impactful imagery.
The latter is a portal to a living world dipped in magical realism that one can get lost in. It is beautifully written and has a neat cyclical nature to it.
The journey ahead will be long but it's totally manageable if you put in the hours. First and foremost the whole situation gave you a glimpse of some of the things that are out there. It may lead you to more interesting and challenging work.
Nowadays the Internet is literally drowned in resources and you may quickly feel overwhelmed by everything. The trick here is to choose only a handful and stick with them for the time being.
Some of my personal favorites for starting out are https://www.freecodecamp.org/ to get your feet wet and up to speed with JS. You will build projects and explore some of the fancier syntax you saw.
You may also want to start building a strong CS foundation at some point. This is going to be really beneficial as you move forward. Arguably one the best (and completely free) resources for starting out is CS50 - https://cs50.harvard.edu/x/2022/.
Also don't follow courses blindly, take notes and try to implement things yourself. Moreover, start tinkering with some projects as soon as possible.
One of the best math teachers on YouTube has to Professor Leonard. He has a lot of different courses and doesn't shy away from details. His way of teaching really worked for me.
If you follow along you will get a solid foundation accompanied by a lot of "aha" moments.