On joining/forming a smaller gamedev team

I'm thinking on either joining a gamedev team, or forming my own.

While I'm a somewhat competent pixel artist, designer, and programmer, I'm still doing everything all while having a full-time and horribly underpaid job (at least sometimes I have a lot of free time to learn Japanese and/or write documentation of my code), not to mention I'm barely passable as a composer.

My main issue is that I don't have any portfolio. I couldn't find a job in my field due to how the job market works in my home country, Hungary.

Since I don't have the budget, the best I could do with my own team is to team up with some other people, and then develop games for the sake of art and all for free, then maybe become a proper studio once we get money and recognition later on. And since I don't have the prestige, nor I believe in auteur theory, I won't be enjoying creative freedom/iron grip.