Tasks:
Worked together with the team to put out a game in 10 months from prototype to gold.
Responsible for creating maps from paper design to block out to polish. Created the maps Biggie's Kitchen, Deep Freeze, and Nugget Shaft owning these maps from start to finish, while also polishing the map Flavor Factory. Other tasks included were scripting events for the maps as well as integrating effects, and working with the art team to better implement assets through animations, sequencer, or blueprint.
Early in development I worked on the design of the weapons and skills for the various classes and balancing them out for prototype play.
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The idea for the map Biggie's Kitchen was to create an easy to understand map centralized around the concept of our doors. I drew much of the inspiration for this map design from mazes created for lab mice and playground jungle gyms.
The buildings were laid out in a manner where the big alien could perch atop buildings and get the drop on players. I felt this gave the big alien a sense of superiority and heightened the players feeling of being a big bad monster.
For the mercenary players I wanted them to be able to weave in and out of buildings and utilize the doors to troll other players or block the aliens progress. I did this by utilizing our design language in game. The design is that flat top windows and door ways were meant for human access, and rounded arched windows and doorways were accessible for both human and alien. This proved to be fruitful in creating great tom and jerry style chases.
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Deep Freeze was our level with an emphasis on soft cover and fog. We wanted to emphasis the use of a conditional fog in the level to allow players to hide from the aliens. In the center of the map we have fog emitters in place that barely hide a crouching player. In the bottom of the map we created a fog room that vented fog and gas at periodic intervals creating a near zero visibility area for a period of time. Players would frequently use these areas to juke the large alien or wait in ambush to hit another player leading to exciting moments in game.
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Nugget shaft was created from our love of man pads and accelerators. Positioned throughout the level are man pads to send the player flying to heights normally unreachable. I heavily emphasized the verticality here so that both sides could access both highs and lows of the map. This brought together an interesting layer of game play as the alien and players would attempt to kill or dodge one another in air. I also modified a man pad to act as an accelerator in this map moving the player quickly from one location to another location as a one way transport. The accelerator brought a whole new level of fun into the game. Players had the choice to take the accelerator or push other players into it to escape from dangerous situations. It also was a transport mechanic that was capable of taking players from the top of the map to the bottom very quickly.
