America's Army is a AAA-quality FPS title, developed for the US Army as a recruitment and branding tool. In 2008 the Champlain College Emergent Media Center partnered with the developer and created two teams of six, to design multplayer maps for the game. I was chosen to lead one group.

District was released in the fall of 2008, and was downloadable from within the game client.

Level Gameplay:

• Two objectives to capture and hold.
• Small map; firefights are never more than a few seconds away.
• Vulnerable central location encourages circular movement around the map.
• Vulnerable streets encourage players to hug cover and move quickly when moving outside.

I was responsible for:

• Level Documentation.
• Concept design.
• Building portions of the level in Unreal 2.5.
• Project planning, assigning tasks.
• Organizing QA Tests.

Resources and Links:

• District Level Design Document (.pdf)
• America's Army website
• Emergent Media Center Website

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon launched a campaign to end violence against women in 2008. The Emergent Media Center became involved soon after, and began a project that became Empowering Play and it's game, Breakaway.. Breakaway is a soccer game aimed at a world-wide audience of boys between the ages of 10 and 15.

There are three major modes: mini-games, soccer matches, and narrative decision-making, all of which are tightly interwoven within the game system. I was one of two designers on the project during the second half of the pre-production phase; we worked closely as a team to tackle most of the design.

We were responsible for:

• Documentation of the design. The images to the right are excerpts.
• Comunicating the design to a team of 20+.
• Designing the three modes, combining them into a meaningful whole.
• Targeting the design to a world-wide audience, including developing nations.
• Designing and balancing the progression of stats and difficulty.
• Re-designing drastically in response to scoping needs.

Breakaway is an episodic game, with the first episode planned for release during the World Cup in 2010. It is being developed in Flash.

Resources and Links:

• Empowering Play website
• Emergent Media Center Website
• 10 Minute pre-production video
• UNiTE Campaign Website

Vesuvium is a side-scrolling action game set inside lava tunnels. The design goal was to provide a sense of controlled speed, fluid movement, and momentum. The player must feel that their avatar is fast and powerful, and that this momentum is something that they can control and turn to their advantage in a smooth and purposeful way.

A central mechanic of the game is the ability to toggle the lava. There are two states for the lava: one with a central stream and empty space above and below, and another with empty space in the middle and lava on the edges. This mechanic allows a skilled player to manipulate their environment to maintain momentum.

Vesuvium is near the end of pre-production; the material shown is from a prototype. I led a team of three for this first leg of the project.

My work on Vesuvium includes:

• Conceptual development.
• Design of gameplay mechanics and progression.
• Level Design.
• Documentation.
• Project plan and task assignments.
• Secondary engineering.
• Sound design.

Resources and Links:

• Vesuvium Design Document