Gods and Heroes: Rome Rising

Lead Level Designer - Massively Multiplayer Online Game (PC)

My title on Gods and Heroes is Lead Level Designer, but my actual day-to-day tasks go far beyond. The core of my day consists of leading the level design team towards a consistent and entertaining game space. From there my duties have expanded to include many other activities that go above and beyond being a Lead Level Designer. For example, over the course of the project I have been an influential decision maker for the entire area team (design, art, story). On any given day I can be found doing the following:

• Design - Driving high-level decisions, setting standards, as well as writing documents and proposals

• Leadership - Mentoring many employees on art, design and the game industry, in addition to planning and guiding individual growth

• Environment Art - Adjusting terrain, defining texture usage, including the micro-level of individual tree design and placement

• Object Art - Advising on concept art usage and object creation

• Quest/Story - Iterating on story flow through the world

• Scripting - Working to resolve edge cases

• Effects - Directing creation and usage within the game

I began my time at Perpetual as a level designer, but quickly took on the role of lead, so an official promotion was thankfully the next step. I finished my transition to full lead while maintaining a solid grasp on the skills, tools and processes needed to build sucessful levels in a complex MMO world. After settling into my new role, I eventually grew into the de facto World Lead. I am happy to say that the area team has always been on time, delivering beautiful levels, producing thoughtful gameplay and compelling quests; this consistent delivery has led us to be the most successful sub-team on GnH.

Accomplishments

• Completed work on entire shipping game space months before ship

• Developed standards for discussing area layout, quests and gameplay

• Designed successful methods for building instanced gameplay

• Developed template area design document

• Designed line item sheets to define level completeness

• Designed modular interior tile sets

• Led design team on the player starting experience

• Ran multiple successful full world space iteration teams

• Developed set-decoration team

• Built team cohesion

• Breed a healthy and exciting atmosphere to work in

Game Images

Gallery