Player Abilities

Curriculum Vitae

Welcome to my portfolio. My name is James, but feel free to call me Jim. I am a level and narrative designer living in the Greater Vancouver Area of British Columbia, Canada. Before games I spent more than 6 years…

Posted on JD

Leading the Player Abilities team

Project:  MythForce Engine:    Unreal Editor 4 Feature:    Player Abilities After unexpected attrition on the design team, I was quickly offered a chance to lead the Player Abilities team towards a critical milestone. This lightweight group made excellent progress in these two…

Narrative treatment for Game Characters

Project:  MythForce Engine:    Unreal Editor 4 Character:   Hawkins, the Ultimate Archer My role in creating Hawkins was to lead the team of three who prototyped, implemented, animated, and added visual polish to his abilities including a transparent shader. I worked with…

Action Verbs for the Ultimate Archer

Project:  MythForce Engine:    Unreal Editor 4 Character:   Hawkins, the Ultimate Archer Teamplay Archetype for Hawkins Ranged Initiator and Escape Expert These three player abilities are the most impactful verbs for Hawkins’ portrayal Design Intentions Hawkins uses strong bow weapon attacks, as…

Class-based upgrade systems

Project:  MythForce Engine:    Unreal Editor 4 Feature:    Player Abilities For each of our twelve abilities, I designed and reached approval on three additional upgrades. These varied in scope, with the original intention that each upgrade must add a differentiator on the…