As a Gameplay Engineer, I worked closely with nearly every discipline. My day to day involved collaboration with Animation, Modeling, Design, Production, Motech Engineering, Systems Engineering and other Gameplay Engineers. The job was very technical but also afforded many opportunities for creativity. My main contributions to the game are as follows.
Worked closely with a small group of engineers on core constraint and posture tech. These systems controlled how Sims know what interactions they can/should do, and how they get themselves to those interactions in the correct state.
Inherited the pickup, putdown, and carry systems and was responsible for maintaining them. Rewrote the putdown system and worked closely with design to add appropriate hooks.
Conceived, designed and implemented a system which intelligently combines interactions behind the scenes as they are queued up so Sims attempt to solve for multiple ordered interactions at once if possible. For example, if a Sim is told to sit in a chair and then told to grab a drink as they route over to the chair, this system allows them to grab the drink on their way instead of them sitting down and then immediately standing back up to go over to the drink.
Owned the Privacy system and worked closely with core systems experts to implement it. The Privacy system allows Sims to force others out of their immediate area before doing any compromising interactions and stops Sims from deciding to interact with objects in inappropriate areas.
Designed and built the Bills/Utilities system and conceived the idea of utility shutoff for delinquent utilities.
Owned the Trash/Cleanup system and worked closely with core systems experts to implement it.
Original implementation and code support for the Cowplant object.
Designed and built the in-game system to support object games (chess, card games, etc) and owned the Chessboard object.
Built and owned the Sim location validation system and worked extensively with the Sim/Object reset and derailment systems.
Worked extensively with the Sim outfit changing system.
Built and owned the gameplay side of the Sim fitness system. Gameplay systems and design hooks for Sims dynamically changing body type as the game progresses.
Inherited, built core tech for and added design hooks for the consumable objects system.
Worked closely with a small number of other core gameplay systems experts to implement pools.
Built the Object Relationship system which allows Sims to build relationships with inanimate objects.
Built, maintained and added design hooks for the gameplay side of the Censor Grid system.
Zineth
Collaboration
Made during the Spring semester of 2012 using Unity3D. Won Best Student Game in the 2012 Student IGF.
I worked on Zineth as a programmer and designer in a team of 6 other students over the course of the Spring semester of 2012. My main programming responsibilities on the project included the camera, rail grinding system, time rewind mechanic, character animation hookup, music and sfx integration, hawk/hawk zones, and cactus system.
Cat Show
Solo
Made in one week for a class in the Spring semester of 2012.
You've disguised yourself as a cat in order to sneak into a cat talent competition and win the cash prize.
meow ~ ♪
Yamada Box Legend
Collaboration
Made during the Spring semester of 2011 using Unity3D. Won 2nd place in the 2011 RPI Gamefest.
Made by a team of 6 students. We had 3 programmers and 3 artists.
Yamada Box Legend is a game about boxes. Boxes have entire worlds inside of them and you can climb in and out to see 'em. What you do on the inside impacts the outside, and you can use this to solve lil' puzzles.
The game is content-driven rather than system-driven, and so I contributed to a lot of different things over the course of the project. Some of my larger contributions were the conversation system, the box management system, the dice system, the circus level, and the ending sequence.
Spikes Tend to Kill You 1 & 2
Solo Projects
Made in 2010/2011 in AS3. Sponsored by Bubblebox.com
I'm a huge fan of challenging platformers, so I decided to make my own. The games are simple, but I'm proud of them and they were pretty well received. After the first game was released, Bubblebox commissioned the development of and sponsored its sequel.
