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design LEADer

Lead Character Gameplay Designer on the Skylanders franchise

LEAD GAMEPLAY DESIGNER ON THE MOBILE TITLE BATTLE STRIKE FORCE

LEAD DESIGNER ON THE unannounced multiplayer action adventure title

About Me

I am a Design Leader with 19 years of industry experience and 10 years in a leadership role. My current passions revolve around building great teams that can make great games and helping designers map out their own progression path through our industry. Some quick highlights from my career:

  • Creator on the $3.5 billion award-winning Skylanders franchise with over 300 million toys sold.

  • Worked on over 60 Skylander characters (35 unique) across the franchise roster while managing our total roster of 150 characters..

  • Leadership experience building teams out, forecasting budgets, developing milestone schedules.

  • Experience working with multiple IP franchises, both in house working with external vendors and working with licensed IP.

  • Innovative content developer on multiple projects, including multiple successfully pitched prototypes.

  • Attention to detail to bring polished AAA and AAAA-budget gaming experiences to millions of players.

  • Veteran in user and focus testing, survey writing and analysis.

  • See my Resume/CV here.

Projects

Click the images to read more details and anecdotes about my work.

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The Importance of Goals

Games need a clear goal. Sometimes this is in the form of a player fantasy. Sometimes it comes from an evocative X-statement. Sometimes this comes from a specific player experience. For Skylanders, the X-statement I brought to the team was “Diablo for Kids.” As leaders, we define a metaphorical box that our teams fill with amazing content. The clearer the box, the better that content will just fit your game. When design or development challenges arise, clear project goals will empower your team to make the decisions that are best for your game.

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Why Me?

I am deeply grateful to have participated on multiple critically acclaimed projects. Our successes were not driven by market research, data analytics, or by trend chasing. They were driven by passionate teams on projects with clear goals, whose collaboration and love of games galvanized into best-in-class experiences. I seek teams that leads with empathy, treats each other with compassion, that openly communicates, and is not afraid of having the hard conversations. I wish to bring my experience these teams and help them find their critical success.

Other Interests

  • Volunteer work as an AIASF Mentor for D.I.C.E. scholars

  • Social Deception games - part of the San Francisco Ultimate Werewolf Community and Moderator Group. 1000+ hours of moderation experience.

  • Games currently playing: Overwatch 2, Deep Rock Galactic, Vampire Survivors, Dave the Diver, The Legend of Zelda: TotK, Marvel SNAP, Warcraft Rumble.

  • Reading: game design books, self development books (Brené Brown, Annie Duke, Daniel Pink, L. David Marquet), fantasy, science fiction, and science fantasy (Brandon Sanderson, Robert Jordan)

  • Dungeons & Dragons, TTRPG, board games & board game design

  • Food and Cooking

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Contact <  > Resume/CV <

 

photo by Avery Wong